Analysis of Leadership, Management, and Operations at Zara

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of leadership, management, and operations within the context of Zara, a global fast-fashion retailer. It begins by defining and comparing the roles and characteristics of leaders and managers, highlighting their distinct responsibilities in areas such as vision creation, goal setting, change management, and risk-taking. The report then explores how leadership and management functions apply to various situational contexts, including change management, conflict resolution, and new product development. It delves into various leadership theories and models, such as situational leadership, systems leadership, and contingency theory, and assesses their relevance to Zara's operations. Furthermore, the report examines key approaches to operations management, including lean manufacturing, Just-In-Time (JIT) systems, and Total Quality Management (TQM), and how they contribute to achieving business objectives. The report concludes by assessing the factors within the business environment that impact operational management and decision-making by leaders and managers, emphasizing the importance of operations management in enhancing productivity, product quality, resource utilization, and cost reduction. This report provides a detailed overview of the management and operations of the global brand Zara.

Management and Operations

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
LO 1.................................................................................................................................................1
P1 Define and compare different roles and characteristics of leader and manger......................1
LO 2.................................................................................................................................................2
P2. How role of leader and function of manager apply to different situational contexts...........2
P3. Different theories and models of approach...........................................................................3
P4. Key approaches to operations management..........................................................................4
P5. Importance and value of operations management in achieving business objectives............5
P6 Assess the factors within the business environment that impact upon operational
management and decision-making by leaders and managers. ...................................................6
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................7

INTRODUCTION
Management and operations can be defined as administration of business practices which
help in creating a high level of business efficiency in the organisation. It is one the most
important area of management which is mainly concerned with the designing as well controlling
the process of production and help in redesigning the business operations while producing goods
and services (Akalin, Huang and Willems,, 2016). In this report Zara is taken as an organisation,
it is a Spanish fast fashion company based on retailing business. It is a clothing company
operating across the world, there are more than 10,000 stores of across the globe. This report
discusses about the roles of leaders and managers in Zara and how role of leader and function of
manager apply to different situational context. Present report also includes various theories and
models applied in Zara and key operational approaches of operations management. This report
also discusses about impact of business environment on operational management and decision
making.
LO 1
P1 Define and compare different roles and characteristics of leader and manger
Leader is a person who leads and commands a certain group of people in an organisation
, a leader is a person who holds dominant position in a group and is able to exercise high degree
of control or influence over a group. Manager is a person who is responsible for administering
the organisation or a group of staff. Manager is a person who is responsible for managing an
entire organisation and whose main job is to organise or even sometimes to train or support a
team (Venkat and 2015).
Role and characteristics of leader and manager in Zara
Role
Leader Manager
1. Leaders of Zara creates vision and inspires
and engages the people towards the vision and
help in turning vision in to reality (Difference
Between Leader and Manager, 2014).
1. Managers creates goals, as managers of Zara
mainly focus on setting, measuring and
achieving goals in an organisation.
2. Leader brings change in the organisation,
leaders of Zara are innovative and they
2. Manager does not bring change but stick to
that what works well for the organisation.
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embrace the changes. They understand and
accept the changes in the system and create
wave for it.
Manager of Zara refines the system, structure
as well as processes in order to make
organisation better.
3. Leaders of Zara are risk takers and they are
willing to take risks in the organisation.
3. Managers of Zara mostly prefer to avoid or
control problems but not embracing them.
4. Leaders of Zara build relationships in an
organisation and focus on the people like
stakeholders which needs to be influenced for
realising their vision.
4. Managers build systems and processes in an
organisation and mainly focus on structure
which are necessary for achieving goals of an
organisation.
Characteristics
1. Leaders of Zara honest and have integrity 1. Experience, managers of Zara are highly
experienced.
2. Leaders inspire others, towards the goals and
objectives which are to be achieved.
2. Managers delegate projects and tasks to the
employees in an organisation.
3. Leaders are risk takers and are willing to
take risk in every format.
3. Managers have high level of confidence and
believe in its abilities, experience and
decisions.
4. Leaders of Zara have adopted friendly
nature which helps them in leading the people
in an organisation.
Manager of organisation respect the employees
of the organisation.
LO 2
P2. How role of leader and function of manager apply to different situational contexts
There are various role which are performed by a leader in Zara and play and important
role for the success of the organisation also managers of Zara has important functions to perform
in the organisation. Role of leader and function of a manager can applied in the organisation as
follows:
Situation 1-Change management: If Zara is implementing a change in an organisation leader
plays an important role for implementing a change in an organisation like leader motivates the
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employees for accepting a change and prepares employees for accepting a change (Slack and
Brandon-Jones, 2018). Leader also plays an important role in bringing the change drivers that
can help in implementing a change in an organisation.
