Overall Warehouse Effectiveness (OWE): A New Integrated Performance Indicator for Warehouse Operations

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report (Previous Reviewer 1)

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The authors corrected the original version of the manuscript and shifted the focus from logistics efficiency to warehouse efficiency assessment. An undisputed advantage of the proposed indicator is its simplicity and ease of application in business practice.

I have only one minor suggestion to improve the manuscript to better meet academic standards. It is common for authors to show the advantages of their new results over previous results obtained by other researchers in the Discussion section. In your case, there is a discussion only of the results obtained, without analyzing the merits compared to the known ones.

I suggest supplementing the Discussion section with a clear comparative analysis of the results obtained in comparison with previous results.

Author Response

Comment: The authors corrected the original version of the manuscript and shifted the focus from logistics efficiency to warehouse efficiency assessment. An undisputed advantage of the proposed indicator is its simplicity and ease of application in business practice.

I have only one minor suggestion to improve the manuscript to better meet academic standards. It is common for authors to show the advantages of their new results over previous results obtained by other researchers in the Discussion section. In your case, there is a discussion only of the results obtained, without analyzing the merits compared to the known ones.

I suggest supplementing the Discussion section with a clear comparative analysis of the results obtained in comparison with previous results.

Answer: Thank you for pointing this out. We have integrated the discussion section with references to previous literature and how our results compare to those references.

 

Reviewer 2 Report (Previous Reviewer 2)

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The article has substantially improved and can be considered for further acceptance provided very few, easy to comply improvements:

1. The figures are difficult to discern and their quality should be improved;

2. Chapters 2 and 3 explore three levels of indentation, which turns the reading difficult and truncated. Please try to reorganize the text to merge subsections and remain at two, not three levels;

3. The last chapter is sensible poorer than the entire study. It should be rewritten to explore not only the limitations but also the avenues for further research that the study opens.

In a general sense, the process of correcting the article was well-succeeded, and now the article has a good amount of technical content that can be useful to other researchers.

 

Author Response

The article has substantially improved and can be considered for further acceptance provided very few, easy to comply improvements:

Comment 1: The figures are difficult to discern and their quality should be improved;

Answer: Most figures are taken from Excel files and in our opinion, they are readable even when exported to a PDF version of the manuscript. However, we noted that the coloring of figures 6 and 10 did not help the reader discern the difference between output and valuable output. Hence, we changed the coloring and modified the two figures accordingly.

Comment 2: Chapters 2 and 3 explore three levels of indentation, which turns the reading difficult and truncated. Please try to reorganize the text to merge subsections and remain at two, not three levels;

Answer: We have formatted the manuscript according to the reviewer’s suggestion.

Comment 3: The last chapter is sensible poorer than the entire study. It should be rewritten to explore not only the limitations but also the avenues for further research that the study opens.

Answer: We have integrated the Conclusion section with the following paragraph:

“Several other avenues for research are engendered by this work. First, the OWE could be extended within the context of warehouse performance measurement to more dynamic resources including labor and material handling equipment (e.g. forklift, conveyor belts, etc.). This would also support the evaluation of warehouses in the realm of Industry 5.0 which advocates for a collaborative environment between human resources and robotic equipment. The OWE may also be integrated with further performance indicators be-longing to production areas, aiming at comprehensively analyze a production and lo-gistics system. Finally, OWE’s potential for integration into real-time decision-making systems, such as digital twins, can further enhance this line of research.”

Comment 4: In a general sense, the process of correcting the article was well-succeeded, and now the article has a good amount of technical content that can be useful to other researchers.

Answer: Thank you indeed for your assessment of our work.

This manuscript is a resubmission of an earlier submission. The following is a list of the peer review reports and author responses from that submission.

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The authors presented the results of a study on the possibility of using the industry-known OEE (Overall Equipment Effectiveness) meter to assess the efficiency of warehouses. By analogy with other researchers, the authors supplement this simple measure with some warehouse-specific indicators and propose to use it to assess the efficiency of the entire logistics.

I have serious concerns about the possibility of using the proposed measure, Overall Logistics Effectiveness (OLE), as a KPI for the entire logistics process. I do not recommend the manuscript for publication as submitted. However, I do have several recommendations to improve the manuscript.

1. The authors assume the dominant role of warehouses in the logistics process and supply chains. The result of this assumption is an attempt to transfer the local performance of one participant to the entire logistics process. However, the efficiency of logistics depends on the efficiency of interaction between all participants in the process on the coordinated advancement of logistics flows. The determining role of a participant is determined, at least, by its costs for the promotion of flows. The capital and operating expenses of, for example, rail transportation far exceed the warehousing costs. Therefore, rail transport operators are never guided by warehouses' desires for frequent delivery of goods in small shipments to reduce warehouse costs and insurance inventories. Thus, I suggest that instead of the term Overall Logistics Effectiveness (OLE), using Overall Warehouse Efficiency (Warehouse Logistics Efficiency). Especially since the authors themselves use the term Overall Efficiency of the Warehouse in the text of the manuscript.

2. Unfortunately, the problem of the manuscript lies not only in the name of the proposed indicator, but also in its use for management decision-making. Orientation of the whole logistics to the performance indicators of warehouses will lead to a decrease in the efficiency of the entire supply chain. Management of a complex logistics process requires consideration of the interests of all its participants. To assess the efficiency and make decisions on the management of logistics flows, it is necessary to use more complex models that consider the influence of many external and internal factors. I propose to limit the conclusions to recommendations concerning only the internal environment of warehouses and not to consider indicators that depend on the functioning of transportation, suppliers, and consumers. Otherwise, the authors should consider the performance indicators of these participants of the logistics process.

3. The case study is model-based and provides weak evidence for the viability of the proposed KPI. I propose to present the results of the case study at a real facility. In addition, I propose to show the management decisions taken based on the proposed KPI, as well as an assessment of the effectiveness of their implementation at a real facility.

Formal remark.

4. The paragraph in lines 575-577 is duplicated in lines 578-580.

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The article is skillfully crafted and does not contain any significant issues that would impede its approval. However, there are some concerns that need to be resolved before it can be accepted..

When citing sources, it's preferable to provide specific references instead of grouping them together, such as using [1,2]. This approach allows readers to independently verify and cross-reference the cited findings.

In section 2, please consider that not all applications of OEE take into account time but the net production volume. In such cases, it is not the time that counts but the amount of production. For instance, equation 2 is performance = total amount of production/ nominal capacity, and equation 3 is quality = total of parts approved/ total of parts produced. I believe you should report such a difference by introducing both sets of equations.

Please correct the reference in line 127.

Table 1 should also present the equations, not only the definitions. It would be a valuable snapshot for other researchers.

The same is true for Table 2.

Please always employ the separator comma for numbers greater than 999.

Is Figure 8 correct? It seems overwhelming.

Please remove the internal title from figures retrieved from Excel, as it is redundant in relation to the captions.

The implications are very good. Congrats.

The last section could be a little bit more developed; please provide it.

Best regards