Analysis of Hook Norton Brewery's Business Operations Report

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of Hook Norton Brewery's business operations, a small family-owned brewery in England. It begins with a company overview, followed by a Gantt chart outlining the production schedule. The report then delves into the challenges faced by the company, including government regulations, growth, hiring, fatigue, and business know-how, and discusses operational management issues such as communication and system design. The 4V model is employed to assess the brewery's operations. A detailed explanation of the beer production process is provided, from malting to finishing. Finally, the report suggests improvements and recommendations based on a continuous improvement model to enhance the brewery's efficiency and address identified challenges. The report covers the business operations of the brewery, including key processes of production, challenges faced by the company, and recommendations for improvements.

BUSINESS
OPERATIONS

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................1
Company overview......................................................................................................................1
Gantt Chart...................................................................................................................................1
Challenges faced by the company and different operation framework.......................................2
Key process of production of product..........................................................................................5
Improvements and Recommendation by continuous improvement model.................................6
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................8
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................9

INTRODUCTION
Business operations means all the things inside the company which helps the business in running
smoothly and to earn money. It is related to increasing the value of the organisation by doing
various efforts. Hook Norton Brewery is a small family business which runs in England. The
famous thing about the brewery is that it runs on a steam engine. There are very few breweries
left in the whole world which runs on a steam engine. There are various topics discussed in the
report like challenges faced by the organisation and some operation management challenges
faced by the organisation.
MAIN BODY
Company overview
Hook Norton Brewery is a small company owned by a family which was established in 1849. it
is situated in Norton, England. It is famous for its beers and various types of alcoholic products.
The brewery is famous for its quality beer and the museum. The museum has various artefacts
and equipments which were used before by the people. Various tours are organised in the
brewery as well as the museum. The brewery works through the steam engine which was started
in 1899. There are various things which can be done in the business to make it more successful
and grow. There are various things which are shared in the report like the problems which small
business faces in the economy, and what are the operations of small business. The report also has
various models which help in the business operation(Uhl and Gollenia, 2016).
Gantt Chart
Gantt Chart is a type of chart which shows the project schedule. The charts shows all the task
which are to be performed on the vertical axis and all the time intervals and timing related graph
on horizontal axis. Modern Gantt charts shows the dependency between activities and current
status of tasks. Gantt charts shows the start and finish date of an element with summary opf the
project. It was invented by Henry Gantt. The process of manufacturing a beer is explained in the
project. There are various challenges which are faced by the organisation are given in the project.
Quality improvement frameworks are also explained in the report(Sugiyama, Kato and
Sakamoto, 2018).
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Activities
Week
1
Week
2
Week
3
Week
4
Week
5
Week
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Week
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Week
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Week
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Week
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Introduction
Preparing the chart
Challenge faced
The process of
production
Quality
improvement
frameworks
Conclusion
References
Challenges faced by the company and different operation framework
Main challenges faced by the organisation: There are various challenges which an organisation
faces daily. These challenges are faced differently by different organisation depending upon their
knowledge and experience. Some of the most common challenges faced by an small organisation
are:
1) Government regulations: Government regulations have become a major headache for
small business owners. Due to changes in government and government policies has
affected the working of small business. The profit has very much reduced due to high
taxes imposed by the government. The government is not giving any leniency to small
business in taxes and so theses business are not able to survive in front of big business
and retailers. Government should start different schemes for small businesses so that they
can easily work in the competitive world. Hook Norton brewery is affected by the
regulations of the government related to the alcoholic beverage (Challenges faced by
small business, 2019)
2) Growth and Quality: Small businesses are not ready for high demand so when any high
demand arise these bushiness are not able to sustain in the market. With high demand
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there is always a need of proper system in which the business can work easily. The most
important thing at the time of increase in demand is that the business is not able to cope
up with demand and quality(Piercy and Rich, 2015 ). For increasing the production of
good, the company reduces the quality of product and this in long run affects the sales
and profits of the company. Hook Norton company is affected by the high demand as
their machinery is slow and takes time to produce good.
3) Hiring new employees: Hiring efficient and effective employees is very important in the
small business. The work and experience of the efficient person will always benefit the
company. The problem of new employee is that he is not known to the rules and working
of the organisation so there are many chances that the new employee will make a
mistake. No one knows the exact working of new candidate so it is very tough for
employees to adjust with the new candidate. In small companies it is the work of the
owner to select the candidate and he is only responsible to train him. The owner should
have ample amount of knowledge and experience which can help him in selecting the
right candidate for the right post(Renfroe, 2015).