It is the function of a manager to ensure that change initiatives are meeting the objectives
with in a set time period and within a set budget. Manager of Zara has to ensure the quality of
change management is managed within the entire change process and has to act as coordinator in
the change process.
Situation 2- Conflict Management: During conflicts leaders of Zara has to play an important
role in managing the conflicts in an organisation. Leader has has to make the both the parties
which are involved in the conflict to compromise and have to motivate both the parties to come
at the negotiating terms. Another role which a leader can play is collaborating i.e. to come up
with creative solution to the problem, which can help in managing the conflicts.
Manager of Zara has very important function to perform like it has to act as a mediator
and has to identify the root cause of the conflict and has to formulate strategies to avoid such
situations in the future.
Situation 3- New product development: Leaders of Zara play an important role in product
development like leader has to provide directions to the employees and encourages their
creativity and innovative thinking and appreciates the employees for taking initiatives (Venkat
and et.al., 2015). Leaders of Zara keeps on motivating the employees towards the new product
development and supports them at every level.
It is the function of a manager to define the why a product development is needed and has
to ensure that for a new product quality and standards are maintained.
P3. Different theories and models of approach
There are various theories of leadership and models of approach which can be applied in
Zara such as:
Situational Leadership Theory: Situational leadership theory works with the assumption that
effective leadership style can be implemented in the organisation depending on the type of
situations. In order to be successful and effective leader, a leader of Zara should be able to adopt
various leadership style to diverse circumstances. For example; Zara have introduced new
technology to increase the production at double rate, but leader has adopted democratic approach
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so at this situation a leader has to shift its leadership approach to contingency approach to
provide training to employee about the new technology.
Systems Leadership: This leadership can be adopted by a leader in order to increase the level of
production in an organisation at level and to increase the potential of the employees in an
organisation. It can help the leaders of Zara to create a condition in the organisation where the
employees can work productively up to their potential (Hitt and Carnes, 2016). By adopting a
system leadership, a leader can make use of principles related to human behaviour for creating a
models of leadership, systems design, social process and organisational strategy. For example if
employees of Zara are under performing in the tasks assigned to them, so in order to increase the
performance of the employees leaders announces incentives for achieving the targets on time.
So, this condition can improve the performance of the employee in the organisation.
Contingency Theory: This theory states that leader's effectiveness is dependent on the
leadership style that should match a particular situation. It claims that there is no best way of
leadership for leading a group or an organisation. It also states that a good leadership style
should match to demand of a situation which is faced in the organisation. For there is rise
conflict in an organisation so, the leadership style used by a leader depends on two factors
leader's personal style and the situation that controls a leader. So it is important for a leader to
adopt appropriate leadership style in order to face certain situation in an organisation.
P4. Key approaches to operations management
There are various approaches to operations management and the role which leaders and
managers play are as follows:
Lean Manufacturing: Lean manufacturing is a method of minimising the waste within in the
manufacturing systems without compromising with quality. Leaders play an important role in
reducing the wastes like leader of Zara provide a training to employees for effective utilisation of
resources in an organisation which can help in reducing wastes (Radnor and et.al., 2015). Also,
manager can a proper standards for waste reduction which have to be followed by the employees
of the organisation.
Just In Time (JIT): JIT is an approach which is used to reduce times within the production
systems as also helps in reducing a response time form the customers or suppliers. Leaders
motivates the employees to get the task done in given period of time and also supports
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employees at various levels of production process in order to improve their performance
(Ravinder and Kollikkathara, 2017). Manager of Zara has to set a time limits for getting the task
done and has to ensure that costs of production are lowered during a production process,
different costs of production are being saves and and high level of customer satisfaction is
achieved.
Total Quality Management: TQM is a structured approach which mainly focuses on the
process of improving the quality of outputs of the organisation by making a continuous
improvements in the internal practices (Adam, 2019). It is an important role of a leader to
motivate the employees to improve the quality of products and has to provide training to
employees so that products are produced with high level of quality standards. It is the function of
a manager to ensure that quality of production is maintained in Zara's production house and has
to ensure that products are produced with less or no errors which can increase the quality of
products of Zara.
P5. Importance and value of operations management in achieving business objectives
Operations management plays an important role in achieving the business objectives of
Zara as operations management help in improving the overall productivity of the organisation
which can help the organisation in generating more and more revenues for the organisation.
