Operations, information, systems and contingency management
In this last section, we review four other significant historical approaches to management that have influenced how today's managers produce goods and services on a daily basis, gather and manags the information they need to understand their businesses and make good decisions, understand how the different parts of the company work together as a whole and recognise when and where particular management practices are likely to work.
To better understand these ideas, let's learn about
operations management
information management
systems management
contingency management.
In chapter 17, you will learn about operations management, which involves managing the daily production of goods and services. In general, operations management uses a quantitative or mathematical approach to find ways to increase productivity, improve quality and manage or reduce costly inventories. The most commonly used operations management tools and methods are quality control, forecasting techniquaes, capacity planing, productivity measurement and improvement, linear programming, scheduling systems, inventory systems, work measurement techniques (similar to the Gilbreths' motion studies), project management (similar to Gantt's charts) and cost-benefit analysis.
Today, with those tools and techniques, we take it for granted that manufactured goods will be made with standardised, interchangeable parts; that the design of those parts will be based on specific, detailed plans; and that manufacturing companies will aggressively manage inventories to keep costs low and increase porductivity. Surprisingly, these key elements of operation management have some rather strange origins: guns, geometry and fine.