The Operations Manager in the Company - Essay Example

Introduction The importance of business planning in the world has become mandatory for any company to prosper. In business planning, several peoplein charge of the business come up with the initial plan and execute the entire project in unison. Opening a business encompasses planning, making key monetary decisions, and implementation of a series of authorized activities. It is a stimulating proposition, but it is also an exceptionally challenging task. A business plan nevertheless is an important road map for professional success among numerous challenges (Wu, Lin, & Shiau, 2010.) The operations manager envisions the lounge to hold a large size of customers at any given moment serving them adequately. The business is also structured to be an event-catering package that handles huge orders creating convenience to the customers. Compared to goods, the constraints of service superiority are more intricate and diverge. Therefore, a full- fledged comprehension of customers’ wishes and prospects is a dire subject on the today’s package construing plan. Being a bakery, the business will receive a general target market since most people of all ages enjoy delightful cakes, pastries and pies not overlooking the fact that the merchandises are low-priced items that are nearly reasonable to anyone even with their varying levels of revenue hence keeping the target market large (Hald, & Mouritsen, 2013). In relation to the several product preferences, convenient services, and an extensive target market, this bakery will be able to meet the requirements of a wide range of consumers. The operations manager was able to foresee the possibility of a company’s website that will be opened on both Facebook and Twitter to create a platform for potential buyers. This paper reviews a business plan for the opening of a bakery known as Annex House in Cardiff, Welsh. A business strategy is the pivotal point of the corporate practices and competitive strategies in the operational management (DAVIS, 2011)) The operations manager in the bakery has used this to strike out a market position, conduct operations, appeal towards customers, enter and achieve organizational objective in the market as a whole. Thus, whether a company wins or loses in the marketplace, it is directly attributable to the calibres of a company’s strategy and the proficiency with which the strategy is implemented and executed. Annex House is a vision of a small entrepreneurial start-up bakery situated in Roath Cardiff in Wales. The business is pictured to make sure there are pastries and cakes served to the city population. The vision is a luxurious lounge that one can stop by with family and friends alongside to take orders. The business is envisioned to make, pies and special cupcakes, cakes and pastries will be offered in an assortment of flavours for instance (chocolate paper pie, saffron coils, chocolate panache, duck and pork hand pies, and classic brioche loaf amongst others). Frostings are also inclusive of the pastry shop menu like (whip cream, glazes and cooked frostings), in different sizes, styles, toppings and decorations. This paper attempts to analyse the overall role of an operations manager in a start-up company situated in Roath Cardiff Wales. The paper will elaborate the operations manger’s role in the company and the impact of the decisions the manager has in the realization of the company’s plans. The operations manager is liable for various activities in the company. In this case he is the planning the entire business plan. The bakery has a direct model where the money the company gains are from the sales made cooking made in the kitchen. An operations manager undoubtedly comprehends the goals of the establishment and develops a clear vision of exactly how operations will help achieve them. This also involves translating these goals into implications for the operations performance, objectives, quality, speed, dependability, flexibility and cost. The operations manager in this case has made it sure to sell the company as a full cooperate package. The first instance is to make the company a competitive one, which meant the manager had to locate the operations manager looked into the projections of the company earnings projections of the future and the company in the region. Every business has broad information. This valuable asset can be utilised as a tactical factor and a conclusive competitive advantage. In this case, the operations manager saw the opportunity in the market and figured the gap there was in the area since there is no business similar to the Annex bakery and opted to utilize the opportunity (PYCRAFT, 2000) Moreover, work and capital-intensive activities, information and knowledge-intensive tasks are gaining advance in significance. In this situation, knowledge is vital in imparting on success. It comprises the obvious knowledge in existing documents as well as the implicit familiarity held by staffs (cite). The operations manager overtly made embedded knowledge clear for other colleagues. Explicit knowledge must be generally reachable in a business, and all this information must be protected to counterweigh serious losses. The primary challenge is preparing the knowledge so that it is available for users at any time. Developing, using and protecting an organization’s strategically meaningful knowledge is the job of knowledge management. Effective knowledge management increases the competitive edge and efficiency of a business. (CORNELISSEN et al, 2012).  