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No doubt that the operation management has a very important role in the global economy, as it is
responsible for delivery and development of goods and service, by adding customer value
through effective and efficient management of process. Operation management definition is “The
management of systems or processes that create goods and/or provide services”. So in order to
deploy good and effective operation management, managers should focus on the below points:
1. How can they define value?
2. How should the process be configured to be both effective and efficient?
3. Which resources are most critical and how they would manage those resources?
4. How could operation management be used as competitive advantage for the
organizations?
The operation management contributes to four general dimension of customer value which is
time, quality, flexibility and cost. Time is related to reliability of the delivery, speed and rapid
product and service development. Quality is related to intangible and tangible characteristic of
the product and service design. Flexibility captures features that are seen by customers, such as
the ability to customize the product and service; and other features that are not seen by the
customers such as the capability of the organization to adapt the significant change in the
demand. The last parameter is the cost, which is act as competitive advantage of the
organization.
Processes, system and strategies are the main building units for operation management. Process
is considered as foundation for the operation management. It consists of process design, planning
and controlling and project management. In the system and strategies, the managers must
develop broader systems that transcend and integrate individual process elements. Which is
made by quality and supply management systems are the two systems that should deserve
managers’ attention. Finally, the pattern of decisions and actions at both the process and systems
levels must be integrated into a coherent operations strategy, which in turn is linked to corporate
strategy.
Important aspects such as the manufacturing process, offering products or services, managing the
inventory, the total quality management of the process within an organizations, and the customer
satisfaction are some of the few aspects that help an organization prosper in it’s segment. Some
of the operations management concepts will be discussed with their impact on the organization to
be discussed (Fell Fab). The operations management along with other departments in an
organization are the key to success or failure; since they are interrelated.
Executive Case Summary
FellFab is a Canadian origin textile manufacturer founded in 1952 and has a a reputation of being
innovative, and a pioneer in it’s segment. The company manufactures innovative products from
technical and specialized textiles. The company has been a leader in leader in many demanding
markets, including industrial, aerospace, aviation, military, materials handling and transportation.
One of the key beliefs, is the long term customer relation, as the company believes that the
customer’s satisfaction is of extreme importance. In 1992 FellFab established a US based
operations to even expand it’s business ground. The company rapidly gained a good reputation
among the US market and it was operating mainly in the textiles and fabrics of airplanes and
other airplane related clothing; such as seats, magazine pouches, seat covers, carpeting, drapes,
curtains, galley furnishings and magazine pouches for the transportation industry, and of course
this was a competition, since in the same airplane, the seats will differ and vary in shape and size
between, business, economy and first class seats, and so will be the fabrics used in them. The
company was dealing with a lot of air line companies, such as NAA North American Airlines.
The company was a product providing company which was selected to receive an offer from
NAA to be a major service provider and expand it’s business consequently. A thorough study
was conducted to investigate the pros and cons of accepting or refusing such an offer by the
company’s CEO Glen Fab.
FellFab products
The company’s president Don Fell had founded the company FellFab in 1952, in Canada. The
