Order Description

 

 

You are required to conduct research into a named organisation that offers a range of services or products (or a single service or product). Using this information and combining it with academic
input to support your findings, present a report to discuss:

a) How important are each of Slack et al’s (2004, various later editions) five performance objectives to your chosen organisation? Which of the performance objectives (that the organisation might
aim to achieve) do you consider to be the most vital to its success in their marketplace? You should explain your conclusions using appropriate academic theories, ideas, and/or statements together
with information from the field research that you have gathered.

b) Just in time (JIT) is associated with the reduction of waste. Using Ohno’s classification of the seven types of waste (Hines & Rich, 1997, p47), analyse how your organisation has reduced waste
and how it may be able to reduce waste further. [You may wish to carry out a process activity map (Hines & Rich, 1997, pp51-52) as a way of identifying sources of waste].

c) What are the savings that your chosen organisation could make through reducing waste? If your organisation is unable to reduce waste, give the reasons why they are unable to change. Is there a
link between your chosen organisation’s relationship with waste and how important they view each of the five performance objectives?

 

 

 

Specific tasks:

a) An analysis of which performance objectives are prioritised and which are not, giving the rationale for the operations choices. The primary research needs to be directed to collecting this
information, ensure you understand the five objectives before conducting your data collection. Further you should be conscious that the actual words we apply academically may be varied in reality;
to avoid any risk of misunderstanding if this is the case, you may need to ensure your subject means what you think they mean, this may be achieved by re-phrasing the question or giving the subject
specific options, for example a rating scale related to importance of each factor.

 

b) Waste is potentially a cost to the operation that adds no value. This element requires a collection of information to identify what the operation does to reduce waste – using Ohno’s 7 wastes as
a paradigm. All 7 wastes should be considered, if one or more is not relevant to your operation you must state this and explain why. The waste reduction could be motivated by economic imperatives
not a desire to pursue JIT, again be conscious of this – e.g. reducing the cost of physical refuse collection. Organisation may free up physical space or make savings in terms of cost, physical
effort or time.

c) This section should indicate were waste can be removed or not – it is unlikely that a financial assessment will be possible, but you should be able to identify if financial savings are possible,
e.g. less frequent refuse collections (commercial operations pay for this service), reducing in utility bills (electricity, gas, water etc.). Wastes may not have an obvious financial impact, for
example an inefficient process flow- which if reorganised, rationalised may produce a faster throughput of goods and or services. If the operation exhibits no evidence of waste – how have they
achieved this state? For example the business model applied has been formulated using the principles of just in time from the outset.

A conclusion is required, as is a reference list. Appendices may be provided, but this should be supporting information only, e.g. raw data from your primary research.

Consider:

Secondary research will not provide the depth of information required.

The tasks require an internal analysis; customer opinion should not be included as it is not relevant.

You are advised that diagrams are a valuable method of presenting your data and identifying patterns, use as appropriate throughout the report.