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Learn to Simul8
New to Simul8?
First of all, welcome!
We're delighted to have you on board and we can't wait to hear about how you're changing the way people make decisions in your organization with Simul8.
Below you'll find a range of top tips for getting started with Simul8, provided by our excellent in-house expert consultants who have worked on 1000s of projects over the years.
Where to start?
To get up and running with Simul8 we recommend you check out these resources. We have a wide range of online support resources, however, if you'd rather speak to us or jump on a call with us, we'd love to help you. Just drop us an email at support@simul8.com.
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Simul8 Academy
Learn the essentials of Simul8 at your own pace online with video-based training modules delivered by our simulation experts.
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Simul8 101 e-book
We've leaned on our decades of experience in simulations projects and created an handy guide for you to get started with Simul8.
Read the e-book -
A guide to the technique
There's more to simulation than just building your simulation and analyzing the results. Read through our tips for understanding your simulation and validating your results.
Read the guide
Documentation
Popular support articles
Find answers to common support questions.
Learn to Simul8
Simul8 Drop-in Sessions
Learn more about Simul8 and its applications by joining our free weekly drop-in sessions! Delivered by our in-house simulation experts, you'll learn about a range of topics - from in-depth feature tours, to some complex modeling scenarios.
View the scheduleBuilding your first simulation and managing a simulation project
Managing a simulation project is much like managing any improvement project. Here are some tips from our Simulation Excellence team to help get you started:
- First create a baseline simulation. To test what impact your changes will have, you need to first be confident that the baseline simulation is reflective of your real-world simulation.
- Build your simulation in an iterative way, validating and verifying as you go.
- Define what this simulation will answer and be clear what is in scope and what is not. This helps to set expectations and avoid scope creep.
- Simulation does not need to be a big undertaking, only add detail if it is relevant and has an impact on the outcome you are measuring.
- If it is a big project, think modular. Simul8 has many collaboration tools to help make this easier – get in touch to find out more.
- In a team project, specify clear roles – who will gather data, who will be the main simulation builder, who are your stakeholders?
A final piece of advice is to remember the value of what you are simulating. How much revenue be generated by the extra units produced? What difference will it make to the happiness of your staff if their utilization rates are planned well? How many lives could be saved by implementing this new process correctly? This will help to guide your thinking and arrive at the optimal outcome.
Our Simul8 consultants follow a 5-step process when developing customer simulations. The process is designed to ensure a quality result in the shortest amount of time.
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Agree initial specification
Create a preliminary simulation and test and refine through a workshop. Agree improvement scenarios and test data availability.
Baseline simulation and validation
Populate your simulation and test results against current data.
Refine simulation and test scenarios
Further development of your simulation. Run, test and analyze results.
Present to stakeholder workshop
Gather your stakeholders and present your simulation, gathering any feedback for future development.
Handover: training and user guide
Give the power to your stakeholders and ensure they have the resources to make your simulation project a success.
From the Blog
Simul8 Tips
Read hints and tips from our in-house simulation experts to get the most out of Simul8.
Conveyors
Using conveyors in your simulations
Control
Stopping arrivals from entering a simulation during specific time intervals
Animation
Animate your simulations to engage your stakeholders
Integrations
Visualizing time-series results as calendar heatmaps with R Integration
Control
Using the Start Point Schedule with Labels
The Simulation Maturity Framework
The Simulation Maturity Framework has six levels. There is a journey towards being able to run progressively more sophisticated simulations by advancing through each level. With each development, reward comes with improved ROI on every decision that has been simulated, which unlocks increasing value for your organization.
We have mapped out the different ways our customers use simulation to improve their decision making. You can use this as a guide to understand where is your organization currently sitting in our framework and what are the next steps to harness the power of simulation.
6. Cognitive Self Learning Simulations
Maximize my process performance for me
5. Continuous Assessment & Auto Tuning Performance
What don’t I know? What is the optimal corrective action I can take?
4. Real Time Simulation Decision Making
What should I do next?
3. Prescriptive Reusable Simulations
What is the optimal action to take?
2. Embedded Predictive Modeling & Optimization
Have you simulated it?
1. Predictive Modeling & Optimization
What is happening, why? What will happen? What is the optimal solution to select?
A lot of new users will start at level 1 – building a one-off simulation to test or prove a specific idea. Maybe you need to prove to stakeholders that the capital investment in a new machine, or building a new ward will provide the benefits that have been assumed.
What if your organization started to make simulation a key part of all investment or decision making? Or you have a specialist person or team to build simulations that answer the ‘what-if’ questions? You would be into level 2.
At the other end of the scale, we have some groundbreaking, game-changing applications. Level 5 and 6 would see simulations that are not only a live digital twin of your real-world environment but are able to play forward the outcomes of different decisions. They can predict less optimal outcomes or crises before they happen and suggest ways to avoid them. We are even aware of some companies really pushing the boundaries and having the simulation make live changes in their systems based on the predictions!
To find out more or discuss how you can move up the framework and get more out of Simul8, get in touch with your account manager or send a message to Support@Simul8.com
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What next?
Join the Simul8 Leading Edge team
Your input shapes Simul8 - that's why we're inviting you to become part our Leading Edge team, designed for users to not only get a sneak peek of our latest products and improvements, but test them before release!
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