BTEC HNC Business Unit 4: Management & Operations - Report Analysis

This report, prepared for a BTEC HNC in Business Unit 4, explores the interconnected roles of leaders and managers in organizational success. It differentiates between leadership and management functions, highlighting how they contribute to achieving defined goals. The report delves into various leadership theories, including situational, systems, and contingency approaches, and analyzes key approaches to operations management, such as Just-in-Time, TQM, and Six Sigma, emphasizing their importance in achieving business objectives. Furthermore, it examines factors within the business environment, such as resource management, financial status, stakeholders, and legal policies, and their impact on operational management and decision-making processes. The report concludes by summarizing the importance of effective leadership and management in driving organizational performance and adapting to market changes.

MANAGEMENT & OPERATIONS

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
LO 2.................................................................................................................................................1
P 2 Ways in which role of a leader and the function of a manager apply in different situation..1
P 3 Theories of approach, including situational leadership, systems leadership and contingency
.....................................................................................................................................................2
LO 3.................................................................................................................................................2
P 4 Key approaches to operations management and the role that leaders and managers............2
P 5 Importance and value of operations management in achieving business objectives.............3
LO 4.................................................................................................................................................4
P 6 Factors within the business environment that impact upon operational management and
decision making by leaders and managers...................................................................................4
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................4
REREFENCES................................................................................................................................6

