Comprehensive Analysis of Management & Operations at M&S Ltd. Report

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of management and operations at M&S Ltd. It begins by defining the characteristics and roles of managers and leaders, highlighting the differences between them and their importance in decision-making and employee engagement. The report then explores the application of managerial functions such as planning, organizing, staffing, directing, and controlling, alongside the supervisory, decision-making, and coaching roles of leaders. Various leadership theories, including contingency, systems, and trait leadership, are examined to understand their impact on M&S Ltd.'s operations. Furthermore, the report discusses different approaches to operations management, such as business process redesign, Six Sigma, total quality management, and lean manufacturing, illustrating how these strategies are applied to improve efficiency and customer satisfaction. Finally, the report evaluates the factors impacting operational management, providing a holistic view of M&S Ltd.'s management and operational strategies.

Management & Operations

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
TASK 1 ...........................................................................................................................................1
P1 Characteristics and roles of managers and leaders................................................................1
TASK 2 ..........................................................................................................................................3
P2 Application of functions and roles of manager and leader in different situations.................3
P3 Application of Leadership theories.......................................................................................4
TASK 3............................................................................................................................................5
P4 Various different approaches to Operations Management.....................................................5
P5 Evaluate the value and importance of operations management.............................................6
TASK 4............................................................................................................................................8
P6 Evaluate the factor that has an impact on operational management......................................8
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................9
.........................................................................................................................................................9
REFRENCES.................................................................................................................................10

INTRODUCTION
Operations Management emphasizes on managing the process of production and
distribution of goods and services. It is one of the important function in every organisation. The
main aim of Operations Management is to increase the efficiency of production process and
satisfy customers by offering them quality products and services (Araujo, 2015) The
management focuses on optimum utilization of resources in order to increase the productivity
and profitability of the firm in a very cost effective manner.
The present assignment is based on M & S Ltd. The headquarters of the company is
located in London and it deals in selling of home products, clothing and food products. This
report covers the roles and functions of manager and leaders and how these roles are applied in
different conditions in an organisation. Different theories and approaches of leadership are also
defined. Apart from this, vitality of operations management in accomplishing business goals and
important approaches to operations management is also explained. Besides this, influence of
internal and external environmental factors on decisions by managers and leaders and operations
management are discussed in the present report.
TASK 1
P1 Characteristics and roles of managers and leaders
In Marks and Spacer, Managers and Leaders, both play an important role in an
organisation. Effective management and leadership assist the firm in the accomplishment of
goals and objectives.
Manager is a person who is responsible for administering or controlling groups or
organisation. Manager provides direction to the employees and controls all the activities of the
firm. In Marks and Spacers, the manager is able to encourage the employees and motivate them
to work in effective manner. They formulate strategies and implement it to increase the
profitability of the firm.
Leader is an person who influence group of individuals towards the accomplishment of
goals and objectives and lead them. An effective leader develops inspiring future vision and
inspire and motivate the individuals to engage with vision (Cabrerizo and et. al., 2010). Leader
helps its team members to correct things. They set a particular direction, creates vision and work
on it to develop something new.

Difference between Managers and Leaders -
Manager Leaders
 Managers handles all the tasks and
activities in an effective and proper
way.
 Managers are passionate. They work to
improve the profitability of the firm.
 It is the duty of the manager to
formulates procedures and policies.
 Managers organise and coordinate
things in a systematic and effective
way.
 Managers emphasizes on tasks and
works such as planning, coordinating,
controlling, organising, decision
making etc.
 Leaders focus on improving skills and
knowledge of employees.
 Leaders are innovative. They creates
ideas in order to improve the
performance of their team members.
 Leaders formulate guidelines and
principles (Chung and et. al., 2011).
 Leaders have the ability to influence
others and lead the team.
 Leaders emphasizes on creating healthy
environment for the success of the team
which includes coaching, mentoring,
motivation, team work , vision,
persuasion etc.
Roles of leader and manager
Decision making : Both managers and leaders plays an important role in the decision
making of an organisation. Managers takes decisions regarding day to day activities of the firm
and leaders takes decisions about the development of skills and knowledge of the employees.
