Recommending Books for Purchase (Bulletin 68 - May 2020): Operations Management

This book assesses Chinese acquisitions in developed countries, evaluates the drivers and opportunities and, above all, explores the major operational challenges. It discusses topics such as cross-cultural issues, integration strategies, risk and resilience, the influence of emerging technologies, servitization, impacts on reshoring, corporate social responsibility, branding strategies, knowledge management, and transfer of best practices. While emerging market multinational corporations' (EMNCs) use of mergers and acquisitions as a strategic vehicle has received considerable attention, much less is known about their post-entry activities, such as the implementation of post-acquisition and integration strategies. It can be expected that, compared with their Western counterparts, EMNCs will face radically different challenges that may undermine the success of their products, brands and marketing. Addressing these issues by means of a case study approach, this book is an ideal teaching resource for a variety of courses at both undergraduate and postgraduate level. It also appeals to academics, researchers, and practitioners with a keen interest in manufacturing industry.

The yard block of a container terminal is the central point of synchronisation for asynchronous container flows between deep-sea vessels and transport to the hinterland. The structure of the block stipulates that containers are stacked on top of each other with only the topmost container directly accessible by a yard crane.  This book describes a holistic and integrative approach to container handling in yard blocks to optimise productivity by minimising re-handling operations. The results provide insights for academic scholars as well as for experts from practical terminal planning and operations. The approach presented is two-fold: first, a theoretical foundation of the interdependencies in decision-making is established using mathematical programming. Secondly, operations involving uncertain container arrival information are examined on the basis of a simulation with a rigorous experimental design and statistical evaluation. In this context, the book develops container-handling strategies and analyses the impact of a system for vehicle arrival management - the "Terminal Appointment System". The findings presented in this book are the result of a close cooperation with experts at the port of Hamburg and build on previous research.

The second edition of this textbook comprehensively discusses global supply-chain and operations management, combining value creation networks and interacting processes. It focuses on the operational roles in the networks and presents the quantitative and organizational methods needed to plan and control the material, information and financial flows in the supply chain. Each chapter starts with an introductory case study, and numerous examples from various industries and services help to illustrate the key concepts. The book explains how to design operations and supply networks and how to incorporate suppliers and customers. It also examines matching supply and demand, which is a core aspect of tactical planning, before turning to the allocation of resources for fulfilling customer demands. This second edition features three new chapters: "Supply Chain Risk Management and Resilience", "Digital Supply Chain, Smart Operations, and Industry 4.0", and "Pricing and Revenue-Oriented Capacity Allocation". These new chapters provide the structured knowledge on the principles, models, and technologies for managing the supply-chain risks and improving supply-chain and operations performance with the help of digital technologies such as Industry 4.0, additive manufacturing, Internet-of-Things, advanced optimization methods and predictive analytics. The existing chapters have been updated and new case studies have been included. In addition, the preface provides guidelines for instructors on how to use the material for different courses in supply-chain and operations management and at different educational levels, such as general undergraduate, specialized undergraduate, and graduate courses. The companion website www.global-supply-chain-management.de has also been updated accordingly. In addition, the book is now supported by e-manuals for supply-chain and operations simulation and optimization in AnyLogic and anyLogistix. Providing readers with a working knowledge of global supply-chain and operations management, with a focus on bridging the gap between theory and practice, this textbook can be used in core, special and advanced classes. It is intended for broad range of students and professionals involved in supply-chain and operations management. 

This book provides a theoretical and application-oriented analysis of deterministic scheduling problems in advanced planning and computer systems. The text examines scheduling problems across a range of parameters: job priority, release times, due dates, processing times, precedence constraints, resource usage and more, focusing on such topics as computer systems and supply chain management. Discussion includes single and parallel processors, flexible shops and manufacturing systems, and resource-constrained project scheduling. Many applications from industry and service operations management and case studies are described. The handbook will be useful to a broad audience, from researchers to practitioners, graduate and advanced undergraduate students.

