Management and Operations Report: A Case Study of Morrisons

This report provides an in-depth analysis of Morrisons' key operational functions, including purchasing, manufacturing, transportation, and storage. It examines the roles and accountabilities of managers and leaders within these functions, highlighting the importance of effective leadership in ensuring smooth operations. The report then explores various operational approaches such as TQM, JIT, and Kaizen, assessing their value in the context of Morrisons. Furthermore, it investigates the impact of external business environment factors, such as social culture, CSR, values, environmental sustainability, and stakeholder expectations, on the decision-making processes of managers and leaders. The study also discusses strategies for improving operational efficiencies to meet business objectives, emphasizing the use of contingency and situational leadership approaches. Finally, the report recommends options for further improvement, advocating for the adoption of Kaizen and TQM operational management approaches to enhance performance and achieve better results. The report concludes by highlighting the importance of adaptability and strategic decision-making in navigating the complexities of the business environment.

MANAGEMENT AND OPERATIONS
Activity 2

Table of content
 INTRODUCTION
 Activity 2
 Key operations of Morrison
 Brief description of operational functions of company and role of manager within it
 Operational approaches to operation management and their value
 Impact of external business environment factors on decision of manager and leaders
 Improve operational efficiencies to meet business objectives
 Recommend options for further improvement taken by company
 CONCLUSION
 REFERENCES

INTRODUCTION
 This section explain the key operations of Morrisons, roles & accountabilities of
managers and leaders in operational functions.
 It justifies operational approaches to operations management, impact of external
factors on decision-making by manager and leader.
 Furthermore, this study clarifies how operational efficiencies improved to effectively
meet objectives of business and draw the final conclusion with supported suggestions
for further improvement of company.

Key operations of Morrisons
 Operations means the decision or actions made by member and stakeholders of
company that effect distribution, production and management services.
 Purchasing, processing, manufacturing, transporting and storing are the different types
of operations that firm operate within their business effectively.
 Morrison is able to operate day to day operations with skilled workers who are
extremely capable to transform raw materials into final good which they offer to large
number of consumers across the nation through their transportation services.

Brief description of operational functions of company and role of manager within it
Purchasing-
 The management of Morrison purchase raw materials from range of their suppliers, in
order to produce quality products or services for their consumers in marketplace.
 Raw materials are commodities that is brought by different suppliers, it is a factor of
manufacturing as capital.
Manufacturing-
 After purchasing, things production department of Morrison manufacture products for
their customers according to their needs and expectations towards business.
 Food production is important to further growth and success of company.
 Workers specially focused on packaging goods by using good quality of materials, that
help to keep food safe for longer.

CONTI..
Transporting-
 After purchasing and manufacturing goods, the next operation of
organization is transportation.
 Transportation team of this company makes thousands of
deliveries to closely 500 stores to cater their services and
products.
 Supermarket chain of company is to outsource sizeable slice of
their transportation operations, with different vehicles'
maintenance sections to Wincanton.
Storing-
Morrisons, store their products after manufacturing it, on their own
warehouse, their warehouse team is based at six phases of art
distribution centres across UK.

Roles and accountabilities of leader & manager in all above functions-
 The role of leader in purchasing, manufacturing, transporting and storing food
products offered by Morrison it to guide team how to perform effectively without
making any mistakes.
 The responsibilities of effective leaders in above operations is to focusing on each and
every activity of employees and the way they work to complete task.
 Leader is responsible to maintain integrity, they always want to keep all operations
above board.
 Manager plays essential role in range of operations mention above for example from
manufacturing to storing products.
 They create plan and list of purchasing raw materials which is important for company.
 They are responsible for making policies and monitoring overall functions and
activities of business specially transportation.

Operational approaches to operation management and their value
TQM-
 It is one of the best operational management approach, seeks to enhance performance and
quality that meet consumers expectations.
 Total quality management will be achieved when Morrisons management integrate all quality
related activities and procedures throughout firm.
 Manager is able to used TQM approach that helps to manage each operation of organization
effectively.
JIT-
 It is inventory strategy where resources are ordered and obtained when it required in
production operations.
 By using this approach, manager will be able to save money as well as efforts of workers. It
helps person to learn which thing is important for business or necessary, the goals of this
approach is to cut costs by saving money on overhead inventory and other expenses.

