Name four areas that are significant to improving labor productivity.
> The financial statements of Apple Inc. for 2014 are presented in Appendix A. Instructions Refer to Apple’s financial statements and answer the following questions. (a) What were Apple’s total assets at September 27, 2014? At September 28, 2013? (b) How m
> What are the three time estimates used with PERT?
> What are dummy activities? Why are they used in activity on arrow= (AOA) project networks?
> Define earliest start, earliest finish, latest finish, and latest start times.
> In December, General Motors produced 6,600 customized vans at its plant in Detroit. The labor productivity at this plant is known to have been 0.10 vans per labor-hour during that month. 300 laborers were employed at the plant that month. a) How many hou
> Describe how expected activity times and variances can be computed in a PERT network.
> What is the use of Gantt charts in project management?
> What are some of the questions that can be answered with PERT and CPM?
> How can we determine the probability that a project will be completed by a certain date? What assumptions are made in this computation?
> What is the difference between the waterfall approach and agile project management?
> Name some of the widely used project management software programs.
> How the variance of the total project is computed in PERT?
> Would a project manager ever consider crashing a noncritical activity in a project network? Explain convincingly.
> Students are sometimes confused by the concept of critical path, and want to believe that it is the shortest path through a network. Convincingly explain why this is not so.
> What would a project manager have to do to crash an activity?
> Refer to Problems 1.12 and 1.13. Problem 1.12: Charles Lackey operates a bakery in Idaho Falls, Idaho. Because of its excellent product and excellent location, demand has increased by 25% in the last year. On far too many occasions, customers have not
> What is the significance of the critical path?
> What is the difference between an activity-on-arrow (AOA) network and an activity-on-node (AON) network? Which is primarily used in this chapter?
> Define work breakdown structure. How is it used?
> What are the three phases involved in the management of a large project?
> Explain the purpose of project organization.
> Give an example of a situation in which project management is needed.
> How would you summarize outsourcing trends?
> How must an operations strategy integrate with marketing and accounting?
> Given the discussion of Southwest Airlines in the text, define an operations strategy for that firm now that it has purchased AirTran.
> How does an OM strategy change during a product’s life cycle?
> Refer to Problem 1.12. The pay will be $8 per hour for employees. Charles Lackey can also improve the yield by purchasing a new blender. The new blender will mean an increase in his investment. This added investment has a cost of $100 per month, but he w
> Identify the mission and strategy of your automobile repair garage. What are the manifestations of the 10 strategic OM decisions at the garage? That is, how is each of the 10 decisions accomplished?
> What global operations strategy is most descriptive of McDonald’s?
> What potential cost-saving advantages might firms experience by using outsourcing?
> There are three primary ways to achieve competitive advantage. Provide an example, not included in the text, of each. Support your choices.
> As a library or Internet assignment, identify the mission of a firm and the strategy that supports that mission.
> Describe how an organization’s mission and strategy have different purposes.
> Define strategy.
> Define mission.
> Coca-Cola is called a global product. Does this mean that Coca-Cola is formulated in the same way throughout the world? Discuss.
> List six reasons to internationalize operations.
> Brown’s, a local bakery, is worried about increased costs—particularly energy. Last year’s records can provide a fairly good estimate of the parameters for this year. Wende Brown, the owner, does not
> Based on the descriptions and analyses in this chapter, would Boeing be better described as a global firm or a transnational firm? Discuss.
> What are some of the possible consequences of poor outsourcing?
> How should a company select an outsourcing provider?
> What internal issues must managers address when outsourcing?
> As a library or Internet assignment, find the U.S. productivity rate (increase) last year for the (a) national economy, (b) manufacturing sector, and (c) service sector.
> Describe some of the actions taken by Taco Bell to increase productivity that have resulted in Taco Bell’s ability to serve “twice the volume with half the labor.”
> What are the five reasons productivity is difficult to improve in the service sector?
> Mass customization and rapid product development were identified as challenges to modern manufacturing operations. What is the relationship, if any, between these challenges? Can you cite any examples?
> What are the measurement problems that occur when one attempts to measure productivity?
> The U.S., and indeed much of the rest of the world, has been described as a “knowledge society.” How does this affect productivity measurement and the comparison of productivity between the U.S. and other countries?
> Lillian Fok is president of Lakefront Manufacturing, a producer of bicycle tires. Fok makes 1,000 tires per day with the following resources: a) What is the labor productivity per labor-hour for these tires at Lakefront Manufacturing? b) What is the mu
> Identify the 10 strategic operations management decisions.
> What are the three basic functions of a firm?
