Strategic Operations Management Decisions: A Consultant's Report

Company Description

All managers are expected to redress the basic functions of the management process, including planning, organizing, staffing, leading, and controlling. The ten strategic operations management decisions are listed as follows.

1. Design of goods and services: Defines much of what is required of operations in each of the other OM decisions. For instance, product design usually determines the lower limits of cost and the upper limits of quality, as well as major implications for sustainability and the human resources required.

2. Managing quality: Determines the customer’s quality expectations and establishes policies and procedures to identify and achieve that quality.

3. Process and capacity strategy: Determines how a good or service is produced the process for production) and commits management to specific technology, quality, human resources, and capital investments that determine much of the firm’s basic cost structure.

4. Location strategy: Requires judgments regarding nearness to customers, suppliers, and talent, while considering costs, infrastructure, logistics, and government.

5. Layout strategy: Requires integrating capacity needs, personnel levels, technology, and inventory requirements to determine the efficient flow of materials, people, and information.

6. Human resources and job design: Determines how to recruit, motivate, and retain personnel with the required talent and skills. People are an integral and expensive part of the total system design.

7. Supply chain management: Decides how to integrate the supply chain into the firm’s strategy, including decisions that determine what is to be purchased, from whom, and under what conditions.

8. Inventory management: Considers inventory ordering and holding decisions and how to optimize them as customer satisfaction, supplier  capability, and production schedules are considered.

9. Scheduling: Determines and implements intermediate- and short-term schedules that effectively and efficiently utilize both personnel and facilities while meeting customer demands.

10. Maintenance: Requires decisions that consider facility capacity, production demands, and personnel necessary to maintain a reliable and stable process.

You are acting as a consultant to the senior managers of an organization and tasked with assisting them in examining and developing the operation management decision making. Specifically, you are required to produce a report including the following sections.

a. Background
b. Objectives

a. Include subsections for each of the ten decision areas, explaining how they are relevant and applied in this organization.

b. Emphasize the five most important decision areas.

a. Explain how performance is evaluated in this organization.
b. Emphasize productivity and forecasting.

Conclusions

a. The main finding that may interest the managers.
b. Recommendations for improvements.