List at least three significant ways in which service systems differ from manufacturing systems.
> Why is lean hard to implement in practice?
> Will lean work in service environments? Why or why not?
> With so much productive capacity and room for expansion in the United States, why would a company based in the United States choose to purchase items from foreign firm? Discuss the pros and cons.
> In which ways, if any, are the following systems analogous to Kanban: returning empty bottles to the supermarket and picking up filled one; running a hot dog stand at lunchtime; withdrawing money from a checking account; raking leaves into bags?
> As the field of OSCM has advanced, new concepts have been applied to help companies compete in a number of ways, including the advertisement of the firm’s products or services. One recent concept to gain the attention of companies is promoting sustainab
> Explain how cards are used in a Kanban system.
> Discuss what is meant by forward loading and backward loading.
> What are the roles of suppliers and customers in a lean system?
> The following activities are part of a project to be scheduled using CPM: a. Draw the network. b. What is the critical path? c. How many weeks will it take to complete the project? d. How much slack does activity B have? АСTIVITY IMMEDIATE PREDECES
> What difference does it make if a customer wants a 10,000 unit order produced and delivered all at one time or in 2,500 unit batches?
> What inventory-related term is used to refer to points in a health care process where waiting takes place, either before or after treatment takes place?
> At first glance, the concepts of the focused factory and capacity flexibility may seem to contradict each other. Do they really?
> A fishing boat manufacturer, Pro Fishing Boats, is having many problems with critical globally sourced parts. Pro Fishing has two manufacturing facilities in the United States. The firm’s reliance on efficient global supply chain operations is i
> You are planning employees for a bank. You plan for six tellers. Tellers take 15 minutes per customer, with a standard deviation of seven minutes. Customers will arrive one every three minutes according to an exponential distribution (recall that the sta
> Circuit Board Fabricators, Inc. (CBF), is a small manufacturer of circuit boards located in California near San Jose. Companies such as Apple Computer and Hewlett- Packard use the company to make boards for prototypes of new products. It is important th
> Discuss how a production system is scheduled using MRP logic, JIT logic, and synchronous manufacturing logic.
> Cyprus Citrus Cooperative ships a high volume of individual orders for oranges to northern Europe. The paperwork for the shipping notices is done in the accompanying layout. Revise the layout to improve the flow and conserve space if possible. Filke
> Value stream mapping involves first developing a baseline map of the current situation of a company’s external and/or internal operations, and then applying lean concepts, developing a future state map that shows improved operations. Ex
> What type of worker constitutes the largest component of the hospital’s workforce?
> A cafeteria serving line has a coffee urn from which customers serve themselves. Arrivals at the urn follow a Poisson distribution at the rate of three per minute. In serving themselves, customers take about 15 seconds, exponentially distributed. a. How
> Do you think learning curve analysis has application in a service business like a restaurant? Why or why not?
> The Bijou Theater shows vintage movies. Customers arrive at the theater line at the rate of 100 per hour. The ticket seller averages 30 seconds per customer, which includes placing validation stamps on customers’ parking lot receipts and punching their f
> Students arrive at the Administrative Services Office at an average of one every 15 minutes, and their requests take, on average, 10 minutes to be processed. The service counter is staffed by only one clerk, Judy Gumshoes, who works eight hours per day.
> A bank of machines in a manufacturing shop breaks down according to the following interarrival time distribution. The time it takes one repairperson to complete the repair of a machine is given in the service time distribution. Simulate the breakdown o
> During the campus Spring Fling, the bumper car amusement attraction has a problem of cars becoming disabled and in need of repair. Repair personnel can be hired at the rate of $20 per hour, but they only work as one team. Thus, if one person is hired, he
> One manufacturer has seen a typical learning percentage of 90% in their firm. They have recently found out that a competitor of theirs has a percentage of 85%. What do you think about this?
> “Shouldice Hospital, the house that hernias built, is a converted country estate which gives the hospital ‘a country club’ appeal.” A quote from American Medical News Shouldice Hosp
> Why would subcontractors for a government project want their activities on the critical path? Under what conditions would they try to avoid being on the critical path?
> What factors account for the resurgence of interest in OSCM today?
