Industry Solutions and Services - Assignment Example

Industry Solutions and Services of the Introduction The ZBZ computing systems is a hardware manufacturing company. The company at present is manufacturing hardware devices for computers that need no customization. All the functional divisions like engineering, manufacturing, quality assurance, and marketing & sales are habituated to work without interaction with the pre programmed guidelines. As the hardware is manufactured with pre designed structures, the staff and the management are not familiar with the development of customized products. The industry solutions and services for broadcasting companies need that rapport with the customers as the hardware and other products should be oriented to the services they offer. The report concentrates on the factors that enable the development of products and services in a customer oriented manner. 2. Organizational Structure The organizational structure depends on the product and services the company develops and offers. This affects the working of functional divisions of the organization. To manufacture the customized products and services ZBZ Company should have a separate unit additional to that of production unit for installation purposes of the hardware the company produces. In the previous context the company used to manufacture and market the products for a large customer base and the installation process used to be done by distributors or assemblers of the hardware into a computer. Now this is not the case and the comp [any needs a separate division in marketing and sales department for the purpose of discussing the needs of the customers. The findings of the department should be conveyed to the production and installation departments for enabling the development of customized products. The work of the scheduling department previously used to be about the planning of production, distribution and marketing. Now the scheduling department can be assigned the work of appointments with the industry leaders to discuss about the customization of the products and to convey the results to the production department. The involvement of production department managers in the discussions of the customization processes with the customers also should be a duty of scheduling department. Previously the scheduling department was not supposed to interact with the customers but now it is inevitable. The customization of the product will decide the internal time variances in the production and marketing activities. The functional divisions of the organization have the responsibilities of marketing function making the production accountable for standards and variances. The responsibility of quality control now will be increased and this division needs much rapport with the production division to avoid the lapses in customized products. This needs the revision of traditional structures in the organization. The organizational structure in the customized products manufacturing will receive information in the following manner. The marketing division will pass information about the customer requirements to manufacturing division and that division will pass them on to the design division, planning and cost estimation divisions. The design, planning and cost estimating divisions can coordinate their activities with manufacturing or production division to know the feasibility of the project and the priorities of the customers. After this the feedback will sent to marketing division and in turn the information is sent to customers. This sharing of information can be enabled by the scheduling department. This sharing of information from customer to all the crucial departments in the organization will achieve near zero defect in the quality. In the previous structure of the company standards are guiding forces for performing, monitoring and controlling all the activities of the company. In the course of manufacturing customized products, the Quality Zero Defect, Maintenance Zero Breakdown, Materials Zero Inventory, Business Processes Zero Waiting Time, Activities Zero Non value Added, Production Planning Zero Progress Chasers are required. In manufacturing the customized products the customer should not merely a code number but also a group whose responses really matter in manufacturing processes. For this purpose in every department an employee should be recruited for attending to the requirements of the business groups and customers. He can convey the divergent priorities of the business groups and customers. The marshalling teams of people from different functional areas to effectively perform a common business process will result in Zeroing in to the level of customer satisfaction. ( B.Mahadevan, 2007)1 3. Planning and Services According to Ulwick and Anthony in 2005 the companies that manufacture customized products and offer customized services need the customer feedback for their planning and services activities. The planning will make each step in the manufacturing an innovative one in identification of opportunities. The planning of the products and services involves evaluation and positioning. The voice of the customer is needed for data collections required for producing customized products. Innovating and creating the products and services will be less expensive if the customer requirements are included in planning at the initial stage. The planning needs the understanding the metrics of customers to get a job done. The obtaining the information in advance will enable the management to include the information in the planning the design activities. The customer