A bank office with five tellers, each with a separate line of customers, exhibits the
characteristics of a multi-phase queuing system.
Outsourcing refers to transferring a firm’s activities that have traditionally been internal
to external suppliers.
The Cpk index measures the difference between desired and actual dimensions of goods
or services produced.
The theory of competitive advantage states that you should allow another firm to
perform work activities for your company if that company can do it more productively
than you can.
The goal of a human resource strategy is to manage labor and design jobs so people are
effectively and efficiently utilized.
Components A, B, and C are connected in series. Component D is connected in parallel
to component B. Which of the following statements is true?
A) The system works only if A works, B or C works, and D works.
B) Component B must work for the system to work.
C) The system works when A works, C, works, and either B or D works.
D) Components B and C are backups to A.
E) The system works if D works, and any of A, B, or C works.
If a load report (resource requirements profile) shows a work center scheduled beyond
capacity
A) the company must add capacity by enlarging the facility
B) the company must add capacity by such tactics as overtime and subcontracting
C) the work center’s load may be smoothed by such tactics as operations splitting or lot
splitting
D) the aggregate plan must be revised
E) the Wagner-Whitin algorithm should be used to rebalance the load
Which of the determinants of service quality involves performing the service right the
first time?
A) access
B) courtesy
C) credibility
D) reliability
E) responsiveness
Gibson Products produces cast bronze valves for use in offshore oil platforms.
Currently, Gibson produces 1600 valves per day. The 20 workers at Gibson work from
7 a.m. until 4 p.m., with 30 minutes off for lunch and a 15 minute break during the
morning work session and another at the afternoon work session. Gibson is in a
competitive industry, and needs to increase productivity to stay competitive. They feel
that a 20 percent increase is needed.
Gibson’s management believes that the 20 percent increase will not be possible without
a change in working conditions, so they change work hours. The new schedule calls on
workers to work from 7:30 a.m. until 4:30 p.m., during which workers can take one
hour off at any time of their choosing. Obviously, the number of paid hours is the same
as before, but production increases, perhaps because workers are given a bit more
control over their workday. After this change, valve production increased to 1800 units
per day.
a. Calculate labor productivity for the initial situation
b. Calculate labor productivity for the hypothetical 20 percent increase
c. What is the productivity after the change in work rules?
d. Write a short paragraph analyzing these results.
Gibson Valves produces cast bronze valves on an assembly line. If 1600 valves are
produced in an 8-hour shift, the productivity of the line is
A) 2 valves/hr
B) 40 valves/hr
C) 80 valves/hr
D) 200 valves/hr
E) 1600 valves/hr
__________ provides a format allowing the electronic transmittal of three-dimensional
data.
Suppose that an iso-profit line is given to be X+Y=15. What would be the profit made
from producing 20X and 10Y?
A) 15
B) 30
C) 0
D) 20X and 10Y is not a feasible solution.
E) Unable to determine
Which of the following is used by methods analysis in analyzing body movement at the
workstation level?
A) MTM chart
B) flow diagram
C) operations chart
D) process chart
E) improvement chart
Break-even analysis can be used by a firm that produces more than one product, but
A) the results are estimates, not exact values
B) the firm must allocate some fixed cost to each of the products
C) each product has its own break-even point
D) the break-even point depends upon the proportion of sales generated by each of the
products
E) None of these statements is true.
Christopher’s Cranks uses a machine that can produce 100 cranks per hour. The firm
operates 12 hours per day, five days per week. Due to regularly scheduled preventive
maintenance, the firm expects the machine to be running during approximately 95% of
the available time. Based on experience with other products, the firm expects to achieve
an efficiency level for the cranks of 85%. What is the expected weekly output of cranks
for this company?
A) 5100
B) 5700
C) 4845
D) 969
E) 6783
At the order fulfillment center of a major mail-order firm, customer orders, already
packaged for shipment, arrive at the sorting machine to be sorted for loading onto the
appropriate truck for the parcel’s address. The arrival rate at the sorting machine is at
the rate of 140 per hour following a Poisson distribution. The machine sorts at the
constant rate of 150 per hour.
a. What is the utilization rate of the system?
b. What is the average number of packages waiting to be sorted?
c. What is the average number of packages in the sorting system?
d. How long must the average package wait until it gets sorted?
Which of the following statements regarding CPM is true?
A) The critical path is the shortest of all paths through the network.
B) The critical path is that set of activities that has positive slack.
C) Some networks have no critical path.
D) All activities on the critical path have their LS equal to the maximum EF of all
immediate predecessors.
E) All of the above are false.
Which of the following aggregate planning strategies might direct your client to a
competitor?
A) using part-time workers
B) subcontracting
C) changing inventory level
D) varying production rates through overtime or idle time
E) varying work force size by hiring or layoffs
Which of the following scenarios illustrates a moment that exceeds the customer’s
expectations?
A) an express mail service that guarantees overnight delivery
B) a flight attendant that responds shortly after being called
C) a hairdresser that cuts your hair at the right length
D) a professor that contacts people in several companies to find you a job
E) a bank that sends you monthly account statements
What is the time required to move orders through the production process, from receipt
to delivery?
A) throughput
B) manufacturing cycle time
C) pull time
D) push time
E) queuing time
A bill of material lists the
A) times needed to perform all phases of production
B) production schedules for all products
C) components, ingredients, and materials required to produce an item
D) operations required to produce an item
E) components, ingredients, materials, and assembly operations required to produce an
item
How is break-even analysis useful in the study of the capacity decision? What
limitations does this analytical tool have in this application?
The __________ is the lowest level of quality that we are willing to accept.
The factor-rating method is an excellent tool for dealing with both __________ and
__________ problems.
__________ is the practice of moving a business process to a foreign country but
retaining control of it.
A professor teaches two sections of a class, one on MWF for 50 minutes per day and
another on T/TH for 75 minutes per day. Use the following information to construct a
scatter diagram with test # on the x-axis and score on the y-axis. Should the professor
argue for a change in the university’s scheduling?
MWF Section Test Results Test # T/Th Test Results
75 1 82
70 2 77
65 3 73
65 4 70
70 5 76
Provide an example of an organization that achieves competitive advantage through
experience differentiation. Explain.
What are decision tables?
Explain the fundamental difference between the “capacity options” and the “demand
options” of aggregate planning strategies.
What does TPS stand for?