MSG Team's other articles

8901 Designing and Developing Decision Support Systems

The business intelligence tools or decision support systems aid decision making in an organization. An effective DSS provides you with unbiased data analysis, real time monitoring and rich reporting, supporting you make an informed decision in the least possible time span. A meticulously designed DSS makes use of analytical models, various statistical and econometric tools […]

13040 A Brief on Customs Brokerage

International trade is regulated through tariffs and trade laws established by the Country’s Federal Governments to control the imports and exports of the country. The Government invests executive powers to the Customs Departments, headed by Custom’s Commissioners to administer the policies and tariffs on all imports and exports into and out of the country. Customs […]

11920 Where Does the United States Go From Here and the Impact on Business and Economy?

How the Events of Mayhem on Capitol Hill Shocked Americans and the World as Well As the world watched in horror at the images of mayhem and destruction that were underway in the United States, many were left wondering as to what has become of the World’s Oldest Democracy and a Beacon for Liberty and […]

11935 Why are Wages Not Rising in America?

Most Americans earn their income in the form of wages rather than in the form of investment income from shares, bonds or real estate. It is therefore important for the people of America that the wages keep increasing in proportion to productivity. However, this has not been the case. The average American worker has stagnant […]

9577 How Chinese Corporations Are Going Global?

China has seen rapid development in the past two or three decades. It has become the export powerhouse of the world. However, Chinese companies were always considered to be the cheap imitators. Chinese companies were earlier contractors for American and European countries who provided cheap labor to assemble their high tech products. However, this has […]

Search with tags

  • No tags available.

Control is all around us. We control the household appliances, the time schedules we follow and such mundane tasks of our everyday lives. We are intuitively aware of these principles. However putting these principles down explicitly helps us develop a formal understanding which we can then use in creating a control plan for our process.

Since control is so widely used in our day to day lives, one of the best way to understand control would be to take an example. A simple example of an air-conditioner with a thermostat would help us understand the principles.

Example: Air-Conditioner with a Thermostat

Suppose you have an air-conditioner at home and you want to set the temperature to 22 degrees Celsius, how do you do it? Well, you simply use the remote to enter the desired temperature into the machine which then ensures that the temperature in the room is approximately the one you had desired. Here is what actually happens behind the scene.

The air-conditioner has a thermostat inbuilt. The thermostat is the equipment which continuously monitors the temperature of the room outside. This provides the air-conditioner with the feedback information it needs.

Let’s suppose that the temperature in the room is 30 degrees Celsius when you switch on the air conditioner and program 22 degrees Celsius as your desired temperature.

The air-conditioner uses a simple algorithm to understand that tells it that since 30 degrees is greater than 22 degrees (the desired temperature), a corrective action must be taken.

The air-conditioner then keeps on cooling the room, until the thermostat tells the air-conditioner that the temperature has reached 22 degrees i.e. the desired temperature. Here the air-conditioner stops cooling.

Once again as the temperature starts increasing and goes beyond a certain level, lets say 24 degrees Celsius, the corrective action is set in and the temperature is brought back to the level where it should be. Hence the thermostat can automatically control the temperature.

The Principles Deciphered from the Example:

The formal principles of what is called feedback based control in statistical language have been pinned down in the example. They are as follows:

  • Desired State of Affairs: To control a process, the desired state of affairs must be explicitly known and programmed into the control mechanism. In our example the air-conditioner knew that the desired temperature was 22 degrees Celsius and could compare whether the actual state were as desired or not.

  • Limits: It is impossible for any process to function in a straight line. Therefore control limits were built in. Temperature within the range of 20 to 24 degrees would be considered as being the desired state of affairs.

  • Feedback Mechanism: The thermostat acted as the feedback mechanism, continuously monitoring the feedback. This feedback was compared with what the desired state of affairs on a real time basis.

  • Corrective Action Plan: As soon as it was realised that the actual state of affairs did not correspond to the desired state of affairs, corrective action plan was immediately triggered.

This is exactly how a process is controlled. The output levels (Y’s) are continuously measured and so are the levels of critical inputs (X’s). As soon as a discrepancy is located, corrective action must take place.

Article Written by

MSG Team

An insightful writer passionate about sharing expertise, trends, and tips, dedicated to inspiring and informing readers through engaging and thoughtful content.

Leave a reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Related Articles

Conducting the Knowledge Transfer

MSG Team

Closing a Six Sigma Project

MSG Team

Step 3B: Choosing the Correct Control Chart (Continuous Data)

MSG Team