Identifying significant factors affecting Request For Information (RFI) process time

The research is to illustrate how to identify the significant factor(s) affecting the request for information (RFI) process cycle time in the context of queueing behavior. Among three different factors involved in the general queueing model (i.e. variability factor, utilization factor, and average process time), the variability factor was selected and investigated to see how variations affect the process cycle time under different conditions along with the batching effect. In order to determine the levels of factors, a set of RFI data was statistically analyzed. Based on the selected factors with levels determined, different scenarios were developed and simulation study was conducted so as to see how the system performs differently. Then, results of simulation were analyzed using the DOE in order to identify the most significant factor(s) which affects the current process cycle time.