Both take crucial decisions with the common interest of increasing the productivity and
profitability of the firm.
Employee engagement : Involvement of employees in the activities of the firm is very
important. Leaders as well as managers, both play vital role in employee engagement. They try
to create coordination and cooperation among the members of staff. It helps them in maintaining
a healthy work environment at workplace (Crane and Matten, 2016). It encourage the employees
in attaining objectives of the firm.
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TASK 2
P2 Application of functions and roles of manager and leader in different situations
Leaders and managers play important role in the growth and sustainability of the firm.
Both have the ability to attain goals and objectives of the firm.
Functions of manager
There are five basic functions of manager that allows them to manage tactical, set and
planned decisions. These are -
Planning : In this, the managers of Marks and Spencer formulates a plan which supports
in the accomplishment of predetermined goals and objectives of a firm. For example, the aim of
M & S Ltd. is to enhance its sales. For this, the manager needs to decide the necessary steps in
order to achieve its goals (Gharajedaghi, 2011). These steps involves increasing sales staff,
advertising and inventory. These are create into a plan and it is followed by the manager to attain
the goal and improve sales.
Organizing : After planning, the managers of M & S needs to organise resources such as
manpower, raw materials, finance etc. as per the plan. Granting authority and assigning work are
the two essential components of this function.
Staffing : In the company, the managers group the people into teams and assign them
different tasks. He identify the requirement of Human Resource and as per the need, and decide
to strengthen his staff by recruiting and selecting the staff and provides them training and
development.
Directing : In Marks and Spencer, it is the responsibility of the manager to guide the staff
members and administer right direction to them so that they are able to complete tasks on time
and achieve the targets. It includes communicating, encouraging, motivating and guiding the
employees in order to avoid the conflicts.
Controlling : After completion of all the four stages, the managers needs to constantly
monitor all the activities and performance of the employees and check results against the
predetermined objectives and take corrective actions if required in order to achieve the aim of the
company of enhancing sales ( Kamrava and et. al., 2015).
Role of leader
There are some important roles which a leader plays in an organisation in different
situations. These are -
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Supervisory : Leaders plays a role of supervisor. In M & S Ltd., the leader supervise the
team and provide direction to them so that they are able to achieve organisational goals as well
as individual goals. The supervisory responsibilities of leader includes performance monitoring,
delegation of duties and communication. They supervise at all levels, from management to
subordinates.
Decision maker : Leaders plays an important role in the decision making process of the
company. They are the primary decision makers as they create and execute direction of the firm.
Staff members rely on supervisors and top level management to make crucial decisions for the
success of the organisation (Lee, A., and et. al., 2012). In Marks and Spencer, the leaders takes
effective decisions in order to achieve higher sales and profits.
Coach : It is the responsibility of leaders to coach and mentor the employees of the
organisation. They assign work to the team member according to their skills. They increase the
engagement of employees in work by motivate them and provide training and development so
that higher level of performance can be achieved.
P3 Application of Leadership theories
Effective leadership helps the firm in increasing its productivity. It shapes the functions
of the organisation and protect its harmony. In this, the leader plays important role in attaining
the vision and mission of the company. Marks & Spencer have those leaders who have the
capability to manage the performance of the employees and encourage them to work in a team.
The managers adopt leadership theories so that higher competitive advantages can be gained.
Some of these theories are -
Contingency or situational leadership theory
This theory states that there is not a specific way to take decisions and lead organisation.
After analysing the whole situation, a contingent leader apply his own leadership style. It assists
the manager in effective management of the operations. According to this model, business firm is
an open system and it is necessary to manage it carefully. For that, leaders try to satisfy the needs
of employees & ready to adapt changes (Moran and Moran, 2014). It is a useful approach for
Marks & Spencer as it encourage leader to think about making leadership effective. The success
of the leader depends on skills by which he adopts his leadership style.