Kaizen-
 This approach of operation management will use by leader or manager in Morrisons
organizations because they both wants to improve overall quality of work.
 Kaizen support by constantly developing and betterment introducing tiny incremental
modifications in work areas needed to gain desirable results.
 It is valuable in context of business as kaizen improve productivity and effectiveness of
operations by reducing waste things.

Impact of external business environment factors on decision of manager and
leaders
Social culture-
 In context of Morrisons, culture within society and community impact on decision-making
procedure of manager.
 Consumers belong to different culture as they place requirement of products accordingly, it
put pressure on manager to conduct research for collecting information about customers
preferences with focusing on their culture.
 In addition to company leaders, social culture make negative impact on leader decision, as
many people change their preferences for specific products that make pressure on leader to
guide their team manufacture good accordingly.

CSR-
 Corporation social responsibilities is kind of global private business self-regulation, it is one
of the environment factor that impact on manager decision as well as leader.
 Due to increasing problems in environmental sustainability, government took necessary step,
they want firm has to contribute in CSR activities.
 It makes positive impact on manager decision, allow them to think towards sustaining
business for longer.
 Leader after government rules in context of CSR, make changes in their leadership style, they
motivate staff to use paper instead of plastic for packaging food products.

CONT..
Values-
 Cultural values is social factor, that affect decision-making of manager & leaders of
Morrisons just like the other factors.
 The behaviour of people's living in society is different, as they want to purchase products
according to their values and nature, which is not possible at all the time.
 It impacts negatively on manager decision, in which they have to change whole plans and
purchasing of raw materials activities that takes a lot of time.
 Along with this, it also impacts on leader decision as well. Leaders guide people do not mix
ingredients together because most people are eating vegetarian food.

Sustainability of environment-
 Environment sustainability is environmental factors, that affect decision taking by leader and
manager within Morrisons from manufacturing products to keep it saves in warehouses.
 Government and consumers concern about environment sustainability, they only purchase
those products that are highly beneficial for environment and contribute to save beauty of
nature.
 This concern of people and national authorities, negatively affect manager decision, in which
they have to deal with issues and make new plans related to production and packaging
activities.

CONT..
Stakeholders expectations-
 The expectations of government towards large companies like Morrisons will be changed,
they want to improve economic standards much better than before after Brexit.
 Goverment want that every company employed local people that help to improve living
standards of individuals.
 It impacts on manager decision where, they change employment structure as whole which
takes a lot of time.

Improve operational efficiencies to meet business objectives
 The operational efficiencies of Morrisons will be improved successfully when manager and
leader work together and take decision in context of business growth after considering all
above factors.
 By using Contingency management approaches they both can reduce unnecessary things and
save money that helps to increase profitability and productivity of company.
 Leader with situational leadership approach can take decision according to situations which is
beneficial for workers as well as company.

Recommend options for further improvement taken by company
 After analysing the whole situation, Morrisons leaders and manager are suggested adopting
kaizen and TQM operational management approaches, because they have certain benefits that
help to enhance leaders and manager performance better than previous ones.

CONCLUSION
 From above analysis, it has been concluded that leader and manager of organization is able to
manage key operations of business effectively, with the help of adopting different operational
and management approaches.
 Manager and leaders can handle the situation and impact of external factors, by taking
appropriate decisions.

REFERENCES
 Aquilani, B and et.al., 2017. A systematic literature review on total quality management critical
success factors and the identification of new avenues of research. The TQM Journal. 29(1).
pp.184-213.
 ARUNACHALAM, S., Zwet, A. and Snailum, N., 2018. TQM MODEL FOR
MANUFACTURING SMEs IN THE MIDDLE EAST. Journal on Management. 12(4).
 Graban, M. and Swartz, J.E., 2018. Healthcare kaizen: engaging front-line staff in sustainable
continuous improvements. Productivity Press.
 Kumar, A and et.al., 2017. A review of multi criteria decision making (MCDM) towards
sustainable renewable energy development. Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews. 69.
pp.596-609.
 Omotayo, T.S., Kulatunga, U. and Bjeirmi, B., 2018. Critical success factors for Kaizen
implementation in the Nigerian construction industry. International Journal of Productivity
and Performance Management. 67(9). pp.1816-1836.
 Zavadskas, E and et.al., 2018. Sustainable decision-making in civil engineering, construction
and building technology. Sustainability. 10(1). p.14.