Exam 1 Flashcards
Why Study Operations and Supply Chain Management
- Every organization must make a product or provide a service that someone values
- Most organizations function as a part of larger supply chains
- Organizations must carefully manage their operations and supply chains in order to prosper, and indeed, survive
Operations Functions (or Operations)
Collection of people, technology, and systems within an organization that has primary responsibility for providing the organization’s products or services
Supply Chain
- A network for manufacturers and service providers that work together to create products or services needed by end users. These manufacturers and service providers are linked together through physical flows, information flows, and monetary flows.
- Primary focus on physical goods- conversion, storage, and movement of materials and products
Operations Management
The planning, scheduling, and control of the activities that transform inputs into finished goods and services
Transformation Process
Takes a set of inputs and transform them in some way to create outputs (goods or services)
Transformation Process Steps
Inputs -> this processes-> outputs
Transformation Process Inputs
- Materials
- Intangible needs
- Information
Transformation Process Includes
- Manufacturing Operations
- Service Options
Transformation Process Outputs Includes
- Tangible goods
- Fulfilled needs
- Satisfied customers
Upstream
Activities or firms that are positioned earlier in the supply chain relative to some other activity of form of interest.
Ex: corn harvesting takes place upstream of cereal processing, and cereal processing takes place upstream of cereal packaging
Downstream
Activities or firms that are positioned later in the supply chain relative to some other activity or firm of interest
Ex: sewing a shirt takes place downstream of weaving the fabric, and weaving the fabric takes place downstream of harvesting cotton
First- Tier Supplier
A supplier that provides products or services directly to a firm
Second- Tier Supplier
A supplier that provides products or services to a firm’s first-tier supplier
Supply Chain Operations Reference Model (SCORR)
A framework developed and supported by the Supply Chain Council that seeks to provide standard descriptions of the processes, relationships, and metrics that define supply chain management
SCOR Areas
- Planning activities
- Sourcing activities
- Make or production activities
- Delivery actives
- Return Activities
SCOR Area Planning Activities
Seek to balance demand requirements against resources and communicate these plans to the various participants
SCOR Area Sourcing Actives
Include identifying, developing, and contracting with suppliers and scheduling the delivery of incoming goods and services
SCOR Area Make or Production Activities
Cover the actual production of goods and services
SCOR Area Delivery Activities
Include everything from entering customer orders and determining delivery dates to storing and moving goods to their final destination
SCOR Area Return Activities
Activities necessary to return and process defective or excess products or materials
Trends in Supply Chain
- Electronic commerce
- Increase competition and globalization
- Relationship management
Trends in Supply Chain- Electronic Commerce
Use of computer and telecommunication technologies to conduct business via electronic transfer of data and documents
Trends in Supply Chain- Increased Competition and Globalization
- Rate of change in markets, products and technology increases
- Managers make decisions on shorter notice and with less information
- Customers are demanding delivery quicker
Trends in Supply Chain- Relationship Management
Manage relationship with upstream suppliers and downstream suppliers
Structural Element
Includes tangible resources, such as buildings, equipment, and computer systems
Major Decisions Addressed by a Strategy
- Structural element
- Infrastructural element
Infrastructural Element
Includes policies, people, decision rules, and organizational structure choices made by a firm.