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System leadership theory
It is a comprehensive approach used by the leaders for the development of firm so that its
effectiveness can be optimized. This theory is applied to develop sustainability of the company
by improving its performance in the market. It states that managers should follow some
principles in order to respond external and internal factors of business environment (Salido and
Barber, 2012). Besides this, some morals and values of firm are there which the leaders should
have to follow while making nay decision. It provides a base of understanding at the time of
strategies and policies formulation.
Trait leadership theory
This theory is based on great man theory and is a systematic theory. The theory states that
the key for successful leadership is the personal characteristics and traits of leader. Effective
judgements and decisions are taken by great leaders. This theory emphasizes on determination of
personality traits of leaders such as integrity, self confidence, determination, intelligence,
sociability etc. This theory helps the leaders of M&S in determining the qualities that are helpful
to lead others. It gives proper understanding and knowledge of leader.
TASK 3
P4 Various different approaches to Operations Management
It refers to the key management area which is designed to control the procedure of
production and modernize business operation. It ensures to utilise the resources of business
enterprise in an optimal manner. It generally deals in transforming the input( available in labor,
energy and raw material)into output(available in final goods and services). Following are the
approaches of operational management:
 Business Process Redesign: It refers to the process of radical redesign and rethinking of
various business activity to accomplish dramatic improvements in quality, speed, service
and cost. It advocates an organisation to go back to their basic and analyse their roots
again so that they can reinvent the total product (Vambol, 2015). Initially M&S was
unable to find an urge for development in their 90s, this led to decrease in their market
share but later on they applied the concept of BPR in its business activities which proves
to be a great success for the cited firm.
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 Six Sigma: It is the set of tools and technique which a company used for its process
improvement. It focuses on enhancing the quality of final output by detecting and
eliminating the defect and diminish the variability in business process and manufacturing.
M&S has introduced voice of customer, central dashboard that covers all prospect of
business enterprise and various extensive improvement measures in order to improve
their quality standard and customer retention (Westphal and et. al., 2015).
 Total Quality Management: TQM refers to management approach that deals in
providing splendid quality to its customer for longer run. Consumer of M&S knows about
the quality of their product and they are ready to pay for it. But M&S is still providing
new attractive offers to its new customer every week in order to motivate their target
clients to buy at certain price just to aware them, they are paying same price for different
quality in comparison with their competitors such as Sainsbury and Tesco.
 Lean Manufacturing: Company used this method in order to eliminate the waste from
the manufacturing process. This theory consider wastes that is generated from uneven or
overburdening workloads. M&S aims at providing lean clothes to its customer that
generates value for them.
Apart from the above mentioned approaches there are other various method such as Kaizen, Just
in Time, Queuing theory which was adopted by M&S to perform their operations effectively and
efficiently.
Role of Leader and Manager: Leader and Manager of an organisation deals with managing the
resources, communication, financial management, education and outlook, goal setting and
incentives and rewards of employees. They tries to maintain healthy relationship with their
employees so that worker can effectively satisfy the customer requirement. Further
responsibilities of manager and leader includes operations strategy, control, embracing design,
planning and performance management.
P5 Evaluate the value and importance of operations management
The main role of operational manager is to build an environment that enhances the
efficiency and effectiveness of workforce. This is generally done by guiding, motivating,
addressing them regarding any issue (Seifert, 2010). They conduct several meetings in which
manager are required to listens the problem of their staff and take corrective actions. Following
are the importance of operation management towards achieving organisational objective:
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 Product Development: This determines various features and characteristics of the
product that is going to be sold in the target market. It initiated with assessing the actual
needs and desire of customer so that company can modify product accordingly. The
equipment and facilities used to manufacture a product and also the information system
that is require to control and monitor the performance related to system design method
(Wolf, 2012). Apart from features and characteristics, it also determines the quality and
cost of product. M&S uses approaches such as Total Quality Management, Lean
Manufacturing in their product development.