feedback in designing the customized products will reduce the brain storming activities in designing and planning activities. (Ulwick, Anthony, 2005)2 Shermon and Jim in 1991 wrote that the planning will be more productive with the customer feed back in manufacturing customized products in broadcasting segment. The planning models in industry solutions and services that produce hardware products need the miniature representations of what is going in the real world. This can be termed as the mind's eye in the planning process. The Inside Out Planning Model will consider the organization as a single entity and develops the coordination between different departments. There will be guidelines for what to do now and the things to be done in future. The planning of the activities and assigning them to the people should take into consideration the enjoying the work by employees. The possibilities of the processes should be considered rather than estimates of the world around the organization. If the hypothetical estimates are possible by extra efforts the planning activities should be made for that also. This helps in achieving long term goals. The appraisal of the capacities of the different departments according to their employees' capabilities. This enables the qualities of the departments substantial and to last longer. Along with Inside Out Planning Model the Outside In planning Model needs its application for customized production of the products and services. In this model the management needs the focusing on the people and events that exist in the world around. The organization's ideas take a back seat and should be used in materializing the customer's ideas. This can be well applied at the context of assigning works to the departments and employees and to show extra effort to materialize the ideas that are termed as hypothetical as mentioned just above. The customization needs the ideas of other people who use the products. In this process the planning is done after continuous analysis and sometimes the analysis should be a part of the planning and environmental factors; in this context the broadcasting segment. (Sherman, Jim, 1991)3 High level Business Plan (i) Development Testing and Installation of Product for KYB broadcasting Identifying the common broadcasting problems to eliminate them in to be made product. Improving access to information and stream lining the budget. Organizing the data and HR for development and testing of the product. The streamlining of the payment activities. Time taken for above activities: 2 months (ii) Services to Customize the Product The development of network relationships using the products and services in the head quarters of KYB Broadcasting. The customization based on optimizing the services and betterment of revenues accrued. The services offered by the product should concentrate on revenue generation even online. The information required to materialize the above decisions and to get better results. Time taken for the above activities (2 months) (iii) Planning for Future Expansion The future expansion plans for the customized product should be a coordinated activity of ZBZ Computing Systems and KYB Broadcasting. This depends on the future requirements and the conditions incorporated in the product for updating it. The first step is to identify the changes to policy in the future and the required changes needed in the processes and information systems. Evaluation of the alternative solutions and the most preferred solution is selected. Time allotted for this work (2 months) (Road Map, 2007)4 4. Managing Work Activities Operations define the activities directly related to the production of goods and services in a manufacturing or a services firm. The management of the operations involves in delivering the value for customers; here KYB Broadcasting Company. Planning and coordination is needed to integrate the marketing, finance, accounting operations of the company. The operations management in ZBZ Computing Systems needs the process of producing goods and services as it is manufacturing customized products and offering services in present and future for the customer it is installing the products. The company should integrate planning, organizing, staffing, directing, motivating, leading and controlling. Tools like linear programming and regression analysis can be used along with simulation to analyse the models of integrating activities. The ZBZ Computing Systems can analyse and discuss broadcasting specific situations by approaching the case studies. This is possible by dividing the operations on functional lines. (Shtub, Avraham, 1999)5 According to Shtub and Avraham in 1999, the operations management is a new approach to bring changes in the organization. The aspect of change is mentioned because the present organization ZBZ Computing Systems has to observe a change in its activities from manufacturing hardware to manufacturing customized hardware for KYB Broadcasting. In this context the development process from idea for a new product or service to a working prototype is needed as the company is producing and installing new product for KYB which is typical organization and have a no compromise attitude regarding quality. Next the company should prepare the facilities for customized product that is broadcasting and media specific. This needs successful completion of design, implementation and testing of the production. Next the assembly or service facility and its supporting systems and resources can be tested at the headquarters of KYB. Regarding the sales operations the company already studied the