Operations objectives in the maturity stage

Operations objectives in the maturity stage

1. Quality

   • Quality objective is multifaceted and addresses the quality of the design of the product and/or the quality of service and processes used to produce it
   • Quality is judged by QUALITY OF CONFORMANCE
     • Quality of conformance is the degree to which a product, service or process meets its design specifications. Conformance is achieved with processes of quality control and quality assurance
       • Measured by how consistently products achieve compliance with the desired standard
   • Quality of design
     • Business must determine the quality of product that it is offering to the market
       • Features
         • How many options are provided
       • Aesthetics
       • Durability
       • Serviceability
         • How easy and convenient it is to perform maintainance
   • Quality of services
     • Customers satisfaction
       • Reliability of service
       • How well the service meets customer needs and expctions
       • Responsiveness of service experience

2. Dependability

   • reliability of the product or service, including how ell the product is made or how long it lasts before it fails
   • Can be measured as a key performance indicator (KPI)
   • Consistently meeting a promised delivery time for a product/service, doing things in a timely manner
   • Increase in delivery speed does not translate to customer satisfaction; the product must also be delivered with manners and quality expectations
     • eg. Fine dining restaurants
   • Can lower costs; avoid costly warranty claims/need for service recovery and refunds.

3. Flexability

   • The ability of a business to change what it does quickly and be able to adapt to internal and external influences
   • Refers to how quickly a business can change its operations system to respond to the market & adapt to changing customer needs: product and demands
   • Product/service flexibility
     • To quickly respond to changing customer needs with me product design or service offerings
   • Volume flexibility
     • increase/decrease output in response to changes in demand and manage capacity
       • eg. tourism; require significant flexibility due to seasonal changes

4. Cost

   • Operations functions is largely an expenditure area for a business and refers to the cost involved in producing goods and services at a level which will enable them to be priced appropriately and reflect marketing strategies
   • Facets of Operation functions
     • Labour costs
     • Processing costs
     • Inventory costs
     • Quality costs
     • Waste
     • Input costs

5. Speed

   • The elapsed time between customer orders and receipt of the product of services
   • Fast: minimising customer wait times, lead times (The time taken from placing the order until it is received)
     • Can be achieved through technologies
       • Computer-aided design (CAD)
       • Computer-aided manufacturing (CAM)
       • Robotics
     • Increasing speed can compromise quality and increase the change of equipment failure/human fatigue
   • Output productivity measured in units of times