Operational Management SLP 3 (Wal-Mart)
Cardsmax

How product design is applied in decision-making of that organization?

As in many corporations product design plays an integral part in the decision making process. Mitchell (2005), confirms that the staying power of Wal-Mart is evident through the product design and their decision making process. The big manufacturers with powerful brands were in charge in the marketplace, and retailers played along. About the only decision retailers had to make was whether to stock a manufacturer's product. If consumers wanted it, stores carried it. This led to the rise of Wal-Mart and other big-box retailers, which turned the power relationship on its head. Suddenly, manufacturers had to play by the retailers' rules. As consumers were increasingly drawn by the stores' low prices rather than the manufacturers' brand names, these retailers built enough market shares to start making demands of their suppliers: about prices, marketing, and even product design…...

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References

Anonymous. (n.d). Wal-Mart Joins WWF's Global Forest & Trade Network. Business Wire, Retrieved from EBSCOhost.

Mitchell, D (2005). "Manufacturers Try to Thrive on the Wal-Mart Workout." New York Times 20 Feb. 2005: BU3. Gale Opposing Viewpoints In Context. Retrieved from EBSCOhost.

Sissell, K. (2009). Wal-Mart Unveils Sustainable Product Index. Chemical Week, 171(19), 11. Retrieved from EBSCOhost.

Operational Management
Learning is a slow but steady procedure. It is fascinating how, even the smallest things in life can teach you wonders. Throughout the length of the operational management course, I have come across a great deal of information which will hopefully help me greatly in the practical side of my career. What make this experience stand apart from all the previous ones are the opportunities provided in it. Not only did the class events give me a deep insight on the managing, designing and delivering of products according to the need of the customer but also gave me the chance to understand the difficulties faced by the operating enterprises in the implementation of management sciences in their everyday encounters. Such knowledge now makes me more capable of analyzing the correct concepts and tools related to any issue in the market and hence, making sensible decisions. I am also…...

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References:

Slack, N, Johnston, R, Chambers, S 2007, Operations management, 5th edn, Prentice Hall/Financial Times, New York.

Then, another, and probably the most obvious, application of operations management is that of achieving cost reductions. ichard Stylves offers the most conclusive example of Henry Ford, who sought to integrate assembly lines using the most cost effective commodities, including labor force. The aim of operations management is then that of reducing expenditure and increasing operational efficiency. Its applications are present at all organizational levels, from resource allocation to product distribution. Amazon.com has successfully integrated these principles by establishing its warehouses in adequately chosen locations which allow it to efficiently and automatically distribute its products to worldwide consumers.

Carter McNamara agrees with most of the previous findings, but his article is more of a generalist one, in which the author simply states that operations management has applications in "purchasing, control and coordinating function of management, product and service management, quality management, inventory management, logistics and transportation management, facilities management, configuration management…...

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References:

Ebojo, M., March 2009, Skillful Communication, Supplement to Pharmaceutical Executive

Koch, C., 2009, Who's to Blame in the Relationship Between IT and Marketing? Better Management,   last accessed on April 23, 2009http://www.bettermanagement.com/library/library.aspx?l=15013 

McNamara, C., 2009, Operations Management, Management Help,   last accessed on April 23, 2009http://managementhelp.org/ops_mgnt/ops_mgnt.htm 

Stylves, R., 2008, FEMA, Katrina and Operations Research: Better Operations Management Would Have Helped FEMA in Preparedness and Response Work before Hurricane Katrina -- and Still Could Now, The Public Manager, Vol. 37

Managing the Total Quality Management (TQM)
Computer integrated manufacturing (CIM) is the amalgamation of diverse entities within the production system all the way through the use of information and computerization technologies for well-organized control and administration of manufacturing and related purposes (Francett, 1988; Gould, 1989; Groves, 1990; Sabbaghi, 1991). Some accounted profits of CIM (Aly, 1989, Chang and Wysk, 1985; Gaylord, 1987; Goldhar, 1985) are faster release of new goods, shorter production preparation, as well as development cycles, increased competence and elasticity, enhanced product quality, as well as serviceability.

