Understanding Operations Management

Operations management is the process or methodology of executing, designing, controlling, and the operations. And this is done for converting the available resources into desired outcomes or products and services and also implementing a business strategy (Bianchi, M. and Åhlström, 2014). Operations management is concerned with the process of planning, monitoring and organizing in terms of manufacturing, producing and making provision of services. This methodology is delivery focused which ensures that a business corporation successfully converting inputs into outputs in an effective and efficient manner. The process of operations management comprises of two major terms and that is supply chain management and logistics. Event operations management is the topic on which the presented report is focused. These operations are made concerned with ensuring and making the customers experience unremarkably monotonous.

A report is designed to document the project specification that includes resources required, cost, project activities and the requirements made by customers. The purpose of a report is to identify the requirements by gathering accurate information about stakeholders. The report is created by interviewing or sending questionnaires to stakeholders of an organization. (Bouchery, Corbett, Fransoo and Tan, 2016) These stakeholders can be both internal and external people who affect the success of an organization.

A project is a description about the plan in action that is accomplished by the project managers in collaboration with supervisors, experts, team members, system analysts and other important personnel of an organization (Brown, Bessant and Lamming, 2013). A project also describes scope as well resources that are required to complete project management activities. A project can be of any functional area like construction, sales etc.

Project management has been considered as the set of activities which comprise initiating, controlling, executing, planning and closing projects. It has also been considered as a discipline or code of conduct that provides the principles, mechanisms, and tools that will be aiding in the completion of projects and tasks within the given timeline and budget (Brown, Blackmon, Cousins and Maylor, 2013). Project management is the process that includes varied range of interlinking operations and procedures and that are also considered as the series of actions performed or executed by the team that is working towards a similar target.

Project Management is the list of techniques and activities that are used to complete a project. Project Management focuses on managing these activities within the limited time. The project manager is responsible for planning, analyzing, monitoring and controlling. This report will discuss the different areas in which project management techniques are applied.  

The Purpose of a Report

These tools are used to keep track of the deliverables for a project. Projects are started by the companies to resolves some of the key issues (Goetsch and Davis, 2014). Development of project can be termed as the initiative taken by the business organizations to accept the changes necessary for the growth and development of the company. Project management tools are used to accomplish goals and objectives in the company. These tools are used by companies to design an action plan. There are varied range of business processes that need to be completed within the limited time duration which can be easily achieved by the project management tools. Some of these tools are broadly described below-

Strategic Planning- This management tool is implemented by almost all companies because comparing execution with planning, planning is easier. It is a fact that companies choose this tool but it creates complexity in business processes. To use this management tool, staff members of the company has to form a team and make better decisions for the company. Strategic planning is done to evaluate the effectiveness of a company’s resources (Mahadevan, 2015). This is used to ensure that the company’s human resources are working together to achieve the same set of targets. It helps the business corporation in making effective decisions like to change the prices of products or create different advertisements. It guides the people to use technology efficiently. Most of the companies have implemented the automated systems to proceed with the business processes as these takes lesser time to perform tasks. A strategic plan is a kind of document that states issues and their possible solutions for an organization. It is important when performing business activities to communicate with each other. Group discussions are a part of decision-making process. Team members can receive a fair chance to represent their priorities. They can also show their talent when doing the business operations.

Steps that are followed in this management tool are:

1. Analysis of internal and external environment
2. Strategy Formulation
3. Execution of a strategy
4. Evaluation

These steps are used to verify the attributes of the strategic planning framework. This management tool practiced for providing profits for an organization. It is not associated with providing benefits to any external factor (Balanced Scorecard, 2018).

Customer Relationship Management- the CRM approach is based on managing customer relationships for an organization. The customer data is analyzed which is later on used for managing sales and marketing functional areas of an organization. Customer retention is what companies focus on more often (McCrie, 2015). An organization has different communication channels which are used to gather information about a customer. This includes the needs of customers, data of the most liked products, price and quality preferences and other related information. Customer Relationship Management is practiced in every business organization because they have to simultaneously manage the task. The main goal of this management tool provides better customer support, manage sales department and to keep track of the marketing functional area of an organization. All these processes are automated and require customer engagement. This improves communication with the customers and thereby helps in building better customer relationships. A customer plays a very effective role in achieving company’s goals as they can bring new leads for the company. When a customer is associated with the organization, they can make use of their services and on the contrary, they can generate new leads. The CRM practice utilizes some strategic planning like operational, analytical, collaborative and customer data platform (Slack, 2015). However, there are few reasons as to why organizations should choose this practice or not as described below.

The Basics of Project Management

Employee Engagement Surveys- Online platform offers varied range of options for executing varied range of surveys to know the level of customer satisfaction. This management tool helps to understand the performance level of an organization. The very easy way to use this tool is to create questionnaires for the internal and external employees associated with an organization. The employee behavior and the actions taken by them to complete any project is useful in identifying their interests. This also helps to detect the skills, talent, and efficiency of an employee. This decides the work culture of an organization that contributes to receiving the competitive advantage in the market. Surveys consist of different questions which are open-ended and closed-ended. The employees can answer these questionnaires point to point or in one word as per the requirement. This management tool is effective to use for both SME’s and large organizations (Kazimoto, 2015).

Benchmarking- this management tool is used to design metric of managing the success of the company. Most of the business industries choose the process of benchmarking to plan, develop and execute a project. Implementation of innovative technologies is sometimes becoming difficult for the companies due to higher expenses and the cost of their maintenance. But companies trying to manage their costs by designing metrics that provides details about the market status. It let the company know whether the applied business strategy will be effective or not. The market analysis can also be done by using this management tool. The strategies used by the rivalries can also be analyzed by this tool. Benefits of using benchmarking practices are to research more efficiently about the competitor’s strengths and weaknesses. This approach is based on managing competitive advantage of a company in the market (Stroud, 2017).

Balanced Scorecard- this management tool is used to develop strategies for the business. The project activities are divided according to the availability of resources, cost utilized for a project and the requirement of customers. Objectives of the company are designed and accordingly, business strategies are developed. These help to reach out to the targets that have been designed by the company. These are mostly used by the Government and non-profit organizations. The management tool balanced scorecard is mostly used in Asian countries where the employment rate is higher (Marr, 2013).

Strategic planning

Customer relationship management

Conclusion

In the limelight of the above executed and analyzed report it has been inferred that the project management tools are considered as an effective platform that can be adopted by the business entrepreneurs for building and establishing strong bonds and communicating with the external stakeholders. The above report has been presented on the basis of the concept of managing the operations and functions within an event management company. It has been concluded that the management tools play an empirical role in the execution of the operations within the business organizations. After analyzing the above report it has is observed that the management tools are proven very much effective in managing the business practices within the event operations management firms and other business entities. Further, the effective business management strategies can be adopted that are developed and enhanced on regular basis by the managers and this is done for dealing and tackling the competitors in the market. Project size can vary from small to medium size and to the larger projects. This report has described various project management tools that can be implemented by an organization.

References

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