Operations Management - Essay Example

Thus no organization can afford to be involved in non-value adding activities (Brown 2005). Non-value adding activities not only increase costs but also result in poor outputs, slow delivery and reduced flexibility to respond to the market forces. In our following discussion, we will start by understanding the various theories and latest practices in the field of Operations Management (OM). We will also try to understand the practical aspects of OM and see how these are actually implemented in the real organizational context.

Since we need to analyze Aldi Stores, which is a chain of retail stores, we will look at the implications of Operations management in the field of retail management. Retail has become a very competitive field today. As retail chains were the first to enter into the globalization arena, especially international sourcing, this industry has reached a very mature level of internationalization of operations. Managing these operations to obtain the real benefits of internationalization is of critical importance for these organizations.

Our aim in the pursuing sections will be to see how these concepts and theories of operations management as a whole (and in specific relation to the retail industry) can be used for obtaining operational excellence at Aldi Stores. Hence, we will first look at operations management examples that have provided competitive advantage to Aldi as well as its competitors Tesco, ASDA and J Sainsbury. This will be followed by a discussion on some OM problems being faced by these companies. A major concern of this field of management is the cost of implementation as it is highly dependent on technology.

Thus, we will analyze the costs and benefits accrued from OM implementation at Aldi. After analyzing all aspects of the operations management we will look at some solutions to the problems faced by Aldi in this respect and arrive at some concrete recommendations for its