The Seven Management and Planning Tools The Creative Design Group (CDG) designs
ID: 386880 • Letter: T
Question
The Seven Management and Planning Tools
The Creative Design Group (CDG) designs brochures for companies, trade groups, and associations. Their emphasis on customer service is based on speed, quality, creativity, and value. They want each brochure to “wow” the customer in its design, meet or exceed the preparation deadline, and be of superior quality at a reasonable price. Value is emphasized over price, because the president, Trendy Art, believes that CDG’s experienced staff should emphasize high quality and creativity instead of price. They accomplish their primary objectives 97 percent of the time.
To carry out their objectives, the small company has four designers, a customer service/estimator (CSE), and Trendy, who is the creative director and strategic visionary. The work environment, in a converted garage behind Trendy’s house, features modern (though not always state-of-the-art) computer hardware and software, excellent lighting, and modern communications for sending design documents to clients and printers. Designers generally work independently of each other, consulting with the CSE about requests for status updates or client-initiated changes. They also consult with Trendy, who signs off on the creative design, after consultation with each client. A casual dress code and work policies, and a number of perks for workers, such as health insurance, flextime, generous vacation and sick leave benefits, a 401(k) retirement plan, and competitive wages have, in the past, made it easy to attract and retain talented people. However, with fewer talented people graduating from design schools in the area, and more competitive firms bidding up salaries, turnover has become an issue.
The CSE, Green Ishied, is the contact point for all projects, which may number 10–20 active at any one time. He must ensure that projects are carefully estimated and prepare proposals, track progress of each project, and communicate with clients on status and change requests. He is also responsible for advertising and promotion of the firm.
Trendy’s husband, Hy, is a CPA and part-time accountant for the company. He noticed recently that costs are increasing, the percentage of their bids accepted is decreasing, and the ROI is slipping.
Given the situation Trendy determined several long-range objectives, among which are outdistancing the competition to grow the business by 10 percent per year for each of the next five years (a 61 percent compound growth rate), and adding a new designer every two years. These factors should be the key ingredients for her goal of increasing her profitability by 10 percent per year. To accomplish her objectives, she must deal with the two major issues of the increasing competition and employee recruitment and retention in order to develop effective action plans to support her long-range plan.
supplier characteristics weights rating ccg rating for cog rating for cow
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system design 0 .3 8 6 5
delivery timelines 0.2 7 4 9
cost 0.2 5 7 6
system service 0.2 9 6 4
experience 0.1 4 9 6
TOTAL 1.0
Note: Independent ratings on a scale of 1- 10 ( where 10 is best ) were performed by small busineess council of Qualdale , where CDG is located.
Suppliers: CCG= Creative Computer Group
COG= Computer Organizational Group
COW = Computer Operation Workgroup
a. Construct a process decision program chart, but closely reflecting CCG’s training needs.
b. What special considerations would need to be included in training graphic designers with little business knowledge and business-oriented people (such as Hy and Green) with little artistic design knowledge, about each other’s areas of work to use an integrated system?
Explanation / Answer
a) The process decision program chart systematically identifies what might go wrong in a plan under development. Countermeasures are developed to prevent or offset those problems. By using PDPC, you can either revise the plan to avoid the problems or be ready with the best response when a problem occurs.
When to Use PDPC
For the problem given here let us look at process decision program chart in word format.. this could be translated in form of layout for further references
Here we have mentioned,steps and possible problems which can occur between those steps
Step 1: Customer gives order to customer service estimator for new brochures
Possibility: Improper recording of customer demand because of extra burden
Gap in communication between customer demand and details given to designer
Error in data collection methodology.
Step 2: CSE distributes jobs to designer with specification and design required
Possibility: Improper distribution of job i.e.; uneven distribution of load to designer
Communication issue leading to gap in understanding
Step 3: Designer consulting CSE in case any doubt or CSE informing designer in case changes suggested by customer
Possibility: Late response by CSE for any doubt raised by designer
Designer not accommodating changes suggested by customer
Poor quality of job due to lack of training
Usage of outdated technology
Step 4: Designer sending designs to creative designer for approval
Possibility: Not following the timelines and sending late design for approval
Creative director not reviewing the design properly
Excessive time taken by creative director to send product to customer
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