market and got order from the KYB and now the onus is on order fulfillment. This involves the delivery of required products or services to KYB. After delivering the product, the company must be ready to fix a problem by a call from the customer. In this case KYB is maintaining zero tolerance to the problem and the ZBZ should offer total quality services for the period mentioned in the order form with the customer. This is possible by integrating the processes of supply chain management, production activities, total quality control and customer service operations. This can be termed as Integrated Production and Order Management. There is another aspect of change that is to be considered by management. Till now the company is manufacturing the hardware storage devices and now it has to produce the transmitters and receivers along with other processing and computing systems for broadcasting segment. This involves the operations of appointing the new suppliers and recruiting new staff according to the new necessities in production activities. The company should develop the tactics and policies to survive as the broadcasting environment is rapidly changing and so the cycle of products. ZBZ should update the products and services according to the changing environment of broadcasting to get and retain the typical customers like KYB. The computing systems manufacturer should be flexible in its operations and zero tolerance in quality. (Shtub, Avraham, 1999)6 5. Quality Management In the present market the successful Quality Management can be considered as crucial factor for enterprise competitiveness and improvement. To implement QM the support of Information Technologies is needed. As ZBZ is a medium size management there is no presence of QM in the organization and the present context of supplying and servicing to KYB needs the installation of QM in the organization according to concept solution that is media specific. A cluster of quality projects need to be analyzed for testing the product supplied to KYB. The aim of quality cluster is to facilitate exchanges between projects to exchange ideas. This exchange of ideas should be implemented in enhancing the results dissemination. Before starting the production activities, the road map of quality RTD projects is needed. This describes the future trends in quality and IT. A data base regarding TQM should be maintained. This enables to provide Unified Quality Environment in future. The aim of quality control unit in the ZBZ should be to produce innovative quality control software system to be used by Company. A factory wide information system based on Hypertext is needed. The main objective will be to develop Quality Information System that is able to collect and provide pertinent quality information. The company should prepare a prototype system in the stage of consultations with KYB about the customized product needed by them. After designing the product the actual product can be developed regarding quality control. The various steps in the quality control can be in the following order mentioned in the diagram. The above diagram is adopted from ftp://ftp.cordis.europa.eu/pub/esprit/docs/iimq-ss.doc The application of methodology quality function deployment will define the accomplishments of the organisation in developing the customised products. The methodology and technology should be integrated to develop a software system that allows for greater flexibility. This should be useful in QFD application. This should lead to intelligent quality system. This system is a computer based support system for generation and maintenance of an effective quality system. The definition module, quality management review module, document generation facility, implementation module and continuous improvement planning system are part of the above mentioned quality control system. Demonstration at the user companies is also a part of quality control. As the user here is a typical broadcasting company, ZBZ should provide integrated IT solutions to support quality management in broadcasting services offered as the broadcasting segment is facing increasingly quality based competition. The quality control system should improve the understanding and management of quality in multi site or distributed environments like broadcasted segments. The quality control about the services of quality management can be given in the following diagram. The Local Site The above diagram is adopted from ftp://ftp.cordis.europa.eu/pub/esprit/docs/iimq-ss.doc This involves collecting the data from customers and their sites, transmission and broadcasting reports on quality evaluation, quality related data analysis and evaluation and problem solving. (ESPRIT, 2007)7 6. Health and Safety Health and Safety of the employees is crucial to achieve long term success in the operations of the company and to have a long term success with HR retention. The increasing prevalence of digital factory is becoming important in planning and production systems. This is due to provision of digital support for planning process. This makes the personnel work more time in office and at home. This increases stress and may result in problems like hypertension and heart problems. These problems can be avoided or minimised by stipulating maximum working hours that do not affect physical and mental health of the employees. The work practices must meet recognised codes of practice and documented worksite health and safety and environmental procedures. The work practices must meet documented worksite operating procedures for computer systems. The evidence of communications