Tuesday, January 14, 2020
Global Projects Management Essay
1 (a). Clearly, human beings have been involved in the management and organization of big projects for quite some long time. This has recently become a common feature of the modern, globalize generation. This has significantly led to the temporality of the originally permanent organizational structures lending them disposable. This has also led to the emergence of the novel forms of linkages between people, nationalities and organizations. However, these projects usually encounter problems which greatly contribute to time and cost overruns as well the decline in quality. The main question is how the cultural differences as well as the institutional differences affect this process of global projects and their outcomes. Human beings interact in a social environment which is made of formal and informal values, norms, rules, codes of conduct, laws and regulations. There are also different policies and polities together with a variety of organizations. These are usually termed as culture and institution. The main aim of these is to reduce ambiguity and uncertainty in behaviors of human beings such as decision making and interaction. In large global projects, there are many factors that affect them in one way or another. These include client related, management related, and project context factors. The cultural and institutional differences are the basis for all these factors. Therefore, it clearly seen that the cultural and institutional differences have an impact and observable implications on the global projects. This will depend on the situation where the particular project is found. For instant, in an Information and Technology industry, a project to come up with a more sophisticated technology can be affected by the presence of poor management whose basis is the cultural differences.            b). The Bullwhip Effect refers to a phenomenon that is observable in forecast-ridden channels used in distribution. It is also known as Whiplash Effect or Forrester Effect. This is mainly in place since the demand of the customers is not always stable. Therefore, there is need for a business to forecast the demand so that it can perfectly balance its inventory and the other resources. These forecasts are usually based on statistics reason as to why they are never perfect.            For instant, if the demand is high, there will be a significant increase in orders made that will mean that the business should increase its inventory. When the demand falls, the participants will increase their orders hence the business will need to reduce their inventory.            This can also be caused by the behavioral and operational factors. The behavioral causes include the misuse of the main stock policies, the misinterpretation of the entire feedback and time delays, the panic order reactions that are caused by the demands that are not met and the perceived risk of the player’s main rationality. The operational causes are those that depend on demand processing such as the errors due to forecast and the adjustment of the inventory depending on the demand observation. The variation due to lead time, order synchronization, promotion and forward buying as well anticipation of knowledge all form part of the operational causes.            The implication of this to the retail industry is that they should be aware of the demands of their customers so that they do not overstock or under stock. Therefore, this concept enables them to predict the direction of the demand to avoid making losses or not meeting the demands of the customers which will inconvenience them.            c). Accurate forecasting is necessary in any industry so that the industry is able to produce to meet the demands of the buyers. For instant, in the travel industry, the management should look at the right time when people are traveling towards a certain direction. For instant, in the morning, most people are headed for jobs in town. Therefore, there should be availability of enough vehicles that will transport all the workers to their destinations. However, in the evening, the reverse is true. The workers want to report home from work thus these  vehicles should also be in plenty to transport them back home. In this way, the travel industry follows the directional flow of the people hence is in a position to meet their demands. At this time, the fare prices go up since people are many hence the demand for transportation is high. During the holiday season, people travel from towns to rural areas. At this time, the vehicles offering services to these people are many and the prices are high as well since the demand for the services is high. At this time, fare from rural areas to town is low since majorities are going against the current. When the schools open, majorities are traveling back to towns so that they can report to their jobs hence the demand for transport to town at this time is high. This means that the prices must also be raised and more vehicles put in the on road to meet these demand. This is however made possible by forecasting of the demands of the people.            d). Inventory control is defined as the process that minimizes the total cost of inventory. It has three major factors that are taken into consideration. These include the cost of holding the cost, the cost of placing an order and the cost of shortage.            Economic Order Quantity (EOQ) is defined as the model that determines the optimal quantity to be ordered in order to minimize the total variable costs that are necessary to order and hold an inventory. Under this, the assumptions taken are that the annual demands for the product or service are known and are always constant. There is no consideration that is taken with regard to the lead time, the receipt of all the orders takes place once the order is made, the quantity discounts are not worked on as part of the model and the cost of ordering is taken to be constant. The Economic Production Quantity (EPQ) is defined as the optimal quantity that is to be produced in order to improve the inventory. It is based on a trade-off between the inventory and the set up of the production costs. Here, the trade-off examination assumes that the demand for the items that are in the inventory is continuous and at a constant rate, productions that are made to improve the inventory are at regular intervals, the production of products is continuous as well as at a constant rate during a production rerun and the production cost is always fixed. This model is similar to the EOQ model. The difference is in the time that is required to change the inventory. In the EOQ, replenishment is instantaneous, while the EPQ model assumes gradual replenishment.            