Needs for trade- offs - business strategy, Operation Management

Assignment Help:

Needs for Trade- offs - Business Strategy

In recent years another reason for questioning the need for trade-offs has arisen. In manufacturing industries great efforts have been expended in developing process technologies, and in particular the application of computers, to create production systems capable of mass customisation. Unlike a mass production system, which produces a standard product at low cost, a mass customisation system would produce 'specials' (traditionally the province of the high-cost job shop) at similar low cost. Such a system has been developed by Levi Strauss, the jeans manufacturer, allowing customers to have their jeans made to measure.

The customer's sizes are sent electronically to the factory, where a computer-driven production system automatically produces the jeans to the specified sizes. A few days later the customer may collect the jeans. Impressive though such technology may be, it raises issues. What then to measure? Ideally, the measures chosen will relate directly to the business qualifiers and order winners. However, care is required in the choice of operations performance measures; the order winners themselves may be inappropriate. For example, consider a business which has identified low price as the prime order winner. Price is an external (market) variable, which may rise or fall for reasons other than operational performance eg in response to competitors' pricing, sales promotions, seasonal price variations, etc. It would be unreasonable to measure the week-to-week performance of operations personnel on the basis of such a variable, which can change substantially for reasons outwith their control. What is needed is an internal (operational) variable, relevant to the order winner concerned: in the case of price it might be appropriate to measure unit cost, labour productivity or equipment utilisation.


Related Discussions:- Needs for trade- offs - business strategy

Explain training idea using any web 2.0 tools, Reading the Over 120 UCLA Ho...

Reading the Over 120 UCLA Hospital Staff Saw Celebrity Health Records article, what training could you as a manager put into place to avoid this situation? Present your training id

The soccer world cup is promoted, The Soccer World Cup is promoted aggressi...

The Soccer World Cup is promoted aggressively to both companies and fans. This is an example of marketing a(n) a. Event b. Idea c. Service d. Plac

Objectives of motion study, Objectives of Motion  Study 1.   Combine  ...

Objectives of Motion  Study 1.   Combine  relative  activities. 2.   Increases the  efficiency of activities. 3.   Reduce physical fatigue. 4.   Eliminate as many unne

Evaluation techniques in plants, what are the rcording techniques used in p...

what are the rcording techniques used in plants as a part of their evaluation method,with the help of data generate the charts?

Explain core value functioning system, In what ways and with two examples, ...

In what ways and with two examples, did Mentor Graphics fail at not focusing on where they wanted to be in the future, in giving a clear definition to the employees and creating a

Electronic data interchange, Electronic data interchange relies on   St...

Electronic data interchange relies on   Structured data and standard business documents.

Define evaluation of the merits or reliability of the source, Share a sourc...

Share a source you are planning to use in writing your Resource Scheduling Methods Analysis Paper. Provide an APA citation for the source. Provide a brief summary of the source, an

Describe the organizational design, 1) Define and discuss the advantages an...

1) Define and discuss the advantages and disadvantages of functional and matrix structures. 2) Define and discuss the advantages and disadvantages of cross-functional teams.

Explain product-by-value analysis, Prepare a product-by-value analysis for ...

Prepare a product-by-value analysis for the following products, and given the position in its life cycle, identify the issues likely to confront the operations manager, and his or

Write Your Message!

Captcha
Free Assignment Quote

Assured A++ Grade

Get guaranteed satisfaction & time on delivery in every assignment order you paid with us! We ensure premium quality solution document along with free turntin report!

All rights reserved! Copyrights ©2019-2020 ExpertsMind IT Educational Pvt Ltd