Running Smoothly Subject Control. If Commit Finding

¶ … running smoothly subject control. If commit finding fixing problems, 'll carry effective control ( organization) fewer personnel' (Minoura, 2003). Discuss statement means agree . Describe organization experience, researched, benefitted --time (JIT) techniques special reference inventory control.

I agree with this statement and there are several elements in it that need further discussion. First of all, it clearly defines how control should be defined and applied within an organization. According to the statement made by Minoura, there are two different scenarios that need to be considered. One is when things are ok, in which case nothing should be changed and control should not be imposed. The second scenario develops as the organization is committed to investigating the process and to determining when problems occur. If this happens, effective control needs to be implemented to correct the errors and achieve the first scenario.

The question arises on how a process can be deemed as being functional (and, as such, according to Minoura, not subjected to control) and when is it no longer functional (and, as such, needs to be corrected). The answer is standardization. Once you have a set of clear standards (not necessarily applicable only in manufacturing processes, but, in general, in different areas of the organization), it can be very easy to spot process that do not adhere to those standards and where control needs to be implemented. At the same time, it is easy to do this with less personnel, because they would only have a monitoring and comparing role, thus saving the company important costs and resources in the process.

The key to this statement is that the objective of control should be to ensure the maximized effectiveness of the organization. In this case, it is through implementing the appropriate level of control depending on the situation, as well as ensuring that the process respects the standardized norms that have been established by the organization. One can move beyond that and refer to the Just-in-Time (JIT) model as on of the most successful business models that proposes the idea that inventory is an additional, unnecessary cost that needs to be eliminated. Toyota was the company that developed this idea and that ensured its implementation.

JIT proposed the elimination of inventories and the complete coordination of sales and demand with production. This meant that all production had an immediate order and, as such, no products were left on stock. At the same time, this also meant a complete correlation with the activity of suppliers, in an overall efficient network that would allow the organization to deliver products for clients at competitive prices, determined by a decrease in costs, namely through the elimination of inventory costs.

The immediate benefits and advantages of JIT are quite clear. The most important one, beyond the lack of inventory and products on stock, is that the entire flow of goods from their production to the end-consumer is significantly streamlined, additional economies of scale becoming available during the process. At the same time, the JIT model implies a highly trained workforce that is able to perform different tasks in different positions of the process: as in Minoura's statement, more things can be accomplished with less personnel, which translates into a decreased cost of human resource.

Overall, the entire synchronization that is necessary in order to achieve a successful JIT model is beneficial for the organization and translates into greater economies of scale in the production process.

Certainly, JIT needed to take several elements into consideration, all of which could become a potential problem. First, supply and demand needed to have some stability on the market or, in the worst case scenario, both needed to be predictable, so that the company could evaluate the necessary supply, as compared to the demands received.

Second, inventory costs were replaced with other types of costs. For example, the cost of transportation, as JIT meant an increased volume of products and supply that needed to be moved from one location to the other. Environmental costs and general price volatility on the market were additional concerns that had to be taken into account when running a successful JIT model.