UNIT 4. Operations Management

Lead in: operations management

Vocabulary: key terms

Reading: rethinking mass production; overproduction

Speaking: procurement

Grammar: Future forms

Case Study: product innovation

Translation: key terms

Writing: manufacturing process; essay

Culture: different work cultures

Lead in

Discuss the quotations[15] given. What are they about? Give a title for each quote. Find other quotations that may reflect any aspects of operations management.

1. The best, most efficient, most profitable way to operate a business is to give everybody in the company a voice in saying how the company is run and a stake in the financial outcome, good or bad …. A business should be run like an aquarium, where everybody can see what’s going on — what’s going in, what’s moving around, what’s coming out. That’s the only way to make sure people understand what you’re doing, and why, and have some input into deciding where you are going. Then, when the unexpected happens, they know how to react and react quickly. (Jack Stack, “The Great Game of Business”)

2. Values should underpin Vision, which dictates Mission, which determines Strategy, which surfaces Goals that frame Objectives, which in turn drives the Tactics that tell an organization what Resources, Infrastructure and Processes are needed to support a certainty of execution… While successful leaders address all four areas, the best leaders always start with why followed very closely by who. Then, and only then, do they work on the design of what and how. (Mike Myatt)

3. The first rule of any technology used in a business is that automation applied to an efficient operation will magnify the efficiency. The second is that automation applied to an inefficient operation will magnify the inefficiency. (Bill Gates)

Vocabulary

These are the terms for you to learn.

A. Make sentences with them.

B. Translate them.

1. assemble- to-order	2. bulk production	3. finished goods	4. maintenance and repair
5. make on (make to order)	6. production cost	7. continuous production	8. production management
9. direct cost	10. assembly line	11. manufacturing cost	12. off-the-shelf
13. one-off production	14. production lead-time	15. piece-work	16. pilot plant
17. technological gap	18. mass production	19. product range	20. performance indicator
21. production overheads	22. throughput	23. by-product	24. safety stock
25. semi-finished product	26. workstation	27. quality control	28. work in progress (WIP)
29. productivity	30. industrial espionage	31. flow production

2. Match terms 1- 10 with definitions a- j:

Production management	a) The presence of a technology that other businesses do not have, so that it can produce a good whose cost might be higher than others’.
Production lead-time	b) A type of performance measurement when there is a need to understand well what is important (to an organization), various techniques to assess the present state of the business, and its key activities, are associated with the selection of it.
Maintenance and Repair	c) A measure of the efficiency of production which can be expressed as the ratio of output to inputs used in the production process.
Bulk production	d) All actions which have the objective of retaining or restoring an item in or to a state in which it can perform its required function.
Technological gap	e) The manufacture of a product on a large scale. The production of items is often done by using an assembly line, or another efficient means of production.
Productivity	f) Final product being produced based on the actual order requirements.
Mass production	g) The cost of direct material, direct labor, and manufacturing overheads in the fabrication, assembly, and testing of an end item.
Continuous production	h) The job of coordinating and controlling the activities required to make a product, typically involving effective control of scheduling, cost, performance, quality, and waste requirements.
Manufacturing cost	i) The manufacture of products requiring the sequential performance of different processes on a series of multiple machines receiving the material for manufacture through a closed channel.
10. Performance indicator	j) Period between receipt of an order and until when it is available for packing or shipment.