Operation Management Assignment

1) At Comp4U, you have tracked warranty claims from your customers for the last month. Here is the list of 

problems and the number of times each occurred:

Monitor not working  5

Wires loose    6

RAM bad    30

CD ROM drive bad  2

Mouse defective    18

Software conflicts  8

Modem defective    4

Draw a Pareto chart using this data. Note that a Pareto chart always go left to right, largest to smallest. The next step is to analyze the problem with the largest number of errors.  How would you go about 

getting more information, and what types of information might you want to know, that is, what 

questions would you ask? Remember that we are trying to find a root cause of problems.

 2)

Draw and develop  a cause-and-effect diagram for the following situation: a less than satisfying course 

experience at CSU-Pueblo. Consider at the end of a semester, you had a course that you think did not go 

very well.  You were just not satisfied with the course for some  reason (there could be lots of reasons). 

Now determine what could be the causes of this experience. 

 3) 

It is often thought that there are two major groups of customers for a university’s services : the student, 

and the future employees of the student.  You are to define quality for these two groups.  For the 

employer, how would the employer define quality in the student that is to be hired? As a student, how 

do you define quality in the education process?

 4)

The forecasting needs of CSU-Pueblo and Comp4U may be different. 

1.   Are the most important forecasts for CSU-Pueblo short, medium, or long term?

2.   What would the most important uses for forecasts at CSU-Pueblo?

3.   Are the most important forecasts for Comp4U short, medium, or long term?

4.   What would the most important uses for forecasts at Comp4U?

 5)

Locate the Westpark Health Care Centre at the web site listed. 

Westpark Health Care    http://www.westpark.org/PatientsAndFamilies/AboutOurFacilities.aspx

Start by looking at the map of the facilities on the first web page, and read the descriptions (above the 

map) of the functions in each of the buildings.

Click on the Long-Term Care Centre link and review the pages associated with that building.

To hand in for the Westpark Health Care Centre (job shop): What is it that makes this a job shop? You 

may want to take note of the layout, customization, and other aspects of this facility that match the 

characteristics of a process focus.  Do NOT draw a flow diagram.  About 1 page typed single spaced 

should do it. You can exceed that without penalty.  

 6)

Batch process: Draw a process flow diagram, with appropriate labels, of the

process. 

Locate the Coors Brewery tour at

http://www.boostmyproduct.com/coors-brewery.html

This is one long page that contains the entire tour.

If for some reason the plant tour site is no longer active, please contact the instructor for an alternative.

What do you notice about this tour that you found interesting? 

If at any time an internet tour is no longer available, please contact the instructor for an alternate 

assignment.

 7)

Repetitive.  Locate the Hershey’s Chocolate Company at the web site listed.  Draw a process flow 

diagram, with appropriate labels, of the process. Do not just copy a web site that has a tour on it, if one 

exists. Create your own flow diagram. 

Locate the Hershey’s Chocolate Company at the web site listed. 

Hershey’s Chocolate:

http://www.thehersheycompany.com/assets/pdfs/hersheycompany/MakingChocolate_pdf

Mostly repetitive, but some batch and continuous processing also.

 8)

Locate the Michigan Sugar mill at the web site listed. 

http://www.michigansugar.com/about/education/production.php 

Draw your own diagram by reading through the explanation of sugar processing on this one page.

 9)

Based on the four organizations just studied in Questions 5 through 8, answer the following questions.

1.   Which companies and process types are make-to-stock?

2.   Which companies and process types are make-to-order?

3.   Which companies and process types have the highest quality products?

4.   Which companies and process types have the lowest unit cost?

5.   Which companies and process types have the highest volumes?

6.   Which companies and process types have the greatest flexibility of product variety?

 

10)

Fill in the following table with the companies that you studied and check the columns on the right  using 

the answers from AE 12. In the large square below that is crisscrossed with dotted lines, you are to place 

each company in one of those 16 smaller squares.  You should place a company in a square so that it 

aligns with the type of process they have and the characteristic that match across the top. For example, 

the job shop should go into the job shop row, in one of the 4 boxes.  Select the appropriate 

characteristics of the job shop across the top left (variety, equipment flexibility, volume) and mark that 

company in the one box that matches the column and the row (job shop). 

Describe in words how the characteristics you have checked on the right half relate to the type of 

process. 

See the table attached