Hello! These are discussions post that needs to be at least 175 words or more for each discussion. Each discussion post must be in your own words. Add references at the bottom.
1. Context: Services are designed differently than products. Typically services are designed to shape how the customer thinks about the product. Explore your own purchasing behavior first to then apply that to designing a service.
Think about your own purchase behavior.
How important are each of the five value dimensions—cost, quality, delivery, agility, and innovation—to the decisions you make?
Explicitly weigh each value dimension. Be sure your weights add up to 100%
Place your ranking and weight under the story header. Just the ranking and weighting.
Now write about the following:
Under what circumstances would you change your weightings? (Discuss 2-3 situations)
The application is your main focus this week:
Change your point of view to the company:
How does your analysis of this exercise inform service system design? (Cite theory from your reading)
Use the following headers to organize the above in your post:
Weights of the 5 value dimension
Scenarios that change my weights
Informing Service System Design
2. Context: Lean Six Sigma (LSS) has emerged as a key to achieving world-class value-added processes. But not everyone has benefited equally from implementing these operating philosophies and their accompanying tool sets.
Discussion: Based on the results of an Internet search—identify a Lean Six Sigma implementation success story.
(Note: you may use your own personal experience if you were at a company when the formal lean six sigma implementation took place. You must have experienced the specific events, decisions and investments made by leadership to use this experience. This means that your experience was from the initial implementation and not working projects.)
Describe how LSS was brought into the organization. How did the key decision-makers use Lean Six Sigma tools to achieve success—that is, improve value and decrease costs?
Identify the specific events, decisions, or investments they made in order to leverage operations as a competitive weapon.
Now, identify a Lean Six Sigma “horror” story (a failed implementation).
Describe how LSS was brought into the organization. More importantly, describe what went wrong with the implementation (we are not talking about LSS project failure).
Assess how key decision-makers failed to appropriately use Lean Six Sigma tools.
As a consultant to the company, how would you help them “fix” the implementation process to achieve success next time? What specific events, decisions, or investments would you promote to help them leverage operations (or Lean Six Sigma) to improve value and reduce costs?
Organize you post with the following headers:
Keys to a Successful LSS implementation (that were extracted from the success case)
What not to do when implementing LSS (extracted from the horror case)
Correcting the LSS failure with the keys to success
3. Context: Having the right product at the right place and time at the right cost and quality is one of the biggest challenges an operations and supply chain manager encounters. To successfully meet customer needs, supply chain professionals must accurately forecast and support operational needs. This requires robust forecasting, inventory, and information management capability.
Discussion:
Based on a related Internet search, identify a a fulfillment failure. A fulfillment failure is when the item does not make it through its supply chain. Assess why it happened (this will most likely require research).
Note: You may use a personal experience if you have access to the information to identify the supply chain of the item and have knowledge of how the break in the item’s supply chain was identified and corrected.
Be sure to choose an example that allows you to showcase the analysis and application. The fulfillment failure must be solved through the supply chain analysis.
As you dissect the fulfillment failure, you must address how each of the following may have or may not have contributed to the problem. Give the explanation why.
Forecasting—that is, did managers underestimate demand? If so, what went wrong?–You may have to look at all parties in the supply chain (raw material, manufacturer, distributor, retailer etc)
Inventory— that is, did decision makers run too lean, leading to a stock out or shortage? If so, what went wrong? (again, all parties)
Information— that is, did managers have all the information they needed to make good decisions? If not, why not? What information is accurate and readily available?
What else might have contributed to the fulfillment? (other parts of the supply chain that should be analyzed)
If the experience you are sharing comes from your work experience, please share how you and your company resolved the issue. What did you do to fix the underlying causes in order to make sure your company did not suffer a similar fulfillment failure again? If you did not find the fix, how would you advise the company to fix their issue so it could not happen again (note: this will be based on what you found in your research).
Organize your post with the following headers:
Brief description of the fulfillment failure (item specific)
Dissection to root cause: (Walk through Forecasting, Inventory, Information, Other considerations for the item)
The Fix so it never happens again
4. Context: Logistics is often viewed as a behind-the-scenes function that deals with the nuts and bolts of day-to-day operations. This may have been true in the past; however, the world has changed, making logistics critical to developing and executing corporate strategy.
Consider the following:
Globalization now means companies must manage geographically dispersed supply and distribution networks. Logistics capabilities enable global networks.
Manufacturers and retailers worldwide strive to operate lean. Logistics enables lean beyond a company’s four walls.
The Internet has changed the way people shop. They now want to buy off the shelf, click and pick up, and get products delivered to their doors. Logistics enables omnichannel strategies.
Discussion: Colgate Palmolive, Zara and DB Schenker are examples of companies that have used logistics to redefine the competitive rules—and customer expectations. Pick one of these companies and perform an Internet search to examine how it has used logistics to develop unique business models and achieve a competitive advantage. Specifically, assess how your chosen company has used logistics to design and execute unique value-added workflows to meet customer needs.
Now share your top takeaways regarding what these logistics capabilities are, how they were built, and why they are so effective. You to find a workflow in logistics that is unique to them. Discuss the following:
Why has it been hard for other companies to benchmark and bring this capability (the unique workflow) to the market?
How could you turn your takeaways from this unique workflow into action to help your company improve its workflow and value-creation capabilities?
Organize your post with the following headers:
Value-Added workflows of (insert company)
-be sure to address each question: what is unique workflow, how it was built and why it is effective.
Benchmarking and copying them
-why is it hard to benchmark and bring capability to market
Moving takeaways to action for others
be specific
Cite your research.
Note: Posts must be original thought.