Even though a lot of U.S. companies depend on the completion of CIM technologies to recover or uphold competitive gain (Doll and Vonderembske, 1987), a significant percentage has been unsuccessful to realize the expected benefits (De Meyer, 1990). One motive for this breakdown is their leading focus on the technological features of implementation at the same time as disregarding the critical success factors…...

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References

Aly, Nael A. (March 1989). A Survey on the Use of Computer-Integrated Manufacturing In Food Processing Companies, Food Technology: 82-87.

Blest, John P., (Spring 1992). Raymond G. Hunt and Carolyn C. Shadle, Action Teams in the Total Quality Process: Experience in a Job Shop, National Productivity Review: 195-202.

Camp, Robert C., (1989). Competitive Bench Marking: Xerox's Powerful Quality tool is making Total Quality Happen, Research Report, The Conference Board. 35-42.

Chang, Tien-Chien and Richard A. Wysk, (1985). An Introduction to Automated Process Planning System, Prentice Hall Inc., Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey.

Cardsmax
Operational Management Case

How does the concept of product life cycle apply to egal Marine products?

The concept of the life cycle applies to egal marine in several ways. First, this company appears to be in the maturity phase. There are discussions in the article that explain the different methods that they have utilized to stay cutting edge and with supply and demand. As the years passed, they would create bigger and better boats that would in fact cost more and make more money. egal was in the growth stage when they were getting new suppliers while they continued to make updates and innovations to their product. Penfield (2009), explain that companies that can implement effective waste-recovery systems will have a competitive advantage over other businesses. They further explain that in the current economic environment companies need to look at waste as an opportunity we cannot afford to squander. life cycle management…...

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References

Penfield, P. (2009). Life cycle management: A competitive advantage for businesses. Business Journal (Central New York), 23(14), 12. Retrieved from EBSCOhost.

Rahimifard, A.A., Newman, S.T., & Rahimifard, S.S. (2004). A web-based information system to support end-of-life product recovery. Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers -- Part B -- Engineering Manufacture, 218(9), 1047-1057. doi:10.1243/0954405041897004

W, W., A, E., Zhang, H.C., & S, E. (2003). Life-cycle engineering: issues, tools and research. International Journal of Computer Integrated Manufacturing, 16(4/5), 307. Retrieved from EBSCOhost.

Application to the Specified Measurable Learning Outcomes from Course Syllabus

The first topic applies to the course syllabus in that it distinguishes those aspects of professional leadership that are important to organizational success from those that may represent an excessively superficial focus on leadership over substantive issues in business management. The second topic applies to the course syllabus in that it outlines the definite correspondence of elements of organizational culture and of different approaches to organizational leadership to objective measures of employee satisfaction, motivation, and performance. Finally, the third topic applies to the course syllabus in that it outlines the manner and degree to which different types of industries, organizations, and strategic missions dictate the need for different types of leadership styles and different types of approaches to management within organizations.

Ultimately, the three concepts suggest that leadership does play an important role in organizations but that leadership cannot be over-emphasized over…...

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References

Ismail, A., Zainuddin, N.F., and Ibrahim, Z. "Linking Participative and Consultative

Leadership Styles to Organizational

Commitment as an Antecedent of Job

Satisfaction." UNITAR E-JOURNAL, Vol. 6, No. 1 (January 2010): 11 -- 27.

Operation Management
Coca-Cola and recycling

Definition of Sustainability and Sustainable Water Management

The definition of Bruntland Commission regarding continuous development investigates the connection between social impartiality, quality of environment, and economic growth. Development in these sectors fulfils the present needs without negotiating the needs of the generations in the future (ogers, Jalal and Boyd 2008). One of life's important elements is water which is facing a lot of problems due to increase in population and availability of fewer resources. There are less water resources to look upon to which is coming out to be a threat as well as a risk and is affecting every region and sector in the world. The Water esources Group estimates that the requirement for water will increase to 40% in 2030 and around 1/3rd of the population of the world especially in the countries still developing will face 50% of water shortage (2030 Water esources Group 2009).…...

