Dear Students, The assignment is an opportunity for you to investigate operation
ID: 358688 • Letter: D
Question
Dear Students,
The assignment is an opportunity for you to investigate operations management in practice and to carry out deeper investigations. We expect you to demonstrate further reading and investigation – and to compare what you see in your own organization (or an organization of your choice) with what is written in the academic literature.
Assignment Brief
Students should select an organization (which you have access to) and work through the following subheadings relating to operations within the organization. Students should write a report (using the headings below as a guide) discussing the operations of the organization, and making recommendations for improvement.
I have suggested some subheadings to consider under each heading – but these are not exhaustive topics (and you may discuss other things you see as being important). I would advise that you adopt a reasonably formal style and structure for your report. Include conclusions. Students should note that they do not need to look at an entire company but instead may decide to focus on a particular business unit or operation. For example, the student wants to look at a large international company – but only has access to one part of the organization – this is perfectly acceptable
Project
Task 1: (500-600 words) 3 Marks
1.1 Introduction of your selected company 1
1.1 Definition and importance of Operation Management 0.5
1.2 Key elements of OM 0.5
1.3 Processing of goods within legal and ethical boundaries 0.5
1.4 Role of OM in achieving strategic objectives 0.5
Task 2: (1000-1200 words) 6 Marks
2.1. Implementation of 3Es’ in your selected company
2.1.1. Efficiency 0.5
2.1.2. Economy 0.5
2.1.3. Effectiveness 0.5
2.2. Critical analysis of profit maximization and cost minimization in your selected company 1.5
2.3. Importance of 5 performance objectives of operation management 0.5
2.3.1. Cost 0.5
2.3.2. Quality 0.5
2.3.3. Speed 0.5
2.3.4. Dependability 0.5
2.3.5. Flexibility 0.5
Explanation / Answer
1.1 Introduction of your selected company
We have selected an operations intensive company Amazon for the analysis purpose. Also amongst the many line of business we would select the ecommerce business to analyze as it is most operations intensive and Amazon sets the industry benchmarks for the etailing industry.
1.1 Definition and importance of Operation Management
Operations management refers to the function of an organization which ensures the goods movement, services management and production activities are conducted seamlessly so as to fulfill customer orders. It is of prime importance in manufacturing companies.
1.2 Key elements of OM
Key elements of OM are supply chain management + Production activities. Supply chain in turn encompasses procurement, logistics and warehousing. Production encompasses plant maintenance, labor management and production line management.
1.3 Processing of goods within legal and ethical boundaries
It refers to Amazon’s business activities to be restricted within the rule of the land such as some products cannot be sold online in few countries legally and hence Amazon cannot list those products on its’ portal and can neither fulfill such orders. Also there are some products which cannot be sold ethically such as animals, weapons etc and hence Amazon complies by the same. Ethical boundaries are kind of vague and in some countries might be more stringent such as in some Asian countries Amazon cannot sell any undergarment or floor mops with the national flag on it.
1.4 Role of OM in achieving strategic objectives
Operational management plays a critical role in strategic objective of Amazon as it is all about fulfilling customers’ orders on time and in full. Any lapses on the operations side could lead to losing customer orders, penalties, lot of bad reviews in digital world, loss of reputation and hece overall loss to the top line or bottom line of the firm.
Task 2:
2.1. Implementation of 3Es’ in your selected company
2.1.1.Efficiency
Efficiency refers to the ratio of output to input which is measured for various machines, people and the overall processes. In case of Amazon, it is superbly high for each of its’ entities due to their constant review of each component of the Supply chain/operations.
2.1.2. Economy
Economy refers to the right allocation of resources (labor and material) at each stage to make the operations less costly. Amazon has mastered the same and is more important for an etailer as they work on thin margins
2.1.3. Effectiveness
Effectiveness refers to the degree to which the desired objectives are achieved with the current set of resources in terms of completion of tasks, cost and time. Amazon has very effective processes and Standard operating procedures to ensure the same and has set the benchmarks for the ecommerce industry in all countries.
2.2. Critical analysis of profit maximization and cost minimization in your selected company
Profit maximization and cost minimization are synonymous as cost reduction without taking any other hits is as good as profit enhancement. Amazon in its beginning took almost 7 years to become profitable in ecommerce line of business but then gradually refined all its’ processes and finally achieved profitability and works constantly to improve its cost structure and thus profit margins.
2.3. Importance of 5 performance objectives of operation management
Any operations intensive organization measures these key parameters in each department, processes etc as they are the building blocks to achieve the desired goals of the organization. These goals are further divided to the minutest levels to measure the system, people, business partners more closely at each stage of production to achieve the desired organizational goals.
2.3.1. Cost 0.5
It refers to the costs incurred by Amazon in procurement, logistics and warehousing as a part of its operations. The employee costs are not included in the same. It also includes the rental costs of the warehouse s and distribution centers owned/leased.
2.3.2. Quality 0.5
Quality refers to the correctness of the order fulfillment. In other words it is about the correctness of the inward processes, outward processes, inventory management processes encompassing the operations.
2.3.3. Speed 0.5
Speed refers to the time associated with each of the operations activities such as time to GRN (goods receive) every SKU, time to pick, pack an order on an average, days of backlog orders to be processed, average delivery time for shipments etc.
2.3.4. Dependability 0.5
Amazon is highly dependent on its’ people and automation to fulfill its orders. Hence having good people and machines with low MTTB (mean time to breakdown) and MTTR (mean time to repair) is prime and Amazon has ensured to put such entities in place
2.3.5. Flexibility 0.5
Flexibility refers to Amazon’s ability to upscale, downscale or change the operations flow as per the need to the season, month or even day.
Related Questions
drjack9650@gmail.com
Navigate
Integrity-first tutoring: explanations and feedback only — we do not complete graded work. Learn more.