Thus, operations management helps in meeting the profitability objective of the organisation
(Harrison and Lock, 2017). Operations management can also help Zara in handling the issues
like deign, operations and maintenance of the systems which are used for productions can help in
increasing the quality of products which are produced by Zara. So, operations management can
help in satisfying the needs of the customers across the world. Operations management can help
company in making the effective utilisation of the resources in an organisation as it focuses on
using the resources which are available in the organisation in a best possible way in order to
achieve the organisational goals. It can help the company in decreasing the costs of productions
which can increase the profit margins for the organisation. Operations management is a type of
process which includes planning, organising, managing, controlling and supervising the
manufacturing and production process. It will reduce delivery time of a products and result in
successful transformation of raw materials in to finished goods. Operations management can
result in reducing the wastage of resources in the organisation as it includes the lean
manufacturing systems for reducing the wastages in the organisation. Operations management
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also increase the quality of products of the company which are manufactured by Zara and it can
also help in making the innovations in the products which can help in attracting the potential
customers for the organisation (Fosso Wamba and et.al., 2017). Operations management also
help the organisation in reducing errors both human and mechanical and this can improve the
overall performance of the organisation this also prevents the organisation from loss and saves
times and money for the organization. Operations management also results in high level of
employee satisfaction in an organization as it helps in improving the performance of the
employees in a firm which in return can help the company in fulfilling the retention objectives
for the organisation.
So it can be said that operations management is important part of the organisation which
can help Zara in achieving its business objectives.
P6 Assess the factors within the business environment that impact upon operational management
and decision-making by leaders and managers.
The economic factor influence the overall organizational decision-making of the Zara
such as inflation, interest rates, and unemployment. The leader and manger takes the decision
according to the economy of the country. These all factors of the economy always affect the
demand of the products of Zara. For example During inflation, the Zara pays more for its
resources and raw materials, so they increase the prices on the product to cover the higher costs.
So its affect the decision because they only forecast the decisions and the changing in economy
affects the cost of production (Chaudhary, 2018).
Technological factor is also influence the decision of manger and leader. The manger of the zara
must be careful about the new technological they use the new technology in the company but
the cost of purchasing the new technology is influence the decision of the mangers (Rumble,
2019). So they use the different methods to converting the resources into the product it helps to
reducing the cost of production. Managers use the different marketing strategy to identify the
new technology which helps to make the best product but the using of technology is also
increased the cost because the employees of the company wants the training for using the new
technology, so the manger takes the best Investment decision to adopt the new technologies.
Internal factor influence the decision of the manager and leader that is also influenced the
overall organizational decision-making of the zara (Ravinder and Kollikkathara, 2017.).
Customer is the one who almost change the decision of the business they change their taste and
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preference according to their income. So manager is must research that which type of products
they want. It also increases the cost and affects the decisions of the managers. Managers and
leader set the target and pay attention on the demand of customer they should pay close attention
to the customers' dimension because customer is the main factor of company because
customers purchase the product that keeps a company alive and sound (Venkat and et.al.2015).
REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Akalin, G. I., Huang, Z. and Willems, J. R., 2016. Is Supply Chain Management Replacing
Operations Management in the Business Core Curriculum. Operations and Supply
Chain Management: An International Journal. 9(2). pp.119-130.
Chaudhary, M. 2018. Integration of BIM in Risk Management during Design Phase of a
Construction Project.
Fosso Wamba, S and et.al., 2017. Guest editorial: transforming operations and production
management using big data and business analytics: future research directions.
Harrison, F. and Lock, D., 2017. Advanced project management: a structured approach.
Routledge.
Hitt, M. A., Xu, K. and Carnes, C. M., 2016. Resource based theory in operations management
research. Journal of Operations Management. 41. pp.77-94.
Radnor, Z. J and et.al., 2015. Public service operations management: A research handbook.
Routledge.
Ravinder, H. and Kollikkathara, N., 2017. Project Management in Operations Management
Textbooks: Closing the Gap. Journal of the Academy of Business Education. 18.
Rumble, G. 2019. The planning and management of distance education. Routledge.
Slack, N. and Brandon-Jones, A., 2018. Operations and process management: principles and
practice for strategic impact. Pearson UK.
Venkat, A and et.al., 2015. Strategic management of operations in the emergency
department. Production and Operations Management. 24(11). pp.1706-1723.
Online
Adam B., 2019. Total Quality Management. 2014. [Online]. Available Through:
<https://www.investopedia.com/terms/t/total-quality-management-tqm.asp>.
Difference Between Leader and Manager. 2014. [Online]. Available Through:
<https://keydifferences.com/difference-between-leader-and-manager.html>.
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