The Supply Chain’s Significance in Developing an Operations Strategy:

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.

The Customer relationship, Order fulfillment, and Supplier relationship processes need to be analyzed from the perspective of process structure, process improvement, layout, and capacity.

Supply chains manage the movement of products from the acquisition of raw materials through production and finally distribution to the end user. A properly designed supply chain can create many opportunities to drive down cost and increase revenue opportunities. In order to create a supply chain that is sustainable and flexible it is necessary to identify and align company goals and initiatives with the manufacturing and distribution of products.

Numerous organisations have effectively executed supply chain ideas with terrific results. Proficient supply chains have empowered these firms to contend better. What were the purposes behind their triumphs? What were the obstacles these firms confronted in their excursions to accomplish joining in their systems? How were they ready to beat

According to Gronroos(2004) the relationship is seen in a marketing perspective, he suggests that strong connection between various departments of an organisation and its supply chain could create additional value to the service and moreover for the end-consumer. This connections could allow the company to have an ongoing relationship with the customer, making him feel secure and developing a sense of trust which underlies to organisational success (Men, 2014).

Russell, R. S., & Taylor III, B. W. (2011). Operations Management: Creating Value along the Supply Chain 7th edition. Retrieved November 18, 2011, from Wiley.com: http://bcs.wiley.com/he-bcs/Books?action=index&itemId=0470525908&bcsId=5869

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 (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)

Grading for this assignment will be based on answer quality, logic / organization of the paper, and language and writing skills, using the following rubric.

An operations strategy is all about harmonising the features of the operations function with the requirements of the market in order to fulfil the needs of the business. A full appreciation of this process requires not merely an understanding of the ideas and methods used to develop an operations strategy but also knowledge of the techniques and principles involved in its implementation or execution thereof. Implementation requires knowledge of operations systems and polices including those that relate to resource planning and activity control, quality, plant management, motivation and organisation of people, performance metrics and continuous improvement.

Supply chains represent the procurement, production and distribution activities of an organisation. Within a supply chain, these activities are viewed as linked and reliant on one another to produce the final outcome. It is believed that if one component of the chain fails, the whole chain is broken and product/service delivery goals will not be achieved.

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.

Operations Management is the systematic (where everything can be defined, measured and managed) control of processes that translates inputs into services and products (output). All the processes are linked together to form a supply chain and all the operations are about transformations (adding value). Two types of operation systems are used : opened and closed-loop. The first one treats time (speed) as a high priority and starts from the input, through the process to the output. In the opposite, the second one includes a control stage between the process and the output and, a feedback at the end. In the first part, I’m going to describe briefly some of Sainsbury’s operations using Porter’s value chain.

The supply chain indicates the supply and demand network made up of the raw materials suppliers, manufacturers, wholesalers, and the ultimate consumers (ARNDT, 2004). The supply chain management is the vital concept in the modern management. In the supply chain management, the supply chain integration is just an important management model. The supply chain integration just realizes higher value and competitive advantages of the whole supply chain through coordinating the businesses process and cooperating within the organization and among the different organizations (LEE, 2000). It does not only facilitate the coordination of the business processes in the supply chain, but