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References

2030 Water Resources Group, 2009. Charting our Water Future. Available from McKinsey & Co.

American Chemistry Council. 2010. Life Cycle of a Plastic Product. Available from:  http://plastics.americanchemistry.com/Education-Resources/Plastics-101/Lifecycle-of-a-Plastic-Product.html 

Coca-Cola Enterprises. 2009. Corporate Responsibility and Sustainability Review. Available from: / Coca-Cola-CRS-Report_LR.pdfhttp://www.cokecce.com/assets/uploaded_fles

Lean Production. 2013. Top 25 Lean Tools. Available from:  http://www.leanproduction.com/top-25-lean-tools.html

Operational issues of IT Department NHS
Organization UK

The objective of this report is to provide a proposal to reduce the IT operational costs. National Health Service (NHS) is a biggest healthcare service provider in the UK, and the organization delivers both primary and secondary healthcare since its formation. The UK government major objective for forming NHS is to provide the affordable and quality healthcare delivery for all social class in the UK. To achieve its objective, the government has implemented the IT project to improve the service delivered by the organization. Despite the implementation of the IT project to deliver the quality healthcare delivery for the UK population, there is an operational issues within the IT department. The external service providers are still delivering the IT services, which has been translated into the high operations costs. The report provides several recommendations to decline the operation costs within the IT department.

One of…...

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References

Boddy, D. King, G. Clark, J.S. et al. (2009).The influence of context and process when implementing e-health. BMC Medical Informatics and Decision Making. 9:9

Hackney, R.A. & McBride, N.K.(2003). The Efficacy of Information Systems in the Public Sector: Issues of Context and Culture. Research Paper Manchester Metropolitan University.

Hendy, J. Fulop, N. Reeves, B.C et al. (2007). Implementing the NHS information technology programme: qualitative study of progress in acute trusts. BMJ.

Hendy, J. Reeves, B.C. Fulop, N. et al. (2005). Challenges to implementing the national programme for information technology (NPfIT): a qualitative study.

The performance of each team member depends on the performance of all others, this being a team project. Constraints include time and financial resources; as such improvement requires permanent improvement effort.
isk Management. No risk has been identified related to the project's completion.

Monitoring and Controlling Mechanisms. The data analysts will develop a metric system to measure each member's performance on a weekly basis. This weekly performance will be submitted to the project manager for potential adjustments.

V. Operations management plan

Operations Strategy. An easy way to understand the meaning of operations strategy is to break the word into the two separate words: operations and strategy - these words being the opposite of each other (Slack & Lewis, 2002). 'Operations' is about the functions and procedures regarding the day-to-day processes, while 'strategy' is about the direction and scope of an organisation over a long period of time. The operations strategy in this case…...

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References:

Aberdeen Group. 2008. Operational KPIs and Performance Management -- Are Your Daily Decisions Based on Fact?,  http://www.aberdeen.com/ 

Cooper, M. & Lambert D. 2000. Issues in Supply Chain Management. Industrial Marketing Management, vol. 29: pp. 65-83.

Johnson, J. C. And Wood, D.F. 1996. Contemporary Logistics, N.J.: Prentice Hall Upper Saddle Creek.

Keah C.R.K. And Handfield, R.B. 1998 .Supply Chain Management: Supplier Performance and Firm Performance. International Journal of Purchasing and Materials Management: pp.2-9.

The people belonging to the third corporate culture are from the engineering culture. This culture is personified by engineers and technical specialists, who believe on the awesome power of the technology in solving the organizational culture. These people believe on the power of the machines in solving human and organizational problems.

According to Schein, people involved with any of the above three cultures often fails to see the other side and the perspective of other culture, often resulting failure in organizational learning. Although people belonging to each of the culture do great service for the organization, yet they fail to see the holistic picture of the organization and fail to share the similar meaning of the organizational problems. The main reasons for these problems certainly occur because of the people inheriting different norms, educational experiences, expectations, and rewards structures in their professions.

Therefore, it is now wonder that an organization who hires…...

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Reference

Schein, Edgar H. (1996) Three Cultures of Management: The Key to Organizational Learning. Sloan Management Review, fall. 9.

Given the fact that the entire organizational structure relies on performance, one needs to ensure that (1) performance levels are reasonably defined and (2) that these performance levels are known to all employees within the organization.
In this sense, an organization that will be implementing the respective framework needs to make sure that the performance levels are reasonably defined. Perhaps an external structure or organization can help defined reasonable levels for outcomes.