Consequently, the operations manager saw its feasibility, and the returns the bakery would bring to the corporate brand. It plays a decisive role in creating the value of an industry (Ahlstrom & Bruton, 2010). In fact, the manager established the opportunity a company like Fabulous Welsh cakes did not foresee like making a diet friendly menu for consumers, which can become a key difference for countering prospective price erosion while similar products are contending for the same market portion. Annex as a brand is therefore geared in standing out against competing companies and to promote competition that is more than just value. Businesses with strong brands always weather challenging economic times as compared to others. In this case, the operations manager saw that strong brands make it simpler to achieve new commercial segments. (SCHNEIDER, 2003) Having identified the feasibility of the business the manager sought the viability of the business. Owing to the market share and the interest in the partners to provide cakes and pastries to the community the viability of the business was bound to be assessed in order to make strategic positioning more plausible. Finding the viable customer, location of the business and the fact that the manager had understand the type of the business the company is being built on. These would help him make sure the customer wants and the business activities of the bakery are in connection. Traditionally, rivalry between two or more companies’ drives returns lower. A highly determined industry or market section is one in which market share is held by the few major companies. When very few corporations holding the vast bulk of market share, there may be very little genuine rivalry and the market may appear closer to a monopoly. However, the major competitions for the company are the two companies, which are yet to serve the entire Cardiff making an opportunity to present itself. As a start up the opening with a very low absorption industry is deliberated to be fragmented, and as such can be vastly competitive. With the weaknesses present in the existing companies gives the company an opening for the new establishment to gain favour. Since the operations manager part of the job description is to plan the project being on the markets best is part of the process. Therefore, the manager sort to make sure the bakery was placed strategically in Raoth since the competition is not as mush in the area making it a center for Annex to grow easily (SCHNEIDER, 2003) Keeping the prices of the cakes in range with the other players in the market was crucial for the company since they made sure the general sales were to be at par with the prices the people are familiar to. This was handy as the manager had in place the required skills to propel the company to better performance in line with the products the market anticipates. Since the bakery is at the startup stage the business and demand for it is under progress. Sales are usually low, and incomes may even be adverse. Rivalry may slowly impinge on incomes during this phase, as other industries become aware of the market prospective. At this stage, demand Annex as a new product and service must be continually created, requiring intensive marketing. The marketing mix the manager has is connected to the four fundamentals of making the market aware of the new product. The product the manager has placed in the market is the pastries that are unique as compared to the other companies in the market. On the other hand, the manager made sure the company is placed in a strategic position to compete with the others in the market making the company viable in the niche it occupies. With the websites in place, the company has a venue to avail the market with products that are competitive market and market share. Every person in the business is a user of the information systems. The people in the organization function at all levels in the order. For instance, a user is a worker, an assistant, an officer, an executive or a manager. All of them have particular tasks and a role to play in the management of any business. The management information system (MIS) in Annex caters to the essentials of all individuals. The main task of a worker is to search the data, make an account and submit it to the higher level. An administrator can use the MIS for a quick search and reporting the same to a higher level. An assistant has the task of accumulating and establishing the data, and steering a rudimentary analysis of integrating the data from different workers and departments to analyse it and make a crucial comment if anything confrontational is found. The management information system offers the methods and facilities to integrate the data and report the same in an appropriate format. An administrative department plays the role of a decision maker. Their responsibility and accountability is the position of a manager and a decision maker. The highest hierarchy is liable for achieving the target and goals of the organization. Max Weber, Emile Durkheim and Vilfredo Pareto are the sociological theorists of the nineteenth Century who made available to us a genuine foundation of organizational theory (Wren 1994). This academic triad gave us ‘bureaucracy’, ‘organic and mechanical’ societal types and the notion of ‘social systems’. Weber’s version of technical management, which was being broadcasted in America while he was working his book on economics and society, was the adjustment and justification of large-scale activities by pronouncing administration to be by position rather than by a person. His conceptualization of ‘bureaucracy’ was posited in three types of genuine authority: rational-legal, old-fashioned, and charismatic, because some form of professional was a necessity for any business. Without an authority arrangement, the union could not be guided to its objectives. The hierarchical structure manages to control the entire business, which makes it viable to have a structure that gives the entire staff direction (CORNELISSEN et al, 2012) MIS provides and facilitates scrutiny of the data and offers the decision support systems to perform the task of execution. MIS delivers action-oriented information. The operations manager has a position of responsibility and accountability