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MANAGING PROJECTS

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Projects represent nonroutine business activities that often have long-term strategic ramifications for a firm. In this chapter, we examined how projects differ from routine business activities and discussed the major phases of projects. We noted how environmental changes have resulted in increased attention being paid to projects and project management over the past decade. In the second half of the chapter, we introduced some basic tools that businesses can use when planning for and controlling projects. Both Gantt charts and network diagrams give managers a visual picture of how a project is going. Network diagrams have the added advantage of showing the precedence between activities, as well as the critical path(s). We wrapped up the chapter by showing how these concepts are embedded in inexpensive yet powerful software packages such as Microsoft Project. If you want to learn more about project management, we encourage you to take a look at the Web site for the Proj...
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Complexity and The Supply Chain

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Complexity in the supply chain can arise from a number of sources and some of the most common causes include: Network complexity, Process complexity, Range complexity, Product complexity, Customer complexity, Supplier complexity, Organisational complexity, Information complexity.
It can be argued that an increasing proportion of total end-to-end costs in the supply chain are driven by complexity in one form or another. Often these costs may not be readily transparent as they are hidden in general overheads or the costs of carrying inventory. Most businesses will find if they perform an 80:20 analysis that they have a ‘long-tail’ of customers who, whilst significant in numbers, actually contribute very little to overall profitability – indeed some may actually make a loss. Likewise, the same conclusions would probably emerge from an 80:20 analysis of products.
These are some of the ways that product design decisions can affect supply chain complexity: Time-to-market and time-to-volume, Added complexity through lack of commonality, Increased replenishment lead times, Supply chain vulnerability, After sales support, Late stage customisation.
Because supply chain complexity is such a major source of total end-to-end pipeline cost as well as being a significant inhibitor of responsiveness, it is essential that complexity reduction becomes a priority. It can be argued that today’s supply chain managers need to be ‘complexity masters’, such is the importance of containing and removing this impediment to enhanced profitability.

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MANAGING QUALITY

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INTRODUCTION to OPERATIONS and SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT

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