Issue link: https://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/1472963
16 I ICT TODAY A WELL-COORDINATED TEAM OF EXPERIENCED PERSONNEL LED TO SUCCESSFUL , ON-TIME DELIVERY The challenge was set to deploy 110 AV stands to NTU teaching spaces in multiple buildings on three Nottingham city campuses by the start of the fall term in September. COVID-19 restrictions were still in place. Orders requiring expedited delivery were placed with all manufacturers, with only a 4-week period for manufac- turing, delivery, integration, testing, and commissioning. Considering manufacturing and logistics lead times, the team planned for a 2-week window for final inte- gration on-site. The integration contractor and NTU's IT and AV departments collaborated to streamline the work. The team was organized into three groups with assigned responsibilities: • Group 1 – Planning, scheduling, material acquisition • Group 2 – Kitting, AV over IP encoder-decoder endpoint configuration, stand integration • Group 3 – Room-by-room delivery, placement, commissioning, final testing, turnover FIGURE 11: One of NTU's classrooms with desks socially distanced for COVID-19. Three AV stands in this room allow everyone to see the lesson material. Two secondary AV stands are located in the foreground and the background. They receive AV lesson material from a primary AV stand located in the middle. Photo courtesy of Nottingham Trent University. leave the assembly task to go hunting for parts. In this case, all components for each AV stand were arranged onto easily moved pallets, one pallet per AV stand. Next, Group 2 performed configuration/pairing of the AV over IP encoders and decoders in each kit to prepare them for network communication. Finally, Group 2 installed and cabled all the kitted components into the stand enclo- sures. This entire process involved assembling 41 primary AV stands and 69 secondary AV stands utilizing an aggregate of just over 700 individual components. Groups 1 and 3 planned and carried out a phased room-by-room deployment in which the stands were positioned, connected to the AC mains and network drop wall receptacles, turned on, and verified to be operating as intended on the NTU enterprise network with high-quality audio and video transmission and display (Figure 11). Group 1 coordinated with NTU's facilities department to complete building construction and remodeling projects prior to AV stand move-in and also to set up a dedicated onsite AV stand planning, material storage, integration, and staging area. Group 1 conducted daily schedule review and update meetings with all stakeholders to ensure the project stayed on track. Group 2 performed AV stand assembly. This task began with kitting the components for each AV stand to facilitate efficient assembly. Kitting is a manufacturing technique of gathering and organizing parts used in manufac- turing a product into bundles that are delivered to the point of use so that assembly personnel do not have to Each stand was cleaned from top to bottom while all packaging and other waste materials were collected and removed for disposal and recycling in accordance with ISO140001:2015 environmental management requirements.