Operations management
1. One of the improvement initiatives that helped to win the Sunderland plant a new model was a four-year programme. It started eight years before the new model was due to start production. Why do you think it takes eight years for initiatives like this to come to fruition?
Definition
Operations management focuses on carefully managing the processes to produce and distribute products and services to its users. A great deal of focus is on efficiency and effectiveness of processes. Therefore, operations management often includes substantial measurement and analysis of internal processes, for example, retail, manufacturing, & whole sale.etc.
Background
One may generally consider that there are three distinct
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Nissan Sunderland plant has achieved spectacular results in productivity and efficiency, and therefore has developed a very strong reputation which does not happen overnight.
There are numerous business improvement initiatives that can be used by organisations to continually improve quality, productivity and sustainability towards achieving excellence. The initiatives can be approaches, systems, tools and/or techniques such as TQM, JIT, Lean Kaizen. Many organisations try to implement these initiatives to try and cure all organisation problems. In reality, however, none of the individual initiatives can solve all problems effectively in the organisation. Each initiative has a role to play towards achieving business excellence.
Managing change among employees
Some initiatives are more affective under certain situations (Ricondo & Viles, 2005). However attempting to apply any initiative in isolation will only provide short term benefits (Dale & McOutor 1998, Dale 2007, icondo & Viles 2005). It is also believed that the attitude of people is key to business improvement initiatives. This determines how long an organisation or operation will take to change and adapt to new initiatives. If companies are to improve their business performance and productivity, they need to look very closely at the attitude of their employees.
Employee Training
There is poor attitude existing among the workforce then any
Operations management refers to all levels of an organisation and how best to efficiently convene, fund, maintain and maximise its services and/or operations, both internal and external. The core goal/objective of operations management it to maximise outputs while reducing and minimising the inputs required to achieve the desired results.
Overview: The Toyota Production System has long been hailed and admired as the source of Toyota’s outstanding performance as a manufacturer. TPS aims to eliminate waste, reduce defects and maximize flow. TPS aims to increase efficiency and productivity by employing a unique production system that cuts costs through continuous improvement. Long term goal is to yield sharp reductions in product development and manufacturing lead times. Toyota want to be the industry best and they stand behind their culture to share the wealth of how they do it.
Shop owners should gather information based on developing a strategic approach to business improvement. Information about total quality management (TQM) should be gathered to help Midas with continuous process improvements for addressing business at every level within the organization (Majed & Zairi, 1999). TQM implementation will define services, products, and customers; specify customer’s satisfaction; chart work steps that needs to be completed; identify key measures of processes; eliminate mistakes and activities that does not add value; in addition to continuing analysis, measurement, and process control (Majed & Zairi, 1999). The shop owners input should also include achieving ways to improve the quality of services to customers; reduce cost and time process; promote continuous improvement; optimize accomplishments to add value to customers; create an atmosphere of high morale and employee satisfaction; as well as provide an improvement efforts strategy for employees (Majed & Zairi, 1999).
Per Satterlee, chapter eight of Organization Management and Leadership, is about operations management, which is how products or services are provided in the most efficient and effective way. “Operations management is the implementation of all the functions of management,” (Satterlee, p. 224). This includes where infrastructure may be built, where supplies and materials are obtained, production is scheduled, inventory is managed, and equipment is maintained.
According to Investopedia ULC (2012), " Operations management is concerned with converting materials and labor into goods and services as efficiently as
The purpose of this project was to gain experience in quality improvement by working with an organization to identify a business problem, analyze the causes, develop an improvement plan, implement changes, and to verify the effectiveness of the solutions. For this project we had to keep scope in mind. This project had to follow certain criteria, such as: that it is a manageable project with a local organization, it can be completed within the time frame of the course, it has a direct impact on external customers, it is relatively simple, and that it is not something that is currently undergoing major changes.
Operations Management focuses on the design and management of products, processes, services and supply chains (Diemond, 2014). It considers the acquisition, development, and utilization of resources that firms need to deliver the goods and services their clients want (Diemond 2014). Operations Management consists of many topics which are applied on a daily basis at the company I work for. Some of the topics include process control, lean manufacturing, six sigma, and supply chain management. It is the process that controls how inputs (raw materials, labor, and energy) get converted into outputs (finished goods or services).
Positive or negative, change can be challenging to manage because employees need to be on board and be obliged to make necessary changes as well as adjust his or her work habits. When implementing change, a manager may run into numerous obstacles from resistance from the staff to morale issues. This is primarily caused by a lack of understanding by the employees and a fear of how the change will affect him or her directly. Implementing change within an organization can be extremely difficult without a manager who understands d his or her role and responsibilities. This could be the deciding factor of whether or not the
James, T. (2011) defines Operations Management as the management of the processes which aid production of goods and or services. This implies that all production activities must be coordinated well to ensure a lean process of resource management is adopted.
Operations Management in an organisation is repsonsible for managing and in making decisions concerning the activities that convert inputs into outputs , that is goods and services. This covers both short term actvities as well as longer term activities to meet strategic goals. Inputs can be the raw materaials need to manufacture goods such as furniture or the computers needed to create a service like online shopping site. Operation management’s role is to make decisions to improve how operation activities function, for example, to improve the final quality of the output or to change production methods to be more efficient in terms of cost and in time.
Operations Management explores the way organizations produce and distribute goods and services. Everything you wear, eat, sit on, use or read comes to you courtesy of the
After the 2011 Earthquake and Tsunami that hit Japan, Nissan was able to recover faster than other leading automobile manufactures, such as Toyota and Honda. Nissan was able to recover so quickly because the company had a crisis plan already in place, which involved international connections, relationships and deals with suppliers. In this essay, Nissan’s operation management functions will be discussed, in addition to the critical path method (CPM) and the program evaluation and review technique (PERT) and how these methods can be fused with the company’s project management.
Operations management focuses on managing the processes of producing and distributing products and services. Operations activities often include product creation, development, production and distribution. It deals with all operations within the organization. Related activities include managing purchases, inventory control, quality control, storage, logistics and evaluations. The nature of how operations management is carried out in an organization depends very much on the nature of products or services in the organization, for example, retail, manufacturing, wholesale, etc.
This paper discusses the strategies alignment which was used by Carlos to bring Nissan Corporation to profitability after suffering a big loss for a number of years. It also analyses the 7s models (Structure, System, Style, Staff, Skills, Strategy, Shared Values) which Carlos implemented to achieve its objectives and action plan which was used by Carlos Ghosn to successful turn around the management of Nissan Company to a profitability. It also analyzes the challenges which he underwent during the execution of his strategies such as cultural gap, resources, multi task management, change in spontaneous and operation concern.
Operations management is generally described as the planning, arrangement, and control of activities that change raw materials or an organization's input into finished products and services. The overall activities covered by operations management include the creation, development, manufacture, and distribution of products. The concept also relates to various activities such as inventory control, controlling purchases, quality control, logistics, storage, and evaluation ("Operations Management in McDonalds", n.d.). Since operations management covers the entire operations in an organization, it mainly focuses on the efficiency and effectiveness of the firm's processes.