for the business results. His management role expands beyond his management function. He is a policy maker and a long-term planner. He is a person with a foresight, an investigative ability and is expected to use these abilities in the functions of top management (Hald & Mouritsen, 2013) MIS provides information in a designed or formless format for him to respond. MIS caters to the continuously changing needs of resources and material. The user of the MIS is expected to be a coherent person and the design of the system is based on this assumption. Nevertheless, in reality the impact created by individuals by MIS is difficult to explain. MIS in the bakery plays a big role in handling the flow of communication in the business. Currently, the world is experiencing a global trend in computerization, digitization of products, services, and processes that should be adopted by every business that wants to succeed in entering the market. Information management of the company is appropriate considering the people need the content the bakery is providing. The operations manager has managed to make sure there is a website that is providing these services (Steinmetz, 1965). In order to make the judgments the manager has the role to make sure the bakery has credible suppliers of these cakes and other merchandise they produce. The manager has to involve a group of other players to drive the supply of the bakery pastries and cakes to the market. Suppliers range is a broad idea, relating the addition of groups that have conventionally found it problematic to break into the structures that large organisations have fixed up to buy in merchandise and services (Arendt & Strohbehn, 2013). The operations manager should use the supplier diversity as a guide to refer precisely to programs meant either by increasing the quantity of ethnic minority-owned businesses (EMBs) that stock goods and services to community, private and voluntary organisations, and straight or as part of a wider stress on smaller enterprises in common. The manager has to make it clear that the role of finding the supply chain is important to the annex’s house growth as a pastry and cake company. With supplier diversity, it would show the diversity of suppliers in Britain does not discriminate, but promotes an equal opportunity to all persons making the company have a better market preference for the suppliers. As a communications regulator the operations manager has to make sure the right content is going out to the customer and the rest of the workers are in line with the intended plan the organization needs. These come in with support for the company where every mishap is handled for the customers to the consistency that the house needs. Communication is crucial in the business environment and the way it is remitted needs to be regulated and controlled in order to maintain the conducive business milieu(Hald, & Mouritsen, 2013) There are a number of forces that are generated in these environment, which have an influence on the managerial presentation. These forces may be from within or from outside the organization. They affect, directly or indirectly, the process of management and a manager is required to meet these forces effectively. While to some extent the internal environment is controllable, the external environment is beyond his control. Since it is proven that, the external environment also has an impact on the business manager’s performance, it is necessary to know and understand the environment. For the purpose of discussion, the external environment is classified into five classes as the economy, the technological, the social, the political and the ethical environment (Williams to ops at Waterstones 2004). The role of the manager encompasses the analysis of the market. With the competitive environment in the global bakery market becoming increasingly intense, no company can afford to ignore growth potential that is emerging. The operations manager therefore placed several growth Strategies in Bakery, which enables Annex House to identify a wide range of opportunities in a variety of cities, categories, channels and formats (Johnston, & Staughton, 2009). The dynamic forces behind these opportunities lie with rising competition and progressively demanding consumers, in turn driving a rapidly rising level and pace of innovation. At the same time, changing routines, new distribution channels and progress in science and technology are forcing industry contributors to consider a more compound set of factors to ensure the success of new product growth (KAMAUFF, 2010). Growth Strategies in Bakery scrutinizes the development of significant trends in new product progress, emphasizing future opportunities for differentiation through innovation, and identifying emerging opportunities in the overall market. In this case, the manager identified the three vital trends the market has in now. Health, convenience and pleasure come out strong in the market. In order to be on a higher demand the customers need to see the healthy pastry Annex House is offering that is convenient to the customer. With a big lounge, the customer gives the market a better place to seek pleasure while enjoying the cakes of their own choices. Currently Annex House has been to work on being recognized by society and become one of the culinary destinations in Cardiff. With the growth of the industry in Cardiff, which also bring corporate opportunity to be operated by other bakeries, or other products that can change the role of cake or pastry. Low opening cost to start a business in this culinary industry makes it easy to have a better hand in the competition for customers considering the biggest competition is only two bakeries that have been in the industry for a while. While the bakery is starting, the need to make prices cheaper will help the company in entering the market, attract customers, or creating other products to