Levels Operations Company
Levels operations corporations is a small corporation which is situated in eastern Pennsylvania. Fresh clients have placed their orders thus influencing the expansion of the production facility to meet the increasing demand of safes. Stephanie Coles is working on a plan for the production of safes in order to meet the growing demand. Organizations utilize forecasting procedures in managing operations and also in production management. This is achieved by implementing strategies of production management. With this Stephanie Coles is necessitated to utilize forecasting in determining the demand as well as the production procedure that is required (Metaxiotis, Carrillo, & Yigitcanlar, 2010). Forecasting is the best available strategies for Stephanie which will this involve the use of numerous estimation methods in determining the possibilities that will occur in the future in order to fully predict the business outcome in the future. This will eliminate the problem of strain in meeting the demands of safes from the clients (Metaxiotis, Carrillo, & Yigitcanlar, 2010).
Implementation and development of plans should be developed prior to the demand rise with the help of forecasting methods (Mahadevan, 2010). These methods will, therefore, help in determining the possible plan that will be effective in comfortably meeting the demand in the future without fail. The manager is necessitated to determine the suitable production quantity for each day of the week (Mahadevan, 2010). This is with the understanding that finished safes are not allowed. With her consultation with the engineering department, she was able to determine the suitable production sequence which is s7-s8-s9-s1-s2. The manager should, therefore, comprehend the wider production picture on the order of demand to ensure that there is product availability in meeting the demand of safes.
The organization's ultimate aim should, therefore, be in implementing balanced operation system and therefore, the manager must consider the inventory policy, demand and the production plan nature (Mahadevan, 2010). Therefore, the manager should opt for a strategy which is fully able to process time in the shortest time period, eliminate wastes and eradicate disruptions. These strategies are essential in ensuring that cost efficiency is observed by eliminating inventory wastes. This is by purchasing the right quantity of inventories that are required in meeting the demands effectively (Mahadevan, 2010). Since Stephanie was provided with the weekly demand quantity she is required to break down the provided numbers to daily demands of production, determine the cycles number that is required in running the daily production and the number that every safe model is required to produce in the given cycles. If the cost of inventory that is determined is high the firm should, therefore, opt to produce the safes in a lower quantity that are adequate in meeting the demands. Stephanie can, therefore, settle for a low policy of inventory or for a higher inventory policy on the grounds of holding lost sells and costs. She can, therefore, make a suggestion to the production manager in regard to fulfilling the growing demand to produce safe items in a five cycle progression regulate.
The strategy of using forecasting method will, therefore, help the corporation in growing its market base (Berger, 2011). This is because the corporation will fully be able to meet the needs of individuals customers will their predictions thus obtaining a competitive advantage over the other firms. However, there are other operations management strategies that would be incorporated in managing the procedures which are required in manufacturing and distributing services and products. There are several essential operation management aspects which include developing, creating, distributing and producing the organization products. Operation management must, therefore, ensure that the developed products are based on the needs of the clients as well as quality (Berger, 2011). Developing of fresh products is also crucial in satisfying the clients and this, therefore, requires the involvement of innovation. Products should be created in adequate quantities to ensure that the expectations of the clients are not lowered because the customers are the main determinant of the success of the products of any organization. Becoming a customer-centric organization is essential because the organization is fully able to focus on the needs of the customers by giving their needs the priority that is required. This helps in earning loyalty from the customers thus helps in maintain the customers as well as attracting other potential consumers (Berger, 2011).
Forecasting procedure is characterized by various advantages as well as disadvantages. The advantages of forecasting are that it helps in providing the corporation with the necessary information that it requires to utilize in formulating decisions on the organization future operations (Berger, 2011). Forecasting is additionally essential because it is an accurate method because it utilizes the knowledge of experts in developing conclusions as well as the judgment of the future because it utilizes qualitative data which is linked to reliability. The method is, however, disadvantageous because the organization is forced to effectively utilize forecasting with additionally analysis tools to ensure that maximum information regarding the future of the organization is obtained. The method is therefore not independent on its own as it requires assistance from other tools (Berger, 2011). Opting for a decision on a negative forecasting can, therefore, result in organizations financial ruin and this supports the fact that an organization should never base it operations decisions based on forecasting procedure alone (Berger, 2011).
Operation management is another method that can help the organization in implementing strategic aims, processes, controlling, planning as well as strategies (Berger, 2011). One of the primary operations management focus is effectively managing organizations resources so that the organization can be able to maximize its potential of the produced products as well as services that are offered by the firm. When the production operations are well managed and organized the organization is fully able to focus on the demand by developing a plan on production sequence. This can thus be achieved by dividing or breaking down the production sequence into fewer units which will be accomplished o daily basis (Berger, 2011).
Operation management is essential in ensuring that the production of goods, as well as services, is based on a particular plan. This, therefore, requires the utilization of resources in order t achieve efficiency (Mahadevan, 2010). The operation manager is therefore required to develop an effective plan which will facilitate the progress of the procedure. This is by developing daily and weekly operation schedules. Since the levels of operation, the corporation is a small firm the method may therefore not be effective because it is not cost effective. The corporation will be required to provide high cost associated items which are innovative in order to achieve efficiency. The corporation may, therefore, opt to break down its operation and production units as it is characterized wit simplicity and cost efficiency (Mahadevan, 2010). The method, therefore, does not require many resources as it only requires the development of production model. This helps in ensuring that the issue that is associated with high demand that may cause the corporation to lose some of the customers because of its incapability to deal with the growing needs of the consumers (Mahadevan, 2010).
The best strategy that Stephanie can adopt is converting the weekly production sequence to daily sequence. Production of the items in small daily quantity is essential as it helps in producing multiple products that are thus based on a few units. This is to make the organization as centric on production level plan and the demand must, therefore, be divided by twenty-five days of safes production. However, the production must be adjusted because the partial safes cycles of production are not allowed. Each production category must, therefore, be referred as a general unit. This can, therefore, be computed as total production in a week as 385 units with the provision those 25 days of working implies that the production is 385 divided by 25 days thus implying that the production on a daily basis should, therefore, be 15. 4 days since the units which are permitted partially are not allowed. Every day of production should be of between 15 and 16 units for every category. This is in consideration of the nearest integer which will give a 5-week demand when multiplied by 25 for the single category. For instance, S1 will, therefore, be equal to 5 every day similarly to S2 which will equal to 4 each day, S7 will be equal to 2 S8 will be equal to 4 and S9 will be equal to 1. This, therefore, demonstrates the demand difference and the level of unit’s production every day which is mentioned above with the production sequence for each.
References
Berger, A. (2011). Operations Management: IKEA. München: GRIN Verlag GmbH.
Mahadevan, B. (2010). Operations management: Theory and practice. Upper Saddle River: Pearson.
Metaxiotis, K., Carrillo, F. J., & Yigitcanlar, T. (2010). Knowledge-based development for cities and societies: Integrated multi-level approaches. Hershey, PA: Information Science Reference.
