Chapter 1 Operations and productivity
1. Why should one study operations management?
We study OM for four reasons. We study how people organize themselves for productive enterprise. We study OM because we want to know how goods and services are produced. We study OM to understand what operations managers do. We study OM because it is such a costly part of an organization.
Productivity can be measured in a variety of ways, such as by labor, capital, energy, material usage, and so on. At Modern Lumber, Inc., Art Binley, president and producer of apple crates sold to growers, has been able, with his current equipment, to produce 240 crates per 100 logs. He currently purchases 100 logs per day, and each log requires 3 labor-hours to
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2. Describe how an organization’s mission and strategy have different purposes. Mission is the purpose or rationale for an organizations existence. Mission statements provide boundaries and focus for organizations and the concept around which can rally. Strategy is how an organization expects to achieve its missions and goals. Mission statements tell an organization where it is going. The strategy tells the organization how to get there.
Chapter 3 Project Management
1. Give an example of a situation in which project management is needed.
The book gives examples such as Bechtel, Microsoft and Hard Rock in the need of project management. Project management came into play when Bechtel entered Iraq in 2003 had to quickly mobilize an international force of manual workers, construction professionals, cooks, medical personnel, and security forces. Microsoft Corporation biggest, most complex and important program Windows Vista needed a project manager. Hard Rock Cafe sponsors Rockfest, hosting 100,000 plus fans at its annual concert; the project manager begins planning some 9 months earlier.
2. What are the three phases involved in the management of a large project?
The three phases are planning, scheduling and controlling. Planning includes goal setting, defining the project, and team organization. Scheduling this phase relates people, money and supplies to specific activities and relates activities to each other.
The Mission Statement is a vital component in the strategic planning of a business organization. Creating a mission is one of the first actions an organization should take. This can be a building block for an overall strategy and development of more specific functional strategies (Abrahams, 1995). By defining a mission an organization is making a statement of organizational purpose.
1. What recommendations would you make to John Wolf with respect to structuring the supplier relationship process for the Wolf Motors dealership network?
To organize and prioritize the current and future projects in the pipeline in a way that fits into the PMB budget of $5B, and ensures projects that increase sales, growth, and stockholder value are of top priority, whereas projects that are not beneficial are either put on hold or discarded.
The mission defines the organization’s purpose, values, and core goals, providing the framework for all other plans. It is simple, vivid and compelling so that the employees from the janitor to the CEO, from the customers to investors can easily understand.
In the current business environment, the demand for project managers is ever growing. In short, project management is a provisional project constrained by time, cost and scope (A guide to the project management body of knowledge, 2013). Between the immense organization, optimization, and communication assets skilled project management brings to a project, it is easy to see why project management is a booming field of study. Furthermore, project management can be both financially and personally rewarding when long term milestones and goals come to fruition.
Gray, C. F. & Larson, E. W. (2008). _Project Management: The Managerial Process_. Boston, MA: McGraw-Hills Companies, Inc.
Operations management (OM) is that phase of an organization where inputs are put into operations to acquire required output (services) without compromising on quality. In other words operations management is also described as combining and transforming various resources in the operations sub-system into value added services in line with formulated policies of the organization. (Kumar and Suresh, 2009)
Operations Management is responsible for designing, operating and improving productive systems or in layman’s terms, systems for getting work done. Operations Managers are found in all walks of life. In anything you basically do or have done there are operations managers. When you go to the store, when you buy gas, in factories, in hospitals, banks even in your government there are operation managers. They are the ones who design systems, who ensure the quality of your
1. It has been said that forecasting using exponential smoothing is like driving a car by looking in the rear-view mirror. What are the conditions that would have to exist for driving a car that are analogous to the assumptions made when using exponential smoothing?
The nature and scope of a project is determined at the initiation stage. This involves analyzing the business needs, developing goals, budgets, tasks, deliverables, and the stakeholder analysis. The project planning stage determines the planning team, develops the scope, and identifies work breakdown structure and activities that will be needed to complete deliverables. The planning stage also estimates time and cost activities, develop schedule and risk plan, and gain formal approval for work to begin. The executing stage involves all processes used to meet the project requirement and involves managing people and resources. The process that entails the identification of potential problems and
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.
"Planning the process of determining the organization's objectives and deciding how to accomplish them." The planning of a business includes the outlining of a mission statement, goals, objectives, and etc... "Mission or mission statement, is a declaration of an organization's fundamental purpose and basic philosophy." A mission statement is basically a statement of purpose. Vision and
The mission statement communicates to stakeholders the main activities that the company focuses on in order for it to achieve its vision. The mission statement communicates to employees’ information on how to conduct their day to day activities. The mission statements also describe the organizations, policies, culture as well as ethics (Alesia 2013).
A mission statement describes the objective of a company or an organization. It shortly defines the overall goal and clarifies why the company exists (Griffin,1990). A mission statement should indicate some core points..
Operational management processes in a firm involves overseeing, formulating and reformulation of the operations of a business. The processes are meant to ensure efficiency in administering resources whilst ensuring there is effective management of client’s specifications and or directions. This is achieved by adding value to the firm’s processes. Such achievements are experienced when a firm embarks in directing its physical and or technical functions towards enhancing its development, production and manufacturing. These should be pre-determined and controlled by market opportunities if a company is to reach its ultimate production levels. Their realisation adds up to ensuring the future of a firm, offering operational