satisfy the same desires or needs, where these conditions will cause an increase in volume of sales of the business, and the migration of customers from a competitor. This can happen only if the customer does find the uniqueness of the annex house products when compared to other bakery. According to the research on the market, it indicates the bakery will have, there is an increase in the pastry shops in Cardiff but the major competition is by two players in the market. Fabulous Welsh Cakes, located at the Mermaid Quay and Francesca Cake, located in Barry, Vale of Glamorgan are the major competition. Having identified the two the operators as competition, the microenvironment in Cardiff presented the company with a better chance to grow. The location of the company is strategically for competition and growth. The focus is to differentiate satisfying the needs of the target audience in Cardiff. (KAMAUFF, 2010) Supply chain is a crucial entity in any business (FULLEN & BROWN, 2004). The most current supply chains achieve the greatest conceivable availability of goods at optimum levels of inventory, transportation, and repositing dollars. Requiring goals for upgrading in these areas that necessitates knowing where one’s company stands at the time. Annex house operations manager has been able to list and explain the factors affecting availability, working capital, and cost; she/he should push the organization to do supply chain benchmarking and best-practice breakdown and should review the results individually. However, many businesses fail to channel outer best-practice benchmarking. For instance, a large pastry company was contented with inventory turns of about even though its opponents were doing much better, freeing hundreds of millions of dollars in cash by aggressively organizing the inventory and general working capital. Other firms develop and report reserved, internally focused supply chain metrics that may actually conceal problems by neglecting crucial information. Therefore, for the bakery to make it in the market niche the operations manager should be able to make sure the bakery has its inventory in order. For instance, he should know the perfect packaging techniques, which are modern. The manager has the role to make sure the products are actually delivered to the customer in time and suppliers need to trust that the company will do this appropriately (Lewis, 2007). Process measuring on the supply and management is appropriate for the bakery. This will help the business plan gain more credibility since there will be a plan on the delivery of the products. Another role the manager has in place is contingency planning. Changes are inevitable in organizations principally during financial hardships times. Changes encompass staff lay off, department deleting organization restructuring among others. Therefore, the operations manager must be able to assist the business to build the capacity to take on any change. The employees should also be well cultured in facing managerial changes as the business places itself in the survivability mode. These plans are made in the contingency structures in place for the company. Just like any other business, the bakery has equipped itself with contingency plans in case of any impediments. For instance when the sales of pears brioche loaf goes down due to few provisions of the ingredients, the company will have a substitute menu of breakfast cereals with similar taste. This is a way to make sure the company has a great deal of flow in terms of sales and since there is always a backup plan in place. This will make the plan have a focus and systems in place that make sure the business succeeds. (GIRARD, OKEEFE & PRICE, 2012). Porters 5 is one of the theories used in the plan (Potter, 1980). This was used alongside the PEST an SWOT analysis of both the company and the competition. By knowing, the kind of market and rival one is up against there is an upper hand in the market. With the establishment of these analyses on the company and the rivals, the bakery has a picture on what it entails as a new player in the market (PORTER, 1980). The comparisons that are made against market leaders show that they have had vision while the others have had established but possibly fixed structures. Forward rational, innovation and predicting skills have delivered effective corporations with a winning formula that others have found hard to match. In addition, these strategies have been covered in managerial expression with discourses about ‘balanced’ approaches to managing and directing companies. For example, has been so prolific in this respect that it has achieved its own icon status in performance management, especially in America, while in Europe a not a different approach is reflected in the Performance Prism. Five forces analysis helps businesses to realise the factors affecting effectiveness in a definite industry, and can help to enlighten decisions connecting to whether to enter a specific industry; whether to increase capacity in a specific industry; and developing competitive strategies. Operations management theory traditionally was developed for manufacturing/production sector corporations. The theories tended to cover matters such as economic batch quantities, line harmonizing and stock panels, which were very appropriate for these companies. In the mid-1980s, when it materialized that there was an ever-increasing move towards service sector businesses, it was realized that these subjects held little relation to the key issues faced by administrators running service sector jobs. These tools and systems did have some value, but the real issues that plaster service sector firms were issues such as consumer service, service quality and service design. Regrettably, there were no tools or techniques available at that time to help. Much has been done since then and it has become clear that the production and service sector