> Answer Question 4 for some other organization, perhaps an organization where you have worked.
> Figure 1.1 outlines the operations, finance/accounting, and marketing functions of three organizations. Prepare a chart similar to Figure 1.1 outlining the same functions for one of the following: a. a newspaper b. a drugstore c. a college library d. a s
> Kimpel Products makes pizza ovens for commercial use. James Kimpel, CEO, is contemplating producing smaller ovens for use in high school and college kitchens. The activities necessary to build an experimental model and related data are given in the follo
> Development of Version 2.0 of a particular accounting software product is being considered by Jose Noguera’s technology firm in Baton Rouge. The activities necessary for the completion of this project are listed in the following table:
> Three activities are candidates for crashing on a project network for a large computer installation (all are, of course, critical). Activity details are in the following table: a) What action would you take to reduce the critical path by 1 day? b) Assu
> What is the minimum cost of crashing the following project that Roger Solano manages at Slippery Rock University by 4 days? NORMAL CRASH TIME ACTIVITY (DAYS) (DAYS) TIME NORMAL CRASH IMMEDIATE COST COST PREDECESSOR(S) A 6 5 $ 900 $1,000 6 300 400 4
> Assume that the activities in Problem 3.11 have the following costs to shorten: A, $300/week; B, $100/week; C, $200/ week; E, $100/week; and F, $400/week. Assume also that you can crash an activity down to 0 weeks in duration and that every week you can
> George Kyparisis (using data from Problem 1.5) determines his costs to be as follows: Labor: $10 per hour Resin: $5 per pound Capital expense: 1% per month of investment Energy: $0.50 per BTU Show the percent change in productivity for one month last
> Using PERT, Adam Munson was able to determine that the expected project completion time for the construction of a pleasure yacht is 21 months, and the project variance is 4. a) What is the probability that the project will be completed in 17 months? b) W
> Four Squares Productions, a firm hired to coordinate the release of the movie Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (starring Johnny Depp), identified 16 activities to be completed before the release of the film. a) How many weeks in advance of the
> Rich Cole Control Devices, Inc., produces custom built relay devices for auto makers. The most recent project undertaken by Cole requires 14 different activities. Cole’s managers would like to determine the total project completion time
> The estimated times and immediate predecessors for the activities in a project at George Kyparis’s retinal scanning company are given in the following table. Assume that the activity times are independent. a) Calculate the expected ti
> Kelle Carpet and Trim installs carpet in commercial offices. Peter Kelle has been very concerned with the amount of time it took to complete several recent jobs. Some of his workers are very unreliable. A list of activities and their optimistic completio
> A renovation of the gift shop at Orlando Amway Center has six activities (in hours). For the following estimates of a, m, and b, calculates the expected time and the standard deviation for each activity: ACTIVITY m b A 11 15 19 B 27 31 41 18 18 18 D
> Ross Hopkins, president of Hopkins Hospitality, has developed the tasks, durations, and predecessor relationships in the following table for building new motels. Draw the AON network and answer the questions that follow. a) What is the expected (estima
> The Rover 6 is a new custom-designed sports car. An analysis of the task of building the Rover 6 reveals the following list of relevant activities, their immediate predecessors, and their duration: a) Draw a network diagram for the project. b) Mark the
> Dave Fletcher (see Problem 3.12) was able to determine the activity times for constructing his laser scanning machine. Fletcher would like to determine ES, EF, LS, LF, and slack for each activity. The total project completion time and the critical path s
> The following is a table of activities associated with a project at Rafay Ishfaq’s software firm in Chicago, their durations, and what activities each must precede: a) Draw an AON diagram of the project, including activity durations.
> George Kyparisis makes bowling balls in his Miami plant. With recent increases in his costs, he has a newfound interest in efficiency. George is interested in determining the productivity of his organization. He would like to know if his organization is
> The activities described by the following table are given for the Howard Corporation in Kansas: a) Draw the appropriate AON PERT diagram for J.C. Howard’s management team. b) Find the critical path. c) What is the project completion t
> Task time estimates for the modification of an assembly line at Jim Goodale’s Carbondale, Illinois, factory are as follows: a) Draw the project network using AON. b) Identify the critical path. c) What is the expected project length?
> Roger Ginde is developing a program in supply chain management certification for managers. Ginde has listed a number of activities that must be completed before a training program of this nature could be conducted. The activities, immediate predecessors,
> James Lawson has decided to run for a seat as Congressman from the House of Representatives, District 34, in Florida. He views his 8-month campaign for office as a major project and wishes to create a work breakdown structure (WBS) to help control the de
> The work breakdown structure (WBS) for building a house (levels 1 and 2) is shown below: a) Add two level-3 activities to each of the level-2 activities to provide more detail to the WBS. b) Select one of your level-3 activities and add two level-4 act
> Briefly describe the contributions of the four individuals identified in the preceding question.
