Assignment Title: Individual analysis of the importance of Operations Management and related Concepts to a case study (an organization) of student's choice.

Assignment Brief

Introduction

If the Marketing function is to identify the needs of customers, then the Operations Management function has the role of providing the required products or services in a way that satisfies the criteria imposed by the market. A critical appreciation of the main operational tasks of Operations Management concepts in your chosen case study example is an essential starting point in this process, and the effective and efficient operation of this function is therefore important if the organization is to be successful.

Assignment

Looking at your company at organizational level, or department level critically assess the operational methods and strategies adopted to provide the product(s) in a way that give(s) maximum satisfaction to the customers or clients.

A good answer will identify the criteria applied by the customer in assessing satisfaction

i.e. the order-winning and order-qualifying criteria. You should Provide a critical of the principal operations tasks to satisfy these criteria

Analyse the process strategies and procedures employed to ensure that these tasks are carried as effectively providing such analysis with appropriate theoretical underpinning.

Provide a critical evaluated reflection of the Value-Added contribution you have made to your chosen case study as a result your application of operations management principles and related knowledge.

The organization may not have an operations/production department defined in such terms, but it will still produce something or provides a service for the use of somebody.

The report, excluding appendices, should be 3000 words +/- 10% in length. For your guidance, it will consist of:

An introduction in which you describe your organization and what you and your department's contribution is to the organization.
An accurate description of who the customers are - they may be external or internal - and what they expect from the output in terms of the broad market criteria discussed in the recommended text (Slack, Brandon-Jones & Johnston, 2013). From this, using the models in the text, you should be able to identify what the operations objectives are. This should then suggest the sort of process that ought to be operating. (The different process types and their ability to meet the range of operations objectives are explained at length in the module material).

You should then describe the process in these terms and explain how and why it helps or hinders in the achievement of the operations objectives i.e. its ability to supply a product which meets the customer's needs. This is the essential analysis that shows your ability to apply the module content to your experience.

Having analysed the process, describe what changes you recommend to make - and explain why these are necessary in terms of improving the ability to meet the operations objectives. You need to give some guidance on the feasibility of the changes, how they ought to be implemented, a cost benefit etc., etc., where these are possible given the case organization context.