Business Operation
Case study 1.1. ‘First Bank’ PLC-, page 15 1. Explain the competitive consequences of ‘pulling out’ of internet banking for this company. 2. Discuss the impact a decision to ‘pull out’ of internet banking will have on this company and similar companies in terms of future technology-based initiatives. 3. Identify the strategic role of operations of a Bank and explain, how can a bank improve customer take-up of its internet banking initiative? Case study 2.3: Operations Strategy in Action, page 32 1. Read the article and discuss how operations can provide strategic advantage to this organisation. 2. Discuss the performance of the company in terms of the five performance objectives and the relationship among these performance objectives. 3. Discuss a suitable operations strategy approach for these kinds of organisations. Case study 4.1: Line Balancing in a Manufacturing Plant, page 88-91 1. Identify the process type used in this organisation and explain the rationale to balance a production line of a manufacturing plant. 2. Explain the strategies that are used to balance a production line in this case study. 3. Explain alternative strategies to balance a production line in a manufacturing plant. Case study 6.4: RFID American Apparel, 139-140 1. Explain the application of RFID as a process technology and how RFID has helped American Apparel. 2. Explain why American Apparel only have one of each item on the shelves and how RFID help the organisation to achieve this objective. 3. Explain the current limitations of RFID. Case study 8.3: F1 Pitstop, page 188-189 1. Read the case study and draw a process map for the Pit-stop processes. 2. Discuss why organisations should follow the path of the F1 pit crew to improve their process management in their organisations. 3. Discuss how can this Pit-stop process be improved Case study 10.3: Using Workforce Scheduling to Lower Labour Costs, page 235 1. Discuss the challenges the organisations have in relation to workforce scheduling. 2. Explain why workforce scheduling technology is particularly suitable to large organisations. 3. Explain how organisations can use operations planning to achieve their organisational objectives. Electronic reading WARNING This material has been reproduced and communicated to you by or on behalf of the University of South Australia in accordance with section 113P of the Copyright Act 1968 (the Act). The material in this communication may be subject to copyright under the Act. Any further reproduction or communication of this material by you may be the subject of copyright protection under the Act. Do not remove this notice Book extract Book title Operations management Book author Greasley, Andrew Citation details pages 15, 32, 88-91,139-140, 188-189, 235 Extract title Case studies Extract author Greasley, Andrew Publication details Chichester, West Sussex : Wiley, 2013 Edition Third edition ISBN 9781119978541 Total pages in book xviii, 492 pages INTRODUCTION 15 eliminate the need for employee contact in customer-facing operations. Information technologies such as e-Business systems are having a major effect on how firms organize their supply chains and use their capacity (see Case Study 1.1). More details on process technology are provided in Chapter 6. 'First Bank' PLC 'First Bank' has recently begun to offer Internet banking to extend its range of services to the customer and decrease the demand on branch personnel. However, the web site has been expe- riencing difficulties with a slow response rate to customer inquiries. Demand for the Internet service has also been much lower than expected. As operations manager the company requires your view on the following issues: SUMMARY Questions 1. What are the competitive consequences of 'pull- ing out' of Internet banking for the company? 2. What impact will a decision to 'pull out' of Internet banking have on the company in terms of future technology-based initiatives. 3. How can the bank improve customer take-up of its Internet banking initiative? Operations management is about the management of the processes that produce or deliver goods and services. The operations system can be seen as a transformation process. It converts inputs known as transformed resources ( classified as materials, information and customers) using transforming resources (classified as staff and facilities) into finished goods and services. An alternative to the functional perspective of an organization is a process view in which the organization is seen as consisting of a set of processes that link together to meet customer needs. Service organizations can be classified by their tangibility (the extent that they incorporate a physical thing that you can touch). The way services are delivered can be classified by their simultaneity (the extent that the service is produced and consumed at the same time). • Service operations can be denoted by front-office tasks, which deal directly with the customer, and back-office tasks, which add value to the inputs of the service operation. Operations management has an important strategic role in ensuring that the management of the organization's resources and processes direct the