Strategy
A mechanism by which a business coordinates its decisions regarding structural and infrastructural elements
Missions Statement
- A statement that explains why an organization exists
- Describes what is important to the organization, called its core values, and identifies the organization’s domain
Business Strategy
Strategy that identifies a firm’s targeted customers and sets a time frames and performance objectives for a business
Core Competency
An organizational strength or ability, developed over a long period, that customers find difficult or even impossible to copy
Functional Strategy
- A strategy that translates a business strategy into specific actions such as marketing, human resources, and finance
- This should align with the overall business strategy with each other
Operations and Supply Chain Strategy
- A functional strategy that indicates how structural and infrastructural elements within the operations and supply chain areas will be acquired and developed to support the overall business strategy
- Ex: Choosing the amount of capacity and sourcing strategies
Objectives of Operations and Supply Chain Strategy
- Help management choose the right mix of structural and infrastructural elements, based on clear understandings of the performance dimensions valued by customers and the trade-offs involved
- Ensure that the firm’s structural and infrastructural choices are strategically aligned with the firm’s business strategy
- Support the development of core competencies in the firm’s operations and supply chains
Structural Decisions Categories
- Capacity
- Facilities
- Technology
Capacity- Structural Decisions Categories
Amount, type, and timing of capacity changes
Facilities- Structural Decisions Categories
- Services/manufacturing, warehouses, distribution huts
- Size, location, degree of specification
Technology- Structural Decisions Categories
Service/manufacturing process, material handling equipment, transpiration equipment, information systems
Infrastructural Decision Categories
- Organization
- Sourcing/perchasing
- Planning and control
- Business Practices and Quality Management
- Product and source development
Value Index
A measurement that uses the performance and importance scores for various dimensions of performance for an item or service to calculate a score that indicates the overall value of an item or service to a customer
Performance Dimensions
- ) Quality
- ) Time
- ) Flexibility
- ) Cost
Quality
The characteristics of a product or service that bear on its ability to satisfy stated or implied needs
Performance Quality
A sub-dimension of quality that addresses the basic operating characteristics of a product or service
Conformance Quality
A subdimension of quality that addresses whether a product was made or a service preformed to specifications
Reliability Quality
A subdimension of quality that addresses whether a product will work for a long time without failing or requiring maintenance
Delivery Speed
A performance dimension that refers to how quickly the operations or supply chin function can fulfill a need once it has been identified
Delivery Reliability
A performance dimension that refers to the ability to deliver products or services when promised
Delivery Window
The acceptable time range in which deliveries can be made
Flexibility
The performance dimension that considers how quickly operations and supply chains can respond to the unique needs of customers
Mix Flexibility
The ability to produce a wide range of products and services
Changeover Flexibility
The ability to provide a new product with minimal delay
Volume Flexibility
The ability to produce whatever volume the customer needs
Trade-Off
A decision by a firm to emphasize one performance dimension over another, based on recognition that excellence on some dimensions may conflict with excellence on others
- Ex: a marathon and long distance runner cannot do both
- Order Winner
A performance dimension that differentiates a company’s product or services from its competitors. Firms win a cusomer’s business by providing superior levels of performance on order winners
Order Qualifier
- A performance dimension on which customers expect a minimum level of performance.
- Superior performance is not an order qualifier will not, by itself, give a company a competitive advantage
Stages of Alignment between Supply Chain and Operations Strategies
1- Internally Neutral
2- Externally Neutral
3- Internally Supportive
4- Externally Supportive
Internally Neutral Stage of Alignment
- Management seeks only to minimize any negative potential in the operations and supply chain areas
- No effort made to link these areas with the business strategy
Externally Neutral Stage of Alignment
- Industries practice is followed, based on the assumption that what works for competitors will work for the company
- No effort to link the operations and supply chain areas with the overall business strategy
Internally Supportive Stage of Alignment
- Operations and supply chain areas participate in the strategic debate
- Management recognizes that the operations and supply chain structural and infrastructural elements must be aligned with the business strategy
Externally Supportive Stage of Alignment
- Operations and supply chain areas do more than just support the business strategy
- Business strategy actively seeks to exploit the core competencies found within these areas
Manufacturing and Service Processes are Important to Firms Because
- Tend to be expensive and far reaching
- Managers must make sure that the process they choose best support their overall business strategy and the needs of their targeted customers
- Process decisions deserve attention- different processes have strengths and weaknesses
Questions to Ask When Selecting a Manufacturing Process
- What are the physical requirements of the company’s product?
- How similar are one another are the products the company makes?
- What are the company’s production volumes?
- Where in the value chain does customization take place (if at all)?
Flexible Manufacturing Systems (FMSs)
Highly automated batch processes that can reduce the cost of making groups of similar products
Production Line
A type of manufacturing process used to product a narrow range of standard items with identical or highly similar designs
Characteristics of a Production Line
- Follows a product-based layout
- Steps are usually linked by some system that moves the items from one step to the next
- Suitable for high-volume production of the product(s) characterized by similar design attributes
- Need high volumes to justify the required investment in specialized equipment and labor
- Are inflexible with regard to items that do not fit the design characteristics of the production line
Product- Based Layout
A type of layout where resources are arranged sequentially, according to the steps required to make a product
Cycle Time
For a line process, the actual time between completions of successive units on a production line
Continuous Flow Process
- A type of manufacturing process that produces highly standardized products using a tightly linked, paced sequence of steps
- Closely resembles a production line process.