> Does Boeing practice a multinational operations strategy, a global operations strategy, or a transnational operations strategy? Support your choice with specific references to Boeing’s operations and the characteristics of each type of organization.
> Rao Technologies, a California-based high-tech manufacturer, is considering outsourcing some of its electronics production. Four firms have responded to its request for bids, and CEO Mohan Rao has started to perform an analysis on the scores his OM team
> Walker Accounting Software is marketed to small accounting firms throughout the U.S. and Canada. Owner George Walker has decided to outsource the company’s help desk and is considering three providers: Manila Call Center (Philippines),
> Fernando Garza’s firm wishes to use factor rating to help select an outsourcing provider of logistics services. a) With weights from 1–5 (5 highest) and ratings 1–100 (100 highest), use the following
> Why should one study operations management?
> Claudia Pragram Technologies, Inc., has narrowed its choice of outsourcing provider to two firms located in different countries. Pragram wants to decide which one of the two countries is the better choice, based on risk-avoidance criteria. She has polled
> Identify how changes in the external environment affect the OM strategy for a company. For instance, discuss what impact the following external factors might have on OM strategy: a) Major increases in oil prices. b) Water- and air-quality legislation. c)
> Identify how changes within an organization affect the OM strategy for a company. For instance, discuss what impact the following internal factors might have on OM strategy: a) Maturing of a product. b) Technology innovation in the manufacturing process.
> Within the food service industry (restaurants that serve meals to customers, but not just fast food), find examples of firms that have sustained competitive advantage by competing on the basis of (1) cost leadership, (2) response, and (3) differentiation
> The text provides three primary strategic approaches (differentiation, cost, and response) for achieving competitive advantage. Provide an example of each not given in the text. Support your choices. (Hint: Note the examples provided in the text.)
> Based on the competitiveness ranking developed by the Global Competitiveness Index (www.weforum.org), rank the following countries from most competitive to least: Mexico, Switzerland, the U.S., and China.
> Based on the corruption perception index developed by Transparency International (www.transparency.org), rank the following countries from most corrupt to least: Venezuela, Denmark, the U.S., Switzerland, and China.
> Match the product with the proper parent company and country in the table below: PRODUCT PARENT COMPANY COUNTRY Arrow Shirts a. Volkswagen 1. France 2. Great Britain Braun Household b. Bidermann International Appliances c. Bridgestone d. Campbell So
> Identify four people who have contributed to the theory and techniques of operations management.
> As part of a study for the Department of Labor Statistics, you are assigned the task of evaluating the improvement in productivity of small businesses. Data for one of the small businesses you are to evaluate are shown at right. The data are the monthly
> Describe the meaning of slack, and discuss how it can be determined.
> Is It Ethical to Target the Homeless for Admittance into For-Profit Universities? Benson Rollins wants a college degree. The unemployed high school dropout who attends Alcoholics Anonymous and has been homeless for 10 months is being courted by the Univ
> Should Goldman Sachs Force Executives to Donate Some of Their Pay to Charity? Preparing for the negative publicity that's certain to fall on Wall Street when the first 2009 bonus checks are cut, Goldman Sachs is pondering the expansion of a program requ
> Should Companies Be Allowed to Ask Employees about Family Health History? Companies generally consider the costs and benefits associated with their strategies in order to be successful. This dilemma involves the conflict between a company's desire to de
> Should Surgical-Device Firms Be Allowed to Market Products for Off-Label Uses That Are Not Approved by the U.S. Government? Some 250,000 people last year underwent an operation in which tiny bits of heart tissue were burned into a maze pattern to rerout
> Fourth, executives need to directly participate in improvement projects not just "support" them.... By observing the successes and failures of improvement programs first hand, rather than relying on someone else's interpretation, executives can make more
> Executives know success in business depends on identifying and fixing problems before they become crises. It is the most basic rule in management: No matter how smart your strategies seem on paper, if you don't know how they're being executed and whether
> Most everyone in Silicon Valley and on Wall Street agrees: The eventual IPO of social-networking site Facebook could make its founder the world's richest twenty-something. Yet Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg, now 25, seems intent on deferring that multib
> American corporations love team work. But few companies are as smitten as ICU Medical Inc. At the San Clemente, California, maker of medical devices, any worker can form a team to tackle any project. Team members set meetings, assign tasks, and create de
