What is“Operations Management”?(and why should you care?)
Dr. Ron Lembke, Ph.D.University of Nevada, Reno
Reaching me• Email: [email protected]• Phone: (775) 682-9164• WWW: http://business.unr.edu/faculty/ronlembke• Don’t call my house, and I won’t call yours.When emailing, please include “352” in the subject line.
Who Are You? (This is Homework)
In an email, please tell me the following:• Your name• Email address• Where From• Major• Interests / Hobbies• Musical interests• when you anticipate graduating• any experience you have had that might be relevant to
this course
The Goal What is the goal of a company?
Efficent & Effective• Efficiency: Doing things with the least use of
resources• Effectiveness: Doing the right thing at the right
time.• Value = Quality / $
What is Operations Management?
• Managing the systems or processes that create goods and/or provide services (p.4)
Goods vs. Services• Car• Coffee at Starbucks• Oil Change
Growth of Service Economy
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
1850 75 1900 25 50 75 2000
Services
Industry
Farming
Why OM is the most important area
•Marketing gets people to buy our product• Finance makes sure we have the money to
operate• Accounting keeps track of what we spend•Management keeps people on task• I/S makes sure systems work to support
everyone else• Operations actually makes the thing we
sell. Without operations, you can’t have a company.
Why Do You Care?
• Satisfying Customers depends on Operations• You must understand and work in or with
Operations:• Finance: Depr, Cash Flow, Make vs. Buy• Acctg: Cost estimates, Overhead, Inv valuation• Mktg: What can be done?• HR: job descr, standards, incentives• MIS: production, shipping, billing, receiving
Operations as Service
Everybody’s in serviceCore services: done correctly, customized to
their needs, delivered on time, priced competitively
Value-added services: make life easier, help do jobs easier:Information on product – data, specsProblem solving – help internal, external customerSales support – demo product trying to sellField support – replace parts quickly
Decisions of OM
1. Quality: what do customers want?2. Goods & Service Design: what to sell?3. Process & Capacity Design: how to make it and how much
capacity to have? When add more? Where? How?4. Location Selection: where to build?5. Layout Design: how to design facilities?
Decisions of OM6. Human Resource & Job Design: what skills and how many
people needed?7. Supply chain management: vendor management, who use as
suppliers?8. Inventory: how much and where?9. Scheduling: HR, facility needs, when?10. Maintenance: how much, when?
Current OM Issues
Flexible supply chains for mass customization of products and services
Global supplier, production, and distribution networksCommoditization of suppliers – “plug compatibility”Enhancing value-added servicesMaximizing use of internet to share information, coordinate
production
Continuous Improvement
• It used to be you had to be “good enough”• Now, you must be looking for ways to make your
customer happy, and meet their future needs • If you aren’t someone else is, and is going to take
your business
IGNORE YOUR TEETH, AND THEY’LL
GO AWAY
Sustainability
• Minimizing the company’s environmental impact• Minimize the impact of operations
• It’s the carbon, stupid• Pollution is bad, too• 97% of climate scientists• As for the 3 percent of scientists who
remain unconvinced, their average expertise is far below that of their colleagues, as measured by publication and citation rates