- The main difference is the form of the product, which usually cannot be broken into discrete units.
- Ex: yarns and fabrics, food products, and chemical products like oil and gas
Job Shop
- A type of manufacturing process used to make a wide variety of highly customized products in quantities as small as one.
- They are characterized by general puspose equipment and workers who are broadly skilled workers
- Main emphasis is meeting a customer’s unique requirements
- Product design is not standardized and work closely with customer
- Typically follow a functional layout
- Ex: custom furniture, specialized machine tools used by manufacturers, and restoration and refurbishing work
Functional Layout
- A type of layout where resources are physically grouped by a function
- Ex: molding, welding, paining
- Process steps required vary from one job to the next
Batch Manufacturing
- A type of manufacturing process where items are moved through different manufacturing steps in groups or batches
- Fits between job shops and lines in terms of production volumes and flexibility and strikes a balance between the flexibility of job shops and the efficiency of a line
- The most common type of manufacturing process
- The sequence of steps is not as tightly linked as the production line
Flexible Manufacturing Systems
Highly automated batch process that can reduce the cost of making groups of similar products
Fixed-Position Layout
A type of manufacturing process in which the position of the product is fixed. Materials, equipment, and workers are transported to and from the product
- Ex: shipbuilding, construction projects, and traditional homebuilding
Hybrid Manufacturing Process
General term referring to a manufacturing process that seeks to combine the characteristics, and hence advantages, of more than one of the classic processes
- Ex: include flexible manufacturing systems, machining centers, and group technology
Machining Center
A type of manufacturing process that completes several manufacturing steps without removing any items from the process
Group Technology
A type of manufacturing process that seeks to achieve the efficiencies of a line process in a batch environment by dedicating equipment and personnel to the manufacture of products with similar manufacturing characteristics
Cellular Layout
Type of layout typically used in group technology settings in which resources are physically arranged according to the dominant flow of activities for the product family
Product Family
In group technology, a set of products with very similar manufacturing requirements
Four Levels of Customization
- ) Made to Stock (MTS)
- ) Assemble to Order (ATO)
- ) Make to Order (MTO)
- ) Engineer to Order (ETO)
Make-to-Stock (MTS) Products
- Products that require no customization
- Are typically generic products and produced in large enough volumes to justify keeping a finished goods inventory
Assemble-to-Order (ATO) or (Finish-to-Order Products)
- Products that are customized only at the very end of the manufacturing process
- Ex: a T-shirt with a company name
Make-to-Order (MTO) Products
- Products that use standard components but have customer-specific final configuration of those components
- Ex: custom refrigeration units
Engineer-to-Order (RTO) Products
Products that are designed and produced from the start to meet unusual customer needs or requirements. They represent the highest level of customization
Upstream Activities
In the context of manufacturing customization it is the activities that occur before the point of customization
Downstream Activities
In the context of manufacturing customization it is the activities that occur at or after the point of customization
Law of Variability
- Greater random variability either demanded of the process or inherent in the process itself or in the terms processed, the less productive the process is
- Customization- Completing upstream activities off-line help isolate those activities from the variability caused by either timing or unique requirements of individual customers
When Customization Occurs Early in the Supply Chain
- Flexibility in response to unique customer needs will be greater
- Lead times to the customer will tend to be longer
- Products will tend to be more costly
When Customization Occurs Late in the Supply Chain
- Flexibility in response to unique customer needs will be limited
- Lead times to the customer will tend to be shorter
- Products will tend to be less costly
Service Processes- Dimensions on Which Services can Differ
- Nature of service package
- Degree of customization
- Level of customer contact
Service Package
A package that includes all the value-added physical and intangible activities that a service organization provides to a customer
Emphasis on physical and intangible activities
Physical Activities
More management’s focus will be towards capital expenditures (buildings, planes, and trucks) material costs, and other tangible assets
Intangible Activities
More critical are the training and retention of skilled employees and the development of the firm’s knowledge assets.
Service Customization
Ranges from highly customized to standardized