Operations Management Assignment 1

Case Selection and Process Identification

Objectives

This assignment helps you develop the skills to master the following course

competencies:

o Develop innovative and sustainable solutions to strategic and global operations

management challenges.

o Apply theories, models, and practices of global operations management to

address business problems.

o Communicate in a manner that is professional and consistent with expectations

for members of the business professions.

Overview

In your assignments throughout this course, you will build an operations improvement

plan (OIP) for a company of your choice that is facing, or recently faced, an operations

challenge. If you have not already done so, take some time now to read all of the

assignments for this course. Each of the first five assignments represents a component

of a typical OIP. For the Unit 6 assignment, you will improve, revise, and compile your

work to deliver a finalized OIP, incorporating updates and focusing on the message you

want to deliver to the organizational leaders at the company.

With this first assignment, you will choose your company and state the specific

challenge it is facing. You will also need to identify two organizational processes that

you believe would be worth addressing.

The assigned readings for this course are a starting point for your research, but it will be

necessary for you to conduct further independent research on the subject in order to

build your OIP. The Capella library is a recommended source of scholarly and

professional information on the subject. You are required to search information related

to the industry of your selected company by using The Wall Street Journal. At least one

case or article from The Wall Street Journal is required to be cited and listed in your

reference section.

Guidelines for Choosing a Client Company

The organization you choose to research and to build your operations improvement

plan for in this course will be referred to as your client company. What type of company

and challenge will suit your project in this course? Read the instructions for the Unit 6

assignment, Operations Improvement Plan, before selecting your client company. Below

are a few other guidelines for choosing a company that is likely to be successful for this

project:

o You may choose any organization that offers some kind of products or services,

as long as:

 The organization is large and/or complex enough to require strategic

operations management processes.

 You can find sufficient information about the organization to fulfill the

tasks outlined in the Unit 6 Operations Improvement Plan instructions.

 If you choose an organization that you have worked for, or are personally

connected to, be sure to follow the privacy guidelines of that organization.

Contact your instructor if you have questions.

o Your client company should be facing a challenge that suits the objectives of the

operations improvement plan.

o It may be easier to choose a client company in the mechanical or automotive

industries, because they may be more similar to the corporations you will study

in our required course readings. However, this is not a requirement

• Instructions

For this assignment, complete the following. Your analyses should be as thorough as

possible. Be sure to cite your resources for this information.

o Identify a company and a challenge that warrant an operations

improvement plan (OIP).

o Using your preliminary research, identify at least two of your client

company's existing organizational processes at the time of the problem

that require operational improvement. You will develop an OIP that would

replace one or more of these processes. For this assignment, your task is

to pick the processes best suited to your OIP.

 Importance: What is the importance of the process to the

organization?

o Analyze the impact of the existing process on the organization, currently:

 Scope: What is the scope of each process you intend to change?

What is the breadth of its reach?

 Parties involved: What customers, as well as internal and external

suppliers, are affected by this process?

 Priority: What is the timeliness or urgency for resolving the issues

involved in this process?

Submission Requirements

o Written communication: Written communication should be free of errors

that detract from the overall message.

o APA formatting: Resources and citations should be formatted according to

current APA style and formatting standards.

o Resources: Minimum of 2 sources required. At least one is required from

The Wall Street Journal.

o Font and font size: Times New Roman, 12 point.

Refer to the assignment scoring guide to ensure that you meet the grading criteria for

this assignment.

• Resources

o Case Selection and Process Identification Scoring Guide.

o Research Guide-MBA Library Guide.

o The Wall Street Journal.

Readings (see attachment)

Use your Operations and Supply Chain Management text to complete the following:

o Read Chapter 1, "Introduction to Operations and Supply Chain

Management," pages 1–31.

 This reading provides you with an overview of processes and

methods. Managers must understand how to efficiently manage

operations within their organizations. They also must develop skills

and strategies for the coordination of operations across a global

supply chain.

 You may also wish to visit the supplement, "Operational

Decision-Making Tools: Decision Analysis," as found on pages

32–52.

o Read Chapter 2, "Quality Management," pages 53–106.

 This reading gives you an idea of the value of process improvement

and quality. In order for an organization to gain success in

improving and managing product and service quality, a complete

commitment to quality is necessary throughout the organization

and its supply chain. Six Sigma is introduced to improve process

implementation and quality. ISO 9000 standards and certifications

are employed by successful companies in order to remain

competitive in international markets.

Use the Capella library to complete the following:

o Read Deming's 1987 article, "Transformation of Today's Management,"

from Executive Excellence, volume 4, issue 12, page 8.

 You will use this article as you complete this unit's discussion.

o Read dos Santos, de Mello, and de Almeida Cunha's 2016 article, "The

Leadership Process During an Organizational Crisis," in the Journal of

Operations and Supply Chain Management, volume 9, issue 1, pages 94–

107.

 Note: for the purposes of this course, you will only need to read

pages 102–107, the "Main Findings" and "Discussion" sections near

the end of the article.

Use the Internet to complete the following:

o Read Gerondeau's 2015 article, "How Toyota Recovered From a Huge

Crisis. What Can Be Learned From It."