INTRODUCTION
Managers and leaders play a vital role within success of an organization. Leaders and
managers both play different roles but works in same direction in order to achieve defined goals
and objectives (Jurburg and et. al., 2018). This report will lay emphasis on role and functions of
leaders and managers, different kinds of leadership theories, approaches to operations
management, importance of operation management and factors within the business environment
that impact upon operational management.
LO 2
P 2 Ways in which role of a leader and the function of a manager apply in different situation
Role of a leader is completely different from role of a manager. Leader helps in taking
effective decision and motivating employees. Whereas, manager helps in managing all the
operations of an organization. Both role of a leader and function of a manager in different
situations has been explained below:
 Manager of Starbucks has been assigned a task which is required to be completed by
manager’s team member within a specific time period. In order to explain function of a
manager classical theory of management can be used. This theory helps in enhancing overall
productivity of employees in order to achieve best results (Mkansi, Eresia-Eke and
Emmanuel-Ebikake, 2018). This theory focuses on examination of valuable source of
information related to management so that efficiency of the employees can be increased and
overall output results can be enhanced. Managers applies this classical theory in order to
enhance overall skills and abilities of their team members in order t complete the task on
time. Leaders can use trait theory to motivate their employees which will help in enhancing
their overall performance and will further help in increasing final result accuracy.
 Due to various factors cost of manufacturing is increasing. Starbucksneed to work on this
factor so that increasing manufacturing cost can reduce and sales can be increased. In such
situation managers can use various kinds of strategies to select suppliers who can provide
raw materials at lower prices. Whereas, leaders can use transformational leadership style so
that they can they can effectively communicate with their employees, motivate them so that
they can easily adopt advance technology in order to reduce or lower manufacturing cost.
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P 3 Theories of approach, including situational leadership, systems leadership and contingency
Leaders of an organization helps in motivating their employees by analysing their needs,
requirements and desires. Any kind of changes that arise within external environment of the
organization are evaluated by the leaders and take appropriate decision so that Starbucks can get
benefitted from those changes.
Situational leadership: It is a kind of leadership in which leaders are assigned work and
activities as per their talent and skills. Leaders of organization analyse market condition and then
take decisions accordingly (Al Khamisi, Khan and Hernandez, 2017). This theory helps the
leaders to take appropriate decisions, find out best solution for the market changes so that
changes of negative results can be reduced
System leadership: It is a kind of leadership quality that focuses on results obtained rather than
the steps or process. This theory completely focuses on the results that will be obtained by a
particular task or activity. In this activity of task is planned so that desired results can be
obtained.
Contingency approach: This leadership approach or theory focuses on different kinds of
situation that arises within an organization like Starbucks. Any kind of issue that arises within
the organization so that solution of the same can be identified after discussing it with all the other
team members. This approach is used by leaders so that they can identify different paths through
which they can achieve organizational goals.
Chaos theory: it focuses on all kinds of changes that are prevailing within the market, leaders
and managers response to such changes accordingly so that organization can work according to
such changes.
LO 3
P 4 Key approaches to operations management and the role that leaders and managers
Operation management is one of the most important part of an organization. It helps in
administrating all the activities of the organization so that overall quality of their products and
services can be improved (Andrade, Mendes and Lourenço, 2017). There are various kinds of
approaches of operation management that can be used by Starbucks. Some of the most
commonly used operation management approaches are as follows:
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 Just in time: This approach focuses on production process. A target is set so that production
process can be completed on time. By focusing on reducing resources wastage and use all the
resources at full potential so that complete production process can be completed on time.
Role of managers of Starbucks is to direct operational and production department so that they
can keep inventory in control and improvement within production process can be brought.
Leaders are required to evaluate their employees performance in defined time period and
keep a track of all the inventory resources.
 TQM: Total quality management is a process that helps in planning for longer time period in
order to achieve success (McGowan, Elliott and Stokes, 2019). This approach focuses on
continuous improvement within quality of products and services that are being offered by the
organization. Role of managers in Starbucks is to apply TQM for continuous improvement
within products offered by them. Role of leader is to motivate their employees so that they
can work in a team and adopt chances in order to increase quality of their products.
 Six sigma: it is a type of approach which is used within organizations that majorly focuses on
team efforts, accomplish task and as a result improved performance is achieved. Managers
are required to develop global strategy for business so that utilization of all the resources can
be done in an appropriate manner, whereas leaders apply six sigma approach so that they can
increase efforts of team members for betterment of organization.
P 5 Importance and value of operations management in achieving business objectives
In order to achieve desired results operation management is important. Value and
importance of operation management in achieving business objectives has been explained below:
 Operation management helps organizations like Starbucks to utilize all of their resources and
inventories in an appropriate and effective manner (West and et. al., 2018).
 It helps in enhancing overall quality of products and services of an organization in
appropriate manner and on continuous basis.
 It helps an organization to convert their raw material into finished goods or products in a
lower price.
 It further helps an organization to eliminate wastage of resources or inventories.
 It further helps in increasing overall sales of their products or services by enhancing overall
quality of their products and services.
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LO 4
P 6 Factors within the business environment that impact upon operational management and
decision making by leaders and managers
Today most of the organizations focuses on needs of maintaining ethics, values and
sustainability within their organization so that they can enhance their relationship with their
customers and enhance their satisfaction level by following ethical standards within operations of
the organization. There are various kinds of factors that can affect overall operational
management and decision making of organization like Starbucks. These factors can affect or
work as a barrier in achieving goals and objectives of an organization. These factors can impact
decision making of leaders and managers of an organization. Some of the main factors within
business environment are as follows:
 It is important for organization to manage their resources (both human resources and raw
materials) in a systematic order so that proper decisions can be taken by leaders or managers
because productivity and performance of employees directly affects operation management
because of which decision making of leaders and managers can get impacted (West and et.
al., 2018). Many times, lack of availability of resources within organization impacts both
operational management and leaders or managers decision making.
 Financial status of Starbucks also affects decision making as financial status of an
organization affects proper strategy making helps in making employees work in a proper
direction. It affects decisions related to product and services cost, cash flow and profitability
as well.
 Stakeholders are another factor that affects operational management and decision making.
Investors are one of the stakeholders who make investment within an organization only if
they get desired results and earn profit. Interest of stakeholders can not only impact
operational management but also impact decision making of managers and leaders.
 Change in legal policy can impact decision making of leaders or managers of Starbucks as
change in legal policies can affect planning that has been done in order to achieve
organizational objectives and goals.
CONCLUSION
From the above report it has been summarized that role of leaders and functions of managers
are completely different from each other but they work in same direction which is to accomplish
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goals and objectives of the organization following different kinds of management and leadership
theories and approaches. It has been analysed that there are various kinds of approaches or
strategies that can be used by organization in order to enhance overall quality of their products,
eliminate waste and improve overall performance of the organization.
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REREFENCES
Books and Journals
Al Khamisi, Y.N., Khan, M.K. and Hernandez, E.M., 2017. A conceptual model for a hybrid
knowledge-based system for quality management at healthcare environment.
In Proceedings of the International Conference on Industrial Engineering and
Operations Management (pp. 24-32).
Andrade, J., Mendes, L. and Lourenço, L., 2017. Perceived psychological empowerment and
total quality management-based quality management systems: an exploratory
research. Total Quality Management & Business Excellence. 28(1-2). pp.76-87.
Jurburg, D., and et. al., 2018. Continuous improvement leaders, followers and laggards:
understanding system sustainability. Total Quality Management & Business
Excellence. 29(7-8). pp.817-833.
McGowan, E., Elliott, N. and Stokes, E., 2019. Leadership capabilities of physiotherapy leaders
in Ireland: Part 1 physiotherapy managers. Physiotherapy theory and practice. 35(11).
pp.1027-1043.
Mkansi, M., Eresia-Eke, C. and Emmanuel-Ebikake, O., 2018. E-grocery challenges and
remedies: Global market leaders perspective. Cogent Business & Management. 5(1).
p.1459338.
West, S., and et. al., 2018, May. Exploring operational challenges for servitization: an European
survey. In Spring Servitization Conference:“Driving Competitiveness through
Servitization (pp. 14-16).
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