operations management must focus on different critical issues (HILL, & JONES, 2007). Whereas production sector companies may never make face-to-face contact with their end customers, service sector companies do make have this contact with their clienteles, usually on a more familiar, and steady basis. This means the client interaction and approval needs to be analyzed rather inversely in the two differing sectors. Quality is a very important issue in service sector firms, including the quality of the service processes, such as customer wait times, efficiency of queues, courtesy of staff, etc. There seems to be a bit more difficulty analyzing the performance of intangible services as opposed to tangible products. Yet, this is precisely what operations management must do to improve the service being offered to end customers. This is a key theory in the development of any business that will demand service. For faultless rationality, total statistics leading to comprehensive knowledge is necessary. An imperative function of a manager is to determine whether the dividing line is reached between inadequate knowledge and the adequate information that can lead to making of a decision. In this case the operations manager has a plan and adequate evidence on how to beet competition on the same playing ground (FULLEN & BROWN, 2004). This is through segmentation of the products the company offers the clients. For the start, the company looks forward to make an accessible and substantial segment that will slowly build up according to the forecasts and objectives of the company. More so, the manager has made sure the pastries are utterly different from the rest of the competition making the bakery an exception in the region. While focusing on the segments the manager ought to find the best offers by suppliers that will give the company a starting boost. The company objective always comes in handy in the process. They act as a guide to the decisions the manager makes in the identification of the segments. Segments will provide the Annex house a structural attractiveness that the rest have yet to establish in the market. That would be the onset of strong competition. Targeting and positioning of the bakery’s products is another method that will propel the bakery to the next level. The manager has a plan in place for the opening of the bakery where he intends to make sure the marketing of the house will be a big event that will linger on the customers for a while. By engaging the audience, the manager is ready to create lifetime ambassadors of the pastry shop. Annex House is a plan that is underway and hopes to get into the Cardiff market and stretch the greatness with it. Therefore, a full- fledged understanding of clients’ needs and prospects is a vital issue on the today’s service execution agenda. Being a bakery, the business will experience a general target market because most people of all ages enjoy delicious cakes, pastries and pies not forgetting the fact that the products are low-priced items that are nearly affordable to anyone despite their varying levels of income hence keeping the target market large. Currently Annex House has been to work on being recognized by society and become one of the culinary destinations in Cardiff. With the growth of the industry in Cardiff, which also bring corporate opportunity to the bakery it is correct to make sure the business is functional al through (GIRARD, OKE EFE & PRICE, 2012). Low opening cost to start a business in this culinary industry makes it easy to have a better hand in the competition for customers considering the biggest competition is only two bakeries that have been in the industry for a while. With the operations manager and other managers in the establishment, it is clear that the bakery will be successful. However, the market needs to be understood efficiently in order to make the bakery a true delight destination. The plan was assisted by the theories to make it sustainable. The plan earns more credit with the theories giving light to the ideas the plan articulates. Conclusion As a start up the foundation with a very low absorption industry is deliberated to be fragmented, and as such can be vastly competitive. With the flaws present in the existing businesses gives the company an opening for the new launches to gain favour. Since the operations manager part of the job description is to plan the project being on the markets best is part of the process. The start-up is a good plan with a lot of potential considering the financial and general projections that the company intends to gain in the future give the company a focus. The financial ambition is not exaggerated, shows realistic objectives the bakery is after and a clear target in future. The paper looks into the managers roles in the business plan and a critical perspective of the business plan in general. The paper is a review of the theories and roles the operations manager contributed into the plan. In this paper, depiction of the process of making a business plan, which is viable, is articulated by the decisions made by the operations manager. With the focus displayed in the plan, the business is in concrete structures placed by the operations manager in bakery. The follow up on the installed aspects of management will ensure the company has the right capacity needed to make Annex House a delight centre in the city and Raoth Cardiff Welsh. References: Top of Form Bottom of Form Ahlstrom, D., & Bruton, G. D. (2010). International management: strategy and culture in the emerging world. Australia, South-Western Cengage Learning. Arendt, S, Paez, P, & Strohbehn, C 2013, Food safety practices and managers perceptions: a qualitative study in hospitality,International Journal Of Contemporary Hospitality Management, 25, 1, pp. 124-139, Social Sciences Citation Index, EBSCOhost, viewed 26 May 2014. 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