 Process Management: It defines how the product is designed. It generally involve two
major elements, one is scale economy and the other is technical component. Scale
component comprises of applying accurate amount of equipment and tools in order to
increase the overall productivity of an organisation whereas Technical Economy consists
of selecting appropriate equipment and series of distinct phases of operational
administration. Apart from that, this also deals with layout, capacity and location for
manufacturing acility. For their process development M&S has chosen to opt BPR and
Six Sigma tool in order to achieve overall objective of firm effectively.
 Customer Satisfaction: M&S believes that if their employees are satisfied then only,
they will be able to satisfy the needs and desire of target consumer. Thus, they are
providing adequate training and leadership programme to its worker so to monitor and
evaluate their performance. Clients is totally depend upon the business regarding their
wants and preferences. For instance M&S is offering every week discounts to its
customer in order to attract and aware them that they are selling different quality of
products at moderate price which enables the M&S to gain competitive advantage over
their competitors.
 Communicate Effectively: In order to achieve overall objective, business enterprise is
required to have effective communication between their employees and employers as
they are considered as an asset of the company (Chen, 2013). It is necessary to convey
company message to target audience in order to represent firm point of view. This can be
in the form verbal, non-verbal and written depending upon the company requirements so
that they. M&S managers communicate effectively with their co-worker in order to
achieve their overall objective.
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TASK 4
P6 Evaluate the factor that has an impact on operational management
Business Environment deals with an external and internal factors that affect the business
operating situation. Following are the various internal and external factors that are discussed in
details:
Internal Factors:
 Value System: This depicts ethical beliefs of an organisation towards achieving its
objective and mission. It also determines the behaviour of business towards their
consumer, society and worker at large. M&S aims at enhancing their values without
sacrificing their quality.
 Employees: M&S believes that if their workers are satisfied then only they are enable to
satisfy the need of target customer (Zou, 2013). Therefore, M&S is focusing on providing
various training programme to their personnel which improves their productivity. Also
the M&S deals with motivating their workforce so that they can retain for longer period,
hence satisfying customer for longer run.
 Organisational Structure: It consists of independent director, board of director, share
holder and professional management. The nature of a company has a significant influence
on its decision making method. For smooth working operation, it is required to have
conductive organisation structure that helps in making quick and effective decision for
the company. Human Resource: HR team deals with the issues related to their employees. Apart from
that they observe when there is need to provide training to its workforce so that they can
effectively and efficiently achieve their organisational goal. Under this, company deals
with retention techniques, disputes, public relation etc.
External factors:
 Political: Various regulation has been set by the UK Government in context with various
British Standards for e.g. risk control, designing hazard identification and risk assessment
(Nayak, 2015). If firms are not following standards set by the government, then in that
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situation company has to pay fine or may bear case for not following the law. There was
situation was M&S was also charged fine by the government for avoiding safety and
health regulations. But after that incidents, the cited company was strictly following the
standards set by the government.
 Economical: Presently, the economic condition of UK is uncertain, therefore consumer
think before spending their income on luxury products. This precondition also hit the
M&S profitability and productivity. They have shut down their stores and suffers from
loss of market share (Vaze, 2013).
 `Socio-Cultural: M&S revealing high portion of clothing stores with their cheap
versions. Consumer buying behaviour is effected by the culture, personal, psychological
and social trend. M&S keeps themselves updated in context with changing preferences of
their target customer. Moreover, they offer various discounts and schemes to attract the
customer, so that they can buy different quality of goods at moderate rate.
 Legal Factors: M&S have updated themselves with new legislation and laws and also
issues related with Safety&Health. They invite changed tax, methods and objective for
re-training and development of their employees.
CONCLUSION
Operation Management deals with using the resources of business enterprise in an
effective and efficient way. Producing industry depend upon the capacity planning, inventory
management and product optimisation to pioneer sustainability and hold out competitive
advantage over their competitors. M&S aimed at using different approaches and techniques
which help them to retain their quality and standards. Operation manager are required to
critically analyse the external and internal factor that influence the decision making of business
enterprise. Operational Manager ensures to increase the overall productivity of workforce by
using tool such as six sigma, total quality management, benchmarking etc. Also the operational
trainer is required to apply transformational model in their business enterprise that helps to
identify the input and them transform it into final output.
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