> Francis Johnson’s plant needs to design an efficient assembly line to make a new product. The assembly line needs to produce 15 units per hour, and there is room for only four workstations. The tasks and the order in which they must be
> Discuss ways to use lean to improve one of the following: a pizza restaurant, a hospital, or an auto dealership.
> As Operations Manager, you are concerned about being able to meet sales requirements in the coming months. You have just been given the following production report. Find the average monthly productivity (units per machine hour). JAN FEB MAR APR Uni
> MRP is based on what type of demand?
> Various financial data for the past two years follow. Calculate the total productivity measure and the partial measures for labor, capital, and raw materials for this company for both years. What do these measures tell you about this compa
> Compare the importance and relevance of quality control in JIT, MRP, and synchronous manufacturing.
> A U.S. manufacturing company operating a subsidiary in an LDC (less-developed country) shows the following results: a. Calculate partial labor and capital productivity figures for the parent and subsidiary. Do the results seem misleading
> Sailmaster makes high-performance sails for competitive windsurfers. Below is information about the inputs and outputs for one model, the Windy 2000. Calculate the productivity in sales revenue/labor expense. Units sold 1,217 Sale price each $1,70
> What methodology is used to assess a client’s performance relative to the expectations of its customers or the performance of its competitors?
> Daily demand for a product is 60 units with a standard deviation of 10 units. The review period is 10 days, and lead time is 2 days. At the time of review, there are 100 units in stock. If 98 percent service probability is desired, how many units should
> Find examples where companies have used features related to environmental sustainability to win new customers.
> In manufacturing, quality measures are largely based on hard evidence. In health care, quality and service measures are largely based on what?
> What relationship is there between learning curves and productivity measurement?
> Why is simulation often called a technique of last resort?
> What do the expressions order winners and order qualifiers mean? What was the order winner(s) for your last purchase of a product or service?
> What are the pro and cons of relocating a small or midsized manufacturing firm (that makes mature products) from the United States to China?
> Why does the proper operations and supply chain strategy keep changing for companies that are world-class competitors?
> What are the major priorities associated with operations and supply chain strategy? How has their relationship to each other changed over the years?
> What is meant by triple-bottom-line strategy? Give an example of a company that has adopted this type of strategy.
> What are characteristics of efficient, responsive, risk-hedging and agile supply chains? Can a supply chain be both efficient and responsive? Risk-hedging and agile? Why, or why not?
> Some manufacturing firms contract with an outside company to manage the firm’s logistics functions. What is the general term for a firm that provides such services?
> What do we mean when we say productivity is a relative measure?
> Will the Human Resource Management (HRM) policies of a firm have much of an effect on the learning rates the firm may be able to achieve?
> Identify an operations and supply chain - related disruption that recently impacted a company. What could the company have done to have minimized the impact of this type of disruption prior to it occurring?
> What mode of transportation is limited to specialized products such as liquids and gases?
> Retailers Warehouse (RW) is an independent supplier of household items to department stores. RW attempts to stock enough items for a 98 percent service probability. A stainless steel knife set is one item it stocks. Demand (2,400 sets per year) is relati
> Hospitals are major users of poka-yoke (fail-safe) devices. Can you think of any?
> What is the term used to refer to the application of the scientific method to evaluate alternative treatment methods and create guidelines for similar clinical situations?
> Item X is a standard item stocked in a company’s inventory of component parts. Each year, the firm, on a random basis, uses about 2,000 of item X, which costs $25 each. Storage costs, which include insurance and cost of capital, amount to $5 per unit of
> S. L. P. Craft would like your help in developing a layout for a new outpatient clinic to be built in California. From analysis of another recently built clinic, she obtains the data shown in the following diagram. This includes the number of trips made
> Look at the job postings at http://www.apics.org and evaluate the opportunities for an OSM major with several years of experience. There are pages and pages of these in the APICS Career Center. Here are some examples: Global Active Ingredient Supply Pla
> Which major OSCM concept can be described as an integrated set of activities designed to achieve high-volume production using minimal inventories of parts that arrive at workstations exactly when they are needed?