The problem we have previously discusses seems to have itself a counterpart in terms of the performance measurement and reporting systems. First of all, measuring performance means that there are specific performance criteria that can be used. These are, in part, related to the strategic planning details I have mentioned on the previous paragraphs.

Second of all, one needs to take into consideration the reasonability of the person who is making the assessments. Again I suggest here someone from outside…...

Operational Motivational Plan
Organization's Motivational Plan

I am President, and CEO of a small geneal contracting company. We are a medium size company for our market, with 20 employees. We operate in the residential, and commercial markets, specializing in higher end residential new construction and remodeling projects in neighborhoods which typically display homes of $250,000.00 or more. Tradesmen in this industry are independent, and perfectionistic. The craftsmen on our staff are some of the most talented carpenters, masons, and painters in their fields. The company has received recognition as "One of the Top 100 Residential Contractors in the Nation" three times out of the last 5 consecutive years.

However, in the past 16 to 24 months, company gross margin has been eroding, and staff moral has begun a consistent downward slide. The site managers are dealing with construction time overruns and wrong / not enough materials on the jobs. These occurrences are becoming…...

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Bibliography

Bishop, J.W., Dow, S.K., & Burroughs, S.M. (2000).

Support, Commitment, and Employee

Outcomes in a Team Environment.

Journal of Management, 26(6), 1113

Indeed, the control function will create a feedback mechanism that will allow the leader or manager (at all levels of the organization) to be constantly informed as to the way that benchmarks are reached, as well as to any potential problems that might appear along the way. This means that the control function is the first phase in actually correcting the potential errors that might appear in the organization.
In Jack Welch's case, the control function as he applied it allowed him to monitor his group of human resources so as to emphasize the most important and most productive 20% and the underperforming 10%. y monitoring and controlling this benchmark, he was able to induce and maintain an organizational culture based on performance as one of the fundamental and defining goals.

5) One of the strategies by which a healthy organizational culture can be maintained proposes to support a close relationship…...

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Bibliography

1. Welch, Jack. 2005. Straight from the Gut. Warner Books.

2. Welch, Jack. 2005. Winning. Collins

At the same time, he then acts as an interface and communicates to the team the general directions in which the company is moving. However, the project manager also acts as an internal motivator within the team, a coordinator and organizer.
A similarly important role will be played by the project manager in his capacity to act as an interface between the different entities and shareholders involved in a certain project. In order to control scope, several documents should be used, such as, for example, the statement of work, as part of the requests for proposals, or scheduling and budget estimates. For these, the project manager will work with representatives from other departments (marketing and sales etc.), but also with the clients. At the same time, the project manager will have consulted previously with his own team, thus being able to carry to these meetings their own evaluations and estimates.…...

In other words, he expects for his efforts to be accordingly remunerated or rewarded with a promotion, a full time job offer for a trainee and so on (Stuart-Kotze, 2008).
In implementing these individual needs, organizational managers have developed numerous incentive plans, such as the offering of increased wages, premiums, bonuses or promotions.

The four above presented theories are relevant in the context of driving the individual, which is then capable to influence the organizational behavior of his employing company. The responses generated by the economic entities relative to the motivational factors vary in terms of intensity, ability to implement or resources possessed, but fact remains that all organizations have attempted to integrate stimuli that increase the performances of the workers. The ultimate goal of each organization offering incentive plans to its staff members is that of best benefiting from their intense efforts.

Aside the offering of a pleasant, yet competitive working…...

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References

Fabozzi, F.J., Peterson, P.P., 2003, Financial Management and Analysis, 2nd Edition, John Willey and Sons Inc.

Hariss, J.O., Hartman, S.J., 2001, Organizational Behavior, 1st Edition, Taylor & Francis Inc.

Stuart-Kotze, R., 2008, Motivation Theory,   accessed on September 15, 2008http://www.goal-setting-guide.com/motivation-theory.htmllast 

2008, Official Website of the Microsoft Corporation,   accessed on September 15, 2008http://www.microsoft.com/en/us/default.aspxlast