This book offers a comprehensive overview of quality and quality management. It also explores total quality management, covering its human, technological and analytical imperatives. It also examines quality systems and system standards, highlighting essential features and avoiding a reproduction of the ISO 9000 standard, as well as people-related issues in implementing a quality system. A holistic understanding of quality considerations, which now permeate every aspect of human life, should guide related policies, plans and practices. The book describes the all-pervasive characteristics of quality, putting together diverse definitions of "quality," outlining its different dimensions, and linking it with reliability and innovation. It goes on to assess the quality of measurements in terms of precision, accuracy and uncertainty and discusses managing quality with a focus on business performance. This is followed by a chapter on improving process quality, which is the summum bonum of quality management, and a chapter addressing the crucial problem of measuring customer satisfaction through appropriate models and tools. Further, it covers non-traditional subjects such as quality of life, quality of working life, quality assurance and improvement in education, with special reference to higher education, quality in research and development and characterizes the quality-related policies and practices in Indian industry. The last chapter provides a  broad sketch of some recent advances in statistical methods for quality management. Along with the research community, the book's content is also useful for practitioners and industry watchers.

This book focuses on the use of quantitative methods for both business and management, helping readers understand the most relevant quantitative methods for managerial decision-making. Pursuing a highly practical approach, the book reduces the theoretical information to a minimum, so as to give full prominence to the analysis of real business problems. Each chapter includes a brief theoretical explanation, followed by a real-life managerial case that needs to be solved, which is accompanied by a corresponding Microsoft Excel® dataset. The practical cases and exercises are solved using Excel, and for each problem, the authors provide an Excel file with the complete solution and corresponding calculations, which can be downloaded easily from the book's website. Further, in an appendix, readers can find solutions to the same problems, but using the R statistical language. The book represents a valuable reference guide for postgraduate, MBA and executive education students, as it offers a hands-on, practical approach to learning quantitative methods in a managerial context. It will also be of interest to managers looking for a practical and straightforward way to learn about quantitative methods and improve their decision-making processes.    

This book describes approaches, opinions, and concepts for new and emerging solutions and technologies that could be successfully applied in the configuration, optimization and management of supply networks in the highly volatile environment of today's global economy. It features numerous case studies and quantitative research from different sectors and different countries. The authors, which include academics and managers alike, present tips on technical, organizational, financial and social aspects of implementing the new SMART solution.  Dynamic and changing market conditions have made it necessary for companies to act in networks to maintain their competitive position. Accordingly, they have to adapt their own actions to those of other market players, which requires a SMART attitude: today's supply networks need to be Sustainable, Modern, Adaptive, Robust and innovative Technology-oriented. For example, this concerns making decisions about the extent to which a business model should be green or lean. In turn, these decisions impact logistics, IT, environmental issues and co-operation between suppliers, customers, competitors, and complementors. 

This book integrates Industrié 4.0, Value Chain Network Management 2.0, and Stakeholder Value-Led Management into a method, offering organizations an opportunity to be more analytical when making strategic decisions for operations management activities. Strategic Capability Response Analysis embraces the value expectations of all stakeholders in a business enterprise and links them together with a demand-supply-response relationship. This convergence delivers a focused "agile-rolling-value proposition" that optimizes the expectations and the resources of its stakeholder constituents. The use of Strategic Capability Response Analysis considers the implications of the changing environment of value chain network management for the digital age. Industrié 4.0 has presented numerous opportunities across all industries to improve both the effectiveness of strategic decisions and the efficiency of their implementation to the network stakeholders. As Industrié 4.0 is changing the characteristics of decision making, the proposed model considers the impact of alternative solutions on the core business model components of performance, profitability, productivity, producibility, partnerships and preservation. The book includes case studies to highlight current management problems and how this approach can be used to help resolve those issues.

This book covers the strategic use of continuous improvement (CI) techniques for manufacturing performance improvement. It focuses primarily on strategies that can be adopted by small and middle-sized enterprises in manufacturing in order to meet the global challenges and competition. The book begins with an introduction to CI (or Kaizen), explaining different CI approaches and strategies. Chapter 2 offers a literature review of CI, examining conceptual frameworks, case studies, and surveys. Next, the book deals with the design of the study, detailing the work done in each phase along with the tools, techniques and models. Chapter 4 presents a detailed survey to determine the present status of continuous improvement strategies in the Indian manufacturing industry, to assess the important barriers that effect the implementation of CI strategies, and to also assess the role of key enablers leading to improve the performance of manufacturing operations. Chapter 5 is comprised of detailed case studies to further analyze the application of the discussed CI strategies. The purpose of Chapter 6 is to develop the relationship among the different identified most important barriers in implementing CI approach using interpretive structural modeling (ISM) and classify these barriers depending upon their driving and dependence power. Finally Chapter 7 provides conclusions, addresses potential limitations, and also looks to the future.