4) Fatigue: The company has to work for hours due to less employees in it. The owner has
to work fro hours if it want to take the company to a good level. It takes time for a new
company to get adjusted in the new market. There are various competition in the market
which affect the working of the company. Hook Norton brewery has been affected by the
competition around it. There are various brewery in world nowadays and the product of
most of them are same so it has become a challenge to cope with the competitive
environment These reasons causes fatigue. Fatigue can also lead to loss in business as
the owner will not be able to take right decision if he is not feeling well or if he is
tired(Paul, Parthasarathy, and Gupta, 2017).
5) Business know-how: Many time people start a business before getting the full knowledge
of it. This leads to loss in the business. Every person should start a company after getting
all the knowledge about it and if possible taking some experience of it before starting
your own. A person should always try to start that business in which he has some passion.
A person who is passionate about a business will always yield something good out of it.
There are very less people around small business owners so they does not have proper
experienced person around the company who can help the business in various issues.
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Some operation management challenges that the business is facing are:
Effective communication: Effective communication is very important for a business if it
wants to succeed. Effective communication helps the business in sending the right information to
the different departments. The communication of Hook Norton company is not efficient. The
work of one person is not known to other and this result in doing the work more than once. There
is wastage of time, resources and energy due to less communication between workers(Knudsen,
2016).
System design: System design means the modules, interfaces and architecture of a place.
System design plays a very important role in the company. If a company want to produce good
quality products in right quantity and at right time then the system design must be good. Hook
Norton brewery design system is old and needs renovation so that it can produce more.
Monitoring Performance: Various performance indicators should be used by the
company to measure the performance of the company as well as the employee. These indicators
will help the company to know the reason for less profits and to know which employees are not
working properly. If employee are not working properly then it can cause a loss to the company.
Hook Norton brewery measure the performance of each employee so that company does not
have to incur huge losses. Performance is generally measured by owner in small
businesses(Steinmetz, 2016).
Models to measure operation management: There are various models which can be used to
measure operation management. Here the model used is 4V model. All business operations have
one thing in common that is all the raw materials or input are converted into outputs. The 4v
model is:
1) Volume Dimension: Volume means the number of goods produced by following the
same process. In big companies the volume is very high comparing to small businesses.
The standard and procedures are all connected and they a new path is derived which is
very low in cost and maximum efficiency. Hook Norton Brewery volume is high because
it produces same beverages and supplies it to different people(Evert, and et.al., 2016).
2) Variety Dimension: Variety means the different variety of goods and services which can
be produced and sold . This is all about diversity. More variety of good provides
flexibility to the producers as they can produce good according to the requirement of
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customers. Hook Norton Brewery produces few variety of beers only. This has reduced
its market share in these years as there are other companies producing variety.
3) Variation: Variation means the change in demand of good over other. Variation is
generally seen when the company is not able to compete with the changing demand or
quality of a product. The changes occur due to the external factors of the business.
4) Visibility: This dimension means the ability of the customer to see or track the
experience through operation. In a courier company the customer can track its shipment
so visibility is very high but in comparing to manufacturing industry the customer cannot
see the goods production so visibility is low(Charter, 2017).
Key process of production of product
The company here produces beer and the production process of beer is:
1) Malting: Beer is produced from barley. Grains are soaked in water and then excess water
is drained out and it is incubated for around 5 days for germination. The germination
allows the formation of enzymes which gives colour and flavour.
2) Kilning: the seed are then killed by heating it to 80 degree Celsius. If the heating is higher
then it will kill enzymes which will make dark beer.
3) Mailing: The dried barley grains are then crushed between rollers to make coarse grist.
4) Mashing: Grist produced earlier is mixed with water and the resulting material is kept at
65 degree Celsius for 1 hr. The liquid obtained by mashing is called wort and all the other
residue left are proteins which are filtered.
5) Hops: Hops are flower which are added to beer for aroma, or for coagulation of
remaining proteins and it is only responsible for the foam of the beer.
6) Fermentation: Fermentation is carried out in 3-4 degree Celsius and it takes around 14
days for complete fermentation. Fermentation is don in open tanks and CO2 liberated can
be collected or can be done after this.
7) Finishing: It is the last step in which beer is kept in containers for weeks or months. Ester
ans other compounds are added so that it gives taste and aroma. The beer is now cooled
and then added in bottles(Wang, and et.al., 2016).
It is very long process and need various machinery. The production of beer is an expensive
process. There is need of a big space , various machinery and a lot of patience.
