The plain language guide to getting things running smoothly in the world of business

Operations management is all about efficiency, and Operations Management For Dummies is all about efficiently teaching you what you need to know about this business hot topic. This book tracks typical operations management MBA courses, and it will help you un-muddle concepts like process mapping, bottlenecks, Lean Production, and supply chain management. Learn to step into a business, see what needs improving, and plug in the latest tools and ideas to shape things up in any industry.

This latest edition covers, you guessed it, digital transformation. Technology is completely upending operations management, and Dummies walks you through the latest, so you can stay at the front of the pack. Other new stuff inside: supply chain traceability, ethical sourcing and carbon footprint, business resiliency, and modularizing the supply chain. It's all here!

• Optimize operations and increase revenue with strategies and ideas that make businesses run better and cheaper

• Get easy-to-understand explanations of complex topics and theories in operations management

• Learn how operations management is affected by digital transformation and sustainability concerns

• Evaluate, design, improve, and scale all sorts of processes, regardless of business size or area of operation

  Businesses can't operate successfully without effective operations and supply management. That makes Operations Management For Dummies a must--for MBA students and business professionals alike.

  Autorentext

Mary Ann Anderson is Director of the Supply Chain Management Center of Excellence at the University of Texas at Austin.

Edward Anderson, PhD, is Professor of Operations Management at the University of Texas McCombs School of Business. Geoffrey Parker, PhD, is Professor of Engineering at Dartmouth College.

Klappentext
Become a smooth operator

A critical competency for any business, operations management is an increasingly popular field for business students and professionals who want to have an immediate impact on a company's bottom line. And in Operations Management For Dummies, you'll discover how firms actually get their products and services out the door. From forecasting demand to ensuring quality control, managing inventory, and sourcing supplies, this book walks you through how to keep a business humming and what to do when something goes wrong. **Inside

• Design the perfect process
• Forecast demand
• Plan capacity and inventory
• Rely on Lean principles
• Conquer quality control
• Understand the supply chain
• Manage Agile projects

• Learn digital operations technologies**

  Inhalt
  Introduction 1

  About This Book 1

  Conventions Used in This Book 3

  Foolish Assumptions 3

  Icons Used In This Book 4

  Beyond the Book 4

  Where to Go from Here 4

  Part 1: Getting Started with Operations Management 7

  Chapter 1: Discovering the Fundamentals of Operations Management 9

  Defining Operations Management 10

  Getting beyond the smokestack 10

  Seeing the relevance of operations management 11

  Understanding the Process of Operations 12

  Driving the business model 12

  Recognizing the diversity of processes 13

  Managing processes 15

  Handling special situations 17

  Meeting the Challenges 18

  Firefighting 18

  Technology 18

  Complacency 19

  Metrics 19

  Perspective 19

  Outsourcing 20

  Chapter 2: Defining and Evaluating Processes 21

  Mapping Processes 22

  Distinguishing between operations and delays 24

  Identifying waste 24

  Developing a process map 26

  Evaluating the Elements of a System 28

  Checking productivity 28

  Considering capacity 28

  Clocking cycle time 29

  Getting a handle on constraints 29

  Talking thruput and takt time 30

  Going with the flow time 31

  Monitoring utilization 32

  Accounting for variability 35

  Chapter 3: Designing Processes to Meet Goals 37

  Getting Started with Process Improvement 38

  Planning Operations 38

  Considering a serial process 39

  Placing operations in parallel 39

  Improving Processes According to a Goal 42

  Reducing customer flow time 43

  Increasing system capacity 44

  Balancing the line 46

  Utilizing flexible resources 48

  Improving a process that has excess capacity 49

  Managing Bottlenecks 50

  Getting tripped up by overproduction 50

  Increasing process capacity 52

  Chapter 4: Dealing with Shared Resources, Batches, and Rework 55

  Sharing Resources 56

  Assigning a resource to more than one operation 56

  Allocating resources to more than one process 57

  Batching Parts and Setting Up Operations 58

  Working with batches 59

  Maximizing operation batch size 60

  Optimizing transfer batch size 62

  Optimizing batch size with operation setups 65

  Handling Poor Quality 68

  Putting rework back in the process that created it 69

  Pulling rework out of the main process 71

  Chapter 5: Designing Your Process to Match Your Product or Service 73

  Considering Costs, Standardization, Volume, and Flexibility 74

  Balancing operating costs 75

  Blurring the lines: Making standardized stuff customizable 79

  Improving Face-to-Face and Back-Office Operations 80

  Strengthening the customer interface 81

  Improving efficiencies behind the scenes 83

  Fulfilling Customer Demand: Making to Stock or Making to Order 84

  Making to stock 84

  Making to order 85

  A tale of two companies: Making either method work 86

  Getting It to Your Customer 87

  Ordering Online and Pickup in Store or Curbside 87

  Ordering Online with Delivery 88

  Designing for X: Designing Products with Operations in Mind 89

  Part 2: Managing Variability and Risk 91

  Chapter 6: Forecasting Demand 93

  Getting Savvy about Forecasts 94

  Building a Forecast to Predict Demand 95

  Recognizing demand variation 95

  Looking to the past to predict the future 96

  Lacking data: No problem 101 Acknowledging the Error of Your Ways 103<...