> Order the following major concepts that have helped define the OSCM field on a time line. Use 1 for the earliest to be introduced, and 5 for the most recent. Supply chain management Manufacturing strategy de
> At times in the past, the dollar showed relative weakness with respect to foreign currencies, such as the yen, mark, and pound. This stimulated exports. Why would long-term reliance on a lower valued dollar be at best a short-term solution to the compe
> What is the difference between a service and a good?
> The learning curve phenomenon has been shown in practice to be widely applicable. Once a company has established a learning rate for a process, they can use it to predict future system performance. Would there be any reason to reevaluate the process’ lea
> What is product-service bundling and what are the benefits to customers?
> Match the following OSCM job titles with the appropriate duties and responsibilities. Plant manager A. Plans and coordinates staff activities such as new product development and new facility location. - Supply chain manager B. Oversees the movement
> A certain custom engraving shop has traditionally had orders for between 1 and 50 units of whatever a customer orders. A large company has contacted this shop about engraving “reward” plaques (which are essentially identical to each other). It wants the
> What is the term used to describe arrangements to move clinical information across various information systems while still maintaining the meaning of the information being exchanged?
> In a data box on a value stream map, what do the abbreviations CT and C/O mean?
> Distinguish between a channel and a phase.
> Which scheduling process drives requirements in the MRP process?
> What service industry has impressed you the most with its innovativeness?
> What mode of transportation is involved in the movement of the greatest number of products?
> Daily demand for a product is 100 units, with a standard deviation of 25 units. The review period is 10 days and the lead time is 6 days. At the time of review, there are 50 units in stock. If 98 percent service probability is desired, how many units sho
> What high-level position manager is responsible for working with the CEO and company president to determine the company’s competitive strategy?
> Define the service package of your college or university. What is its strongest element? What is its weakest one?
> Where would you place Shouldice Hospital on the product–process framework (see Chapter 5 case, “Shouldice Hospital—A Cut Above”)? What are the implications of adding a specialty such as cosmetic surgery?
> What recent changes have caused supply chain management to gain importance?
> Is it possible to achieve zero inventories? Why or why not?
> What was the first major project management information system that is now commonly used for managing very large projects?
> The following scenario was written by a reporter who became a Taco Bell worker for a few hours to experience what it’s like to work at one of the most high-tech quick-serve restaurant chains in the world. As you read, visualize how you could anal
> Recently, Phil Harris, the production control manager at Brunswick, read an article on time-phased requirements planning. He was curious about how this technique might work in scheduling Brunswick’s engine assembly operations and d
> Research and compare the inventory turnover ratios of three large retailers: Walmart, Target, and Nordstrom’s. Use the same financial web site for all three, and compare numbers from the same time frame. What do these ratios tell you? Are you surprise
> Why is it desirable to increase a company’s inventory turnover ratio?
> Some people tend to use the terms effectiveness and efficiency interchangeably, though we’ve seen they are different concepts. But is there any relationship at all between them? Can a firm be effective but inefficient? Very efficient but essentially i
> Define process batch and transfer batch and their meaning in each of these applications: MRP, JIT and bottleneck or constrained resource logic.
> Why might managers resist buying a more expensive piece of equipment that is known to have a lower TCO than a less expensive item?
> What is the current “hot area” for operations consultants in both manufacturing and services?
> Have you ever purchased a product based on purchase price alone and were surprised by the eventual TCO, either in money or in time? Describe the situation
> Describe how outsourcing works. Why would a firm want to outsource?
> As a supplier, which factors would you consider about a buyer (your potential customer) to be important in setting up a long-term relationship?
> As in manufacturing, productivity and capacity utilization are important performance measures in health care operations. What are the similarities and differences in how these measures might be used in the two different industries?
> Describe the differences between functional and innovative products.
> Some have argued that for hospitals, both medical schools and nursing schools should be considered part of the supply chain. Do you agree?
> Remote diagnosis uses electronic devices for diagnosing patients at a distance. What is another term used to refer to this practice?
> What is the MRP term for the time periods used in planning?
> What could a hospital learn from benchmarking a Ritz-Carlton Hotel? Southwest Airlines? Disneyland?
> Would you expect the Poisson distribution to be a good approximation of a. Runners crossing the finish line in the Boston Marathon? b. Arrival times of the student in your OM class? c. Arrival times of the bus to you stop at school?
> How does a physician-driven supply chain differ from a typical materials supply chain?
