Operations management is the study of how organizations produce goods and services.

Operations management, which focuses on how organizations produce goods and services efficiently and effectively. The emphasis is on the study and improvement of operations, the transformation process through which goods and services are actually created. The essentials of operations management include business process analysis, workflow designs, facilities layouts and locations, work scheduling and project management, production planning, inventory management, and quality control.

An open system transforms resource inputs from the environment into product outputs.

Contingency thinking tries to match management practices with situational demands.

Quality Management Focuses

Attention on Continuous

Improvement

Total quality management is managing with an organization wide commitment to continuous improvement, product quality, and customer needs.

Evidence-based management involves making decisions based on hard facts about what really works.

Any research following the scientific method will display the following characteristics:

•A research question or problem is identified.

•Hypotheses, or possible explanations, are stated.

•A research design is created to systematically test the hypotheses.

•Data gathered in the research are analyzed and interpreted.

•Hypotheses are accepted or rejected based on the evidence.

Rapid Review • Advanced quantitative techniques in decision sciences and operations management help managers to solve complex problems. • The systems view depicts organizations as complex networks of subsystems that must interact and cooperate with one another if the organization as a whole is to accomplish its goals. • Contingency thinking avoids “one best way” arguments, recognizing instead that managers need to understand situational diff erences and respond appropriately to them. • Quality management focuses on making continuous improvements in processes and systems. • Evidence-based management uses findings from rigorous scientific research to identify management practices for high performance.

Learn About Yourself

Ethics and Social Responsibility

Your Thoughts? What social responsibility do employers have to make sure that employees don’t work so many hours that they lose productivity and damage their health and personal lives?

Does it surprise you that soft ware coders produce higher quality work in 40-hour versus 60-hour weeks? Someone who works long hours gives the impression of being “dependable” and “committed.” But at what price? An occupational psychologist says: “We need to see duty of care as part of the role of manager . . .

sensible hours need to be championed by middle managers as well as senior leaders.” Not taking care of your health, missing children’s life and school events, and inattention to spouse or partner are warning signs. Living with always-on technology doesn’t help.

• Ethical behavior is values driven. • Views diff er on what constitutes moral behavior. • What is considered ethical can vary across cultures. • Ethical dilemmas are tests of personal ethics and values. • People have a tendency to rationalize unethical behavior.

Ethics set standards of good or bad, or right or wrong, in our conduct. Ethical behavior is “right” or “good” in the context of a governing moral code.

Consider this situation. About 10% of an MBA class at Duke University were once caught cheating on a take-home final exam. The “cheaters” were also big on music downloads, file sharing, open-source soft ware, text messaging, and electronic collaboration. Some say what happened relates to “postmodern learning,” where students are taught to collaborate, work in teams, and use social media. For others, there is no doubt—it was an individual exam, and those students cheated.

Ethical issues and problems arise when people do something that violates their, or someone else’s values—underlying beliefs and judgments of what is right or wrong.