A collaborative planning system has many features that are distinct to enhance its success. For instant, the automotive production industry has its objectives that bind it to the performance of its duties in order to meet these goals. This company has intense connection of all production-related functions into an integrated computerized production system. This will make the performance successful.  A collaborative planning system has a competent network that will ensure that all the workers are in a position to access the data that the need in order to perform their duties. For instant, the automotive industry is developing a web based collaborative surrounding that will facilitate the design and the production together with planning systems. A collaborative planning process also requires a collaborative working system, information sharing without discrimination and exchange of ideas among the people in the different locations. In this form of system, each production process is defined in terms of products, processes involved, resources used and their general relationship. In the automotive industry therefore, the environment is made of four modules. These include: Digital mock-up that supports the entire product digital mock-up process. Has a process planning module that is essential in the provision of time estimation and the full analysis of working procedures. It also has a layout planning module that is responsible for designing the correct layout of the production lines. It has a work place layout which is the major system for workplace design the ergonomic consideration.  A collaborative planning system has room for the employees and the entire community to hive contributions to what they want to perform. For instant, they can use questionnaires or interviews in order to get the feeling of the individuals concerning the particular question at hand should be given a chance and the ideals of the people be taken into consideration. This system should also be a multidimensional system that is capable of handling many issues at once. For instant, in the automotive industry, the system should be able to produce more than one type of a product at singe time at the same time be in a position to control that other related operations. This is made possible through the use of a sophisticated information technology as well as the maximum use of advanced tools and equipment and skills. 3). Lean production refers to the process of producing goods using less resources as compared to the traditional mass production. That is, there is less waste, less human effort, less manufacturing space, less investments in the tools to be used, fewer inventories and less time required to develop a new product. For many, lean is the entire set of tools that are important in that they assist in the identification as well as the steady elimination of wastes. These tools also improve the quality of the product that is to be produced at the same time ensures there is a significant production time and cost reduction. Lean Manufacturing has numerous tools that are important in solving the problem of waste elimination. This is made up of the continuous process improvement as well as mistake-proofing which are an indication that this it taking the same approach to the other improvement methodologies. The second approach to Lean Manufacturing focuses upon the improvement of the flow of work in the system. The techniques that have been chosen to improve the flow include the pull production and leveling production. This however, is different from the methodologies which greatly accounts for its unpopularity. The distinction between the two approaches is the prime approach that is used to achieve the set goals and regulations. Smooth flow implementation exposes the quality problems that existed before leading to reduction in waste in a natural manner. Therefore, this approach is advantageous since it takes a system-wide perspective naturally. On the other hand, the waste focus has its main perspective which is sometimes assumed wrongly. Lean has competing principles that are closely connected whose main goals are to reduce the costs of production through the elimination of wastes. These principles include the pull process, waste minimization, perfect first-time quality, continuous improvement, the flexibility. It also includes the process of building and maintaining a long term relationship with its suppliers, load leveling process and the production flow as well as the visual control. The process of lean implementation is therefore focused on getting the correct things, at the correct time, to the right place, in the preferred quantity in order to achieve a perfect level of work flow while minimizing the waste as well as being flexible and easily  changed. The concepts of flexibility and ability to change are basically required to enhance production leveling. However, they have their analogues in other processes. They are not open ended hence not expensive capability requirements. They therefore have to be understood, appreciated and embraced by the employees involved in the product building process. The cultural and managerial features of Lean are more important than the actual tools or methodologies of the process of production itself. There are numerous examples of Lean tool implementation that do not have known benefit which are often blamed on the entire understanding of Lean in the organization which is weak. Lean’s main aim is to make the work simple enough to understand, to do and to manage in the shortest time possible. Most of the basic goals of lean manufacturing are common sense and that avoiding unnecessary costs is more profitable that increasing sales. In a manufacturing industry, if the recourses are kept constant and productions costs cut down, then the industry will definitely make very high profits. This will only be possible are the management and the workers involved do their duties satisfactorily and the management ensures that the entire processes are in time.  References. Jalan, K. S. Chaudhuri, (1999). An EOQ Model for Deteriorating Items in a Declining Market with SFI Policy, The Korean J. Comput. & Appl. Math No. 2. 437-450. C. Giri, K. S. Chaudhuri, Deterministic Models of Perishable Inventory with Stock Dependent Demand Rate and non-linear Holding Cost, European Journal of Operational Research 105 (1998), 467-474. Vahidian, H. R. Tareghian, (1999). Production Planning in Fuzzy Environment. The Korean J. Comput. & Appl. Math. No. 2, 315-330. M. Lee, J. S. Yao, Economic Production quantity for fuzzy demand quantity and fuzzy production quantity, European Journal of Operational Research 109 (1998), 203-211 De, A. Goswami, A replenishment policy for items with finite production rate and fuzzy deterioration rate, Opsearch 38 (2001), No. 4, 419-430.  Â
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