Operations management
Introduction
Operation management contains several objectives; companies manage their operation with the aim of improving their organizational productivity, flexibility, quality, dependability, and for achieving cost benefits. Any organization who wants to evaluate its operations’ performance, these are the factors against which the performance should be evaluated (Barnes, 2004).
The objective of the report is to assess the input/output transformation model of an operation function critically. For the attainment of this objective, Wal-Mart is selected for examination.
Wal-Mart, a retail giant, is an American international retail company, which is involved in operating a chain of grocery stores, discount department stores, and supermarket. It had total 11620 units until 2015; the store is operating in 28 countries under 65 banners around the world. Currently, the store has total 620 stores in the United Kingdom, and the store has grown as the second largest supermarket of Britain. Wal-Mart has 169568 associates in the country (United Kingdom) (Wal-Mart, 2016).
How Operations Management, in manufacturing, service, private, public, and voluntary sectors, fits within the overall organization and with other functions.
Operation management is all about producing services and products in effective and efficient manners. Wal-Mart invests million dollars in its operations for lowering down its cost. The store just not understands the customer needs and its market, but also manages its operations in a way that it can supply services and products to its customers in cost effective and efficient manners. The store is recognized for its visual merchandising and store layout for making the customer experience better (Storify, 2016). The organization reduced its SCM links, started working directly with producers with the objective of cutting the cost, and quickens the flow of supplies. Wal-Mart went aboard as through the strategic sourcing the company wanted to find the products at the best price that can meet the demand of customers. The retailer arranged the delivery of the product through cross-docking technique. The store uses advanced technology for keeping the store clean with the objective of cutting cost in failure prevention and for forecasting demand for predicting inventory level. The aim of forecasting demand is to cope up with the demand fluctuation that could result in inventory waste if over purchased. These activities represent partial efforts of the company of its overall operation management. If the store lacks in these activities, it will result in empty shelves, dissatisfied customers and staff, lower quality, poor customer experience, and late deliveries (Lu, 2016).
Input/output Transformation Model
The Wal-Mart is a retail giant that does not produce products, but it produces service. Therefore, the input/output transformation model is presented from the perspective of the service organization.
The input of the store is information regarding the customer purchase that is gathered from the sale of the point. This input (customer purchase data or information) is then sent to warehouse for inventory management. Data is used to procure most demanded products with the aim of delivering efficient services to customers. The procured material is loaded on trucks for delivering them to retail outlets. After reaching the retail outlet, the products are restocked on shelves by staff. In result of transforming the information, the retailer is able to deliver low cost and high quality products to its customers with excellent in-store experience in the shape of full shelves with the required material (Chandran, 2003). In this way, the operation management fits in other functions of the organization.
Strategic Role of Operations Management
The word strategic refers to important things, things that are essential in the action plan of an organization. Thus, the role of OM in a business is to make sure the attainment of organizational goals (Mintzberg, 2015). The OM plays an important role in the strategic characterization of items at Wal-Mart. Quality management is a part of OM, and it applies to Wal-Mart at three tier quality standards. This three-tire approach through OM helps the organization in making a decision on quality management. Operation management helps Wal-Mart in selecting the most appropriate process and capacity designing. Constant assessment of store capacity helps the organization in deciding to continue with existing design or in the adaption of the new. Operation management enables the company to select the stores’ location and design strategically so they can attain their cost minimization objectives. OM assists Wal-Mart in maximizing productivity for supporting the minimization of cost through selecting different options (Smithson, 2015).
Factors That Contribute To Good Process Design
Design refers to the arrangement and working of things before their creation. It is essential for the good process design that the objective of design is clear. Understanding the functions and expectations of the store is essential for good process design. Product design is an important factor and contributes immensely to good process design. Little change in product design has serious implication in transforming the process design. The aim of the process design is to make sure that the performance of design is gaining the set objectives. For example, of the objective of the performance is “quality” then the process design will aim to provide error free processing, appropriate resources, and capability of achieving the specification of services.
The Wal-Mart aims to reduce the cost and offer products to its customers, at a lower possible price as compared to its competitors. Thus, the process design of the company is based on reduced supply chain activities. The company eliminated the process waste from its supply chain that resulted in lower resource cost, processing cost, inventory, and delay cost (Slack, Chambers & Johnston, 2010).
Operations Concepts and Techniques to Address Real Operations Problems
The process design of the new stores is not appropriate as the previous stores. Improvement of process design is about reducing the activities that generate waste. For improving the store process design, the Wal-Mart should use the process mapping technique. Through this technique, the store can eliminate the waste activities. The aim of the store is to offer products at every day low price to customers. Thus, the store can incorporate the digital service with its physical store so people can visits the store by sitting at home and can order what they want for delivery or in-store pickup. It will just not reduce the time waste that occurs in the result of waiting in queue for making payments, but will enhance the service delivery process and sale as well. For maintaining the quality (fresh items, wider product assortments, general merchandising, etc.) of the products, it is crucial for the store to manage the capacity. For the management of capacity, managers can use planning and control techniques.
List of References
Barnes, D. (2004). Operations Management: An International. UK: Thomson Perspective
Wal-Mart. (2016). United Kingdom at a glance. Available from http://corporate.walmart.com/our-story/our-locations#/united-kingdom [Accessed 25 January 2016]
Storify. (2016). Wal-Mart Store Layout and Visual Merchandising. Available from https://storify.com/qma4/walmart-store-layouts [Accessed 25 January 2016]
Lu, C. (2016). Incredibly successful supply chain management: how does Wal-Mart do it?. Available from https://www.tradegecko.com/blog/incredibly-successful-supply-chain-management-walmart [Accessed 25 January 2016]
Chandran, P. (2003). Wal-Mart’s supply chain management practices. Available from http://mohanchandran.files.wordpress.com/2008/01/wal-mart.pdf [Accessed 25 January 2016]
Mintzberg, H. (2015). Strategy Bites Back ePub eBook. UK: Pearson UK.
Smithson, N. (2015). Wal-Mart: Operations Management 10 Decisions, Productivity. Panmore Institute. Available from: http://panmore.com/walmart-operations-management-10-decisions-areas-productivity-case-study-analysis [Accessed 25 January 2016]
Slack, N., Chambers, S., & Johnston, R. (2010). Operations Management. Italy : Prentice Hall.