collected should be in accordance with the work site procedure. These procedures are regarding content, recipient, timing and method. Particularly the employees should be granted leave in case of physical ailments and should not be allowed to work from home as that may result in increase of stress. The hazard and potential harm should be defined and avoided in the context of work for employees according to the guidelines of Safety Employment Act. In general all the specific worksite identification procedures are identified according to computer based working principles. The compressed air, extra working hours and the mode and time of sitting before the computer are reasons for health hazards. The clothing, hair, footwear, strain injury, sleep deprivation, respiratory, fatigue and stress are some other causes for health hazards in computer system manufacturing industry. To avoid these problems the procedures for minimizing exposure to hazards like protective clothing, equipment, house keeping techniques are needed. These procedures and responsibilities can be explained to all the employees to follow them. (Nzqa, 2007)8 7. Future Improvements The future improvements of the company regarding the products and services depend on up to date reservoir of knowledge. This is based on international studies with a wealth of relevant information. The efforts of the company should outline the future trends in the basic industrial needs in broadcasting segment. This is done by exploring relevant changes in technologies, organizational capabilities and knowledge skills. The identification of emerging technologies can play a role in facilitating the achievement of a trade off between market demands and sustainable development. The acknowledgement of influential, social and environmental sustainability is needed for deciding the future developments. The future improvements involve the identification of importance of human resources and their functional involvement in providing the computer systems manufacturers competitive advantage over the competitors. The mapping and synthesis of work and the initial scenario construction should be based on previous experiences regarding design and development. The experiences in the past should form a data base to make use of them in solving practical problems regarding planning and developmental activities. This type of planning can provide the elaboration of future strengths and weaknesses to reflect the emerging configuration of technologies. This involves the social, political an environmental context of manufacturing computer systems for broadcasting segment. The company should form a case study regarding the development of products and services for KYB and should store the information in the database to use it in designing for future requirements. The most important value is given to broadcasting companies as the company is interested in manufacturing customized products for broadcasting segment. The above processes should deliver the materials to the transforming process of the planning, designing, production activities of the computer systems manufacturing. Gantt Chart The above diagram is adopted from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gantt_chart Activity A: Customer feed back from Marketing department to production and designing department. Activity B : The designing work of designing department and the consultations of designing department with KYB if needed Activity C: The collaboration between designing and production department. Activity D: The planning of the production activities Activity E: The integration of activities of designing, production, planning, marketing and customer service Activity F: The planning and implementation of Quality control activities can be done in two stages. Activity G: The activities regarding future improvements. References 1. B.Mahadevan, 2007, Top Gear Manufacturing, iimb.ernet.in, Volume information not available, Electronic Source Retrieved on 7th October from http://www.iimb.ernet.in/mahadev/topgear.pdf 2. Claudio Roveda and Paolo Vercesi, 2007, Case Sector Report: Basic Industrial Chemicals, Fondazione Rosselli),, Volume Information not available, Electronic Source Retrieved on 7th October from http://ec.europa.eu/research/industrial_technologies/pdf/pro-futman-doc8-casestudy-basicindustrialchemicals.pdf 3. ESPRIT, 2007, Lim Quality Projects, ESPRIT, Volume Information not Available, Electronic Source Retrieved on 7th October from ftp://ftp.cordis.europa.eu/pub/esprit/docs/iimq-ss.doc 4. Nzqa, 2007, Identify and describe workplace risks in a wood manufacturing operation, NZQA, Volume information not available, Electronic Source Retrieved on 7th October from http://nzqa.govt.nz/nqfdocs/units/doc/22977.doc 5. Road Map, 2007, High Level Project Plan, 21st Century Accountability, Volume inromation not available, Electronic Source Retrieved on 7th October from http://www.ofm.wa.gov/roadmap/plan.htm 6. Shtub, Avraham. 1999, Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP). The Dynamics of Operations Management Kluwer Academic Publishers. Hingham, MA, USA:, 1999. p 1. http://site.ebrary.com/lib/nulibraries/Docid=10053308&ppg=16 7. Sherman, Jim, 1991, Plan Your Work - Work Your Plan : Secrets for More Productive Planning. Course Technology Crisp , Menlo Park, CA, USA:, p 6. http://site.ebrary.com/lib/nulibraries/Docid=10058013&ppg=12 8. Ulwick, Anthony. 2005, What Customers Want : Using OutcomeDriven Innovation to Create Breakthrough Products and Services. USA: McGraw-Hill New York, NY, p 16. http://site.ebrary.com/lib/nulibraries/Docid=10175152&ppg=56 Read More