organization closer to its long-term goals. • Technology plays a key role in the transformation of materials, customers and information for which operations is responsible. www.wileyopenpage.com 32 OPERATIONS MANAGEMENT Operations Strategy in Action Almost every company seems to be restructur- ing itself to face the downturn, be it through financial engineering, or by retrenching to core activities. So they sell off foreign subsidiaries (Aviva), recent diversifications (ABB), or in des- perate cases almost anything that's worth some- thing and isn't nailed to the floor (Vivendi and Marconi). Oddly, few firms make a thing about going back to the real basics, which is manu- facturing or, more accurately, operations. Odd, because competing operationally - making and selling things better and more cheaply than the opposition - is the simplest and best strategy of all. In tough times like these, most other 'strate- gies' look like sorry substitutes for failing to get the basics right in the first place. Schefenacker Vision Systems (formerly part of Britax) is a maker of car wing mirrors. Schefenacker has been improving its mirrors for more than 10 years. It can now satisfy the most demanding cus- tomers - for example, from its plant in the south of England it delivers a possible 420 permutations of mirror daily direct to Jaguar's assembly line in the Midlands to match each car that comes down the assembly line. The ability to do this cost-effectively is an entry ticket to lots of international business. Less obviously, the company's virtuosity allows it to design and build better, more sophisticated parts - for instance, with lighting or electronics built in. That allows it to go upmarket, where margins are wider. At the same time, as with Dell, it also gives it the possibility of expanding up and down the value chain. Thanks to relentless emphasis on doing more with less .. . Schefenacker has freed up space on the factory floor for five new pro- duction cells. It uses these to manufacture simple O www.wileyopenpage.com parts which it had previously outsourced to oth- ers. Strategic result: Schefenacker no longer pays the other guy's profit margin, spreads overheads across a larger base, and can suck waste out of a larger section of the supply chain. Manufacturing director Mickey Love says: 'Lean production gives you an opportunity to make things that you can sell to customers you didn't have before.' Of all the advantages of operations excel- lence as a strategy, its impact on people is the most momentous. In firms that take this route, improvement of every aspect of design, manu- facture, distribution, delivery and service is by definition strategic. Better product quality or a day sliced off delivery lead time is a strategic, not tactical, move. That means improvement is part of the day job for every individual; which also means 100 per cent participation, with no choice. The secret is that operating excellence makes strategy easy. As Richard Schonberger, one of the original proselytizers for lean manufacturing, said: 'What makes a great team is the basics. Then almost anything the coach chooses to do makes the coach look like a shrewd strategist.' Source: Excerpt from 'Business: The basics that beat the world: Making things better and cheaper is the best strategy of all' by Simon Caulkin, The Observer November 3, 2002. Reproduced with permission. Questions 1. Read the article and discuss how operations can provide strategic advantage. 2. Discuss the performance of the company in terms of the five performance objectives. 88 OPERATIONS MANAGEMENT SUMMARY There are four basic layout types: fixed position, process, cell and product. • A fixed-position layout is used when the product or service cannot be moved. A process layout is one in which resources that have similar processes or functions are grouped together. A cell layout is created by placing together resources which serve a subset of the total range of products or services. A product layout arranges the resources required for a product or service around the needs of that product or service. • Group technology has three aspects of grouping parts into families, grouping physical facilities into cells and creating multi-skilled workers. Production flow analysis is a group technology technique that can be used to identify families of parts with similar processing requirements. The technique of line balancing is used to ensure that the output of each stage in a product line layout is equal and maximum utilization is attained. Line Balancing in a Manufacturing Plant This study concerns a former division of a major UK-based manufacturer of railway rolling stock and equipment. The plant manufactures a range of bogies, which are the supporting frames and wheel sets for rail vehicles. The company has a history of supplying the passenger train market in the UK but over a period of time low demand and increased competition had led it to enter new markets including European inner-city transport and the supply of freight bogies to Far East coun- tries. The need to compete on a global basis led the company to re-evaluate its manufacturing facility with particular emphasis on the need to