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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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Conducting Marketing Research

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Companies can conduct their own marketing research or hire other companies to do it for them. Good marketing research is characterized by the scientific method, creativity, multiple research methods, accurate model building, costbenefit analysis, healthy skepticism, and an ethical focus.
The marketing research process consists of defining the problem, decision alternatives; and research objectives; developing the research plan; collecting the information; analyzing the information; presenting the findings to management; and making the decision.
In conducting research, firms must decide whether to collect their own data or use data that already exist. They must also choose a research approach (observational, focus group, survey, behavioral data, or experimental) and research instruments (questionnaire, qualitative measures, or technological devices). In addition, they must decide on a sampling plan and contact methods (by mail, by phone, in person, or online).
Two complementary approaches to measuring marketing productivity are: (1) marketing metrics to assess marketing effects and (2) marketing-mix modeling to estimate causal relationships and measure how marketing activity affects outcomes. Marketing dashboards are a structured way to disseminate the insights gleaned from these two approaches within the organization.

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OPERATIONS AND SUPPLY CHAIN STRATEGIES

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The operations and supply chain areas are important providers of value in any organization. To ensure that managers make sound operations and supply chain decisions, firms must develop strategies for these functions that are tied to the overall business strategy. This chapter has presented a top-down model of the strategic planning process, with particular attention to the concepts of value, competitive advantage, and core competency. In the second half of the chapter, we defined the major operations and supply chain decision variables, outlined the four generic performance dimensions (quality, time, flexibility, and cost), and discussed the need to make trade-offs between these key dimensions. We showed how order winner and order qualifier information can help managers understand exactly what their customers demand, so they can make trade-offs in a logical fashion. We ended the chapter with a discussion of the four stages of alignment in operations and supply chain strategy, sho...
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MANAGING QUALITY

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As an area of intense business interest, quality is here to stay. Operations and supply chain personnel in particular need to be familiar with the major quality topic areas, including the different philosophical perspectives on quality and the tools used to manage quality levels on a day-to-day basis. In this chapter, we gave you a solid introduction to quality topics, ranging from high-level discussions of quality issues to detailed descriptions of tools and techniques. We started by defining quality and describing a total cost of quality model. We then presented an overview of total quality management (TQM), as well as a section on statistical quality control (SQC). We ended the chapter with a discussion of how organizations manage quality across the supply chain and some of the issues they face. We encourage you not to let your quality education end here. The American Society for Quality ( www.asq.org ), the Juran Institute ( www.juran.com ), the W. Edwards Deming Institute ( www....
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INTRODUCTION to OPERATIONS and SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT

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Operations and supply chains are pervasive in business. Every organization must provide a product or service that someone values. This is the primary responsibility of the operations function. Furthermore, most organizations do not function independently but find that their activities are linked with those of other organizations through supply chains. Careful management of operations and supply chains is, therefore, vital to the long-term health of nearly every organization. Because operations and supply chain activities cover everything from planning and control activities to sourcing and logistics, there are numerous career opportunities for students interested in the area. Trends in e-commerce and global competition, as well as the growing importance of maintaining good relationships with other supply chain partners, will only increase these opportunities. Fortunately, there are many professional organizations, including APICS, CSCMP, and ISM, that cater to the career development ...
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Internal Analysis: Resources, Capabilities, and Core Competencies

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This chapter demonstrated various approaches to analyzing the firm’s internal environment . Differentiate among a firm’s resources, capabilities, core competencies, and activities. Core competencies are unique, deeply embedded, firm-specific strengths that allow companies to differentiate their products and services and thus create more value for customers than their rivals, or offer products and services of acceptable value at lower cost. Resources are any assets that a company can draw on when crafting and executing strategy. Capabilities are the organizational and managerial skills necessary to orchestrate a diverse set of resources to deploy them strategically. Activities are distinct and fine-grained business processes that enable firms to add incremental value by transforming input into goods and services. The compare and contrast tangible and intangible resources . Tangible resources have physical attributes and are visible. Intangible resources have...
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BUSINESS PROCESS

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Although the term business processes has been in the management lexicon for years, not all organizations clearly understand the importance of business processes and their effects on operations and supply chain performance. In this chapter, we defined the concept of business processes and showed how the business process perspective is different from the traditional, functionally oriented view of business. Business processes change the focus from “How is the business organized?” to “What does the business do?” Fortunately, practitioners and theorists continue to develop various tools and approaches for managing business processes. In this chapter, we described two process mapping approaches and demonstrated how they can be used. We also spent considerable time talking about various approaches to managing and improving business processes, including performance measurement and benchmarking, the Six Sigma methodology, and continuous improvement tools. We concluded the chapter with a discu...
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