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Improvements and Recommendation by continuous improvement model
Improvement in the good can be done by various techniques. It is very important for a
company to check the process again and again for improvement. The method used here for
improvement is PDSA technique. PDSA technique starts with:
1) Plan: Plan starts with identifying an objective that should be achieved an then
formulating a plan so that success can be achieved. The volume of good should be
planned in advance. It should be noted that the amount of good produced should be equal
to the demand. Excess should not be produced. Excess production will lead to loss to the
company. More production can be done by increasing the demand. Quality should always
be the first priority of the company. Planning should be done seeing the quality of goods.
If quality is reduced when the production is increased then planning should be done like
that the quality is not reduced. Planning to increase the variety should be done by Hook
Norton Brewery. Increase in variety will give more customers to the company. Less
customers means that the company is not able to earn profits from the sale of its products.
2) Do: Do is that step which means that actual implementation of the strategies of the plan.
All the things which are thought to be increased should be implemented in this stage.
Volume should be increased by increasing the production of good. Variety should also be
increased so that more customers will but the good. Increase in market share means more
profit to the company. The company can face the competition and competitors only if it is
doing business in more than one segment(Christoff, 2018).
3) Study: It is the step in which outcomes of implementation are seen and they are
monitored and measured. The plan is either success or plan is changed due to failure.
Plan to increase the volume of good is studied here. All the reports are studied about the
decision of increasing the volume of good. It is also studied that whether increasing the
variety of good was profit for the company or loss.
4) Act: this is the final step where feedback is taken from the previous step whether the
changes were right or not. It is learned from this step and from the reports that whether
the decision was right or wrong. If the changes were right then they are carried out
further but if they are wrong or not applicable then they are removed or changed. The
decision of increasing volume and variety is seen and then the decision is taken(Renfroe,
2015).
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CONCLUSION
Different companies work in there own styles and the process of manufacturing a good is
also different for them. The company chosen here is Hook Norton Brewery. It is small business
whose main work is producing beer and it earns from the museum it has made. There are many
visitors who come to see the machinery and who like to taste fresh beer. The best thing about this
brewery is that it runs on a steam engine. It is the only brewery from few which is left and which
runs on a steam engine. The report has Gantt chart which shows how the report is made. The
report include various challenges which the companies are facing today. There are various
operation management challenge faced by the company in the business. The report also shows
operation management model which are used in the report. The manufacturing process of a
product is also given in the report and there are some pros and cons which the company faces
from the production process. There are recommendations given in the form of PSDA techniques.
It says how quality can be measured. There are various ways by which an organisation can
change its operations and various factors due to which an organisation has to to change its
working. It depends upon different business and its management to check the working of the
company properly and find the deviations in it.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Charter, M., 2017. Greener marketing: A responsible approach to business. Routledge.
Christoff, P., 2018. Running PDSA cycles. Current problems in pediatric and adolescent health
care.48(8). pp.198-201.
Evert, R.E. and et.al., 2016. Empirics in family business research: Progress, challenges, and the
path ahead. Family Business Review.29(1). pp.17-43.
Knudsen, J.S., 2016. The Growth of Private Regulation of Labor Standards in Global Supply
Chains: Mission Impossible for Western Small and Medium-Sized Firms?.
In Sustainable Value Chain Management (pp. 121-140). Routledge.
Paul, J., Parthasarathy, S. and Gupta, P., 2017. Exporting challenges of SMEs: A review and
future research agenda. Journal of world business.52(3). pp.327-342.
Piercy, N. and Rich, N., 2015. The relationship between lean operations and sustainable
operations. International Journal of Operations & Production Management.35(2).
pp.282-315.
Renfroe, G.A., 2015. System and Method for Integrating Business Operations. U.S. Patent
Application 14/458,397.
Steinmetz, R., 2016. Small states in Europe: challenges and opportunities. Routledge.
Sugiyama, Y., Kato, T. and Sakamoto, T., 2018.July. Improvement Method for Business
Operations Using User Experience Adaptive Information Sharing Terminals.
In International Conference on Applied Human Factors and Ergonomics (pp. 326-330).
Springer, Cham.
Uhl, A. and Gollenia, L.A. eds., 2016.A handbook of business transformation management
methodology. Routledge.
Wang, H.,and et.al., 2016. Corporate social responsibility: An overview and new research
directions: Thematic issue on corporate social responsibility.
Online
Challenges faced by small business. 2019.[Online]. Available
Through.<https://smallbiztrends.com/2017/10/biggest-challenges-for-small-business-
owners.html>.
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