Report: Operations and Project Management Principles at Hotpoint

This report delves into the operational and project management practices of Hotpoint, a home appliance company, with a focus on its expansion into the television market. It begins by examining the implementation of operations management principles, including reality and accountability, and then explores the application of Six Sigma and lean principles within the organization. The report critiques these methodologies, assessing their effectiveness and impact on product quality and cost. Task 2 focuses on developing a continuous improvement plan, leveraging the insights from the operational review, and suggesting the use of the Kaizen theory to address quality and delivery issues. The report then progresses to analyze the stages of the Project Life Cycle (PLC), including business cases and work breakdown structures, along with the rationales for project methodologies, leadership, and tools. Finally, it evaluates the effectiveness of the PLC in project application and differentiates between large and small-scale projects, concluding with a comprehensive analysis of Hotpoint's management strategies.

Operations and
Project Management

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
TASK 1............................................................................................................................................1
P1. The implementation of operations management principles within an organisational context
.....................................................................................................................................................1
M1 Review and critique of operation management in relation to six sigma methodology and
lean principles.............................................................................................................................5
TASK 2............................................................................................................................................5
P2. Continuous improvement plan based on the review and critique of operations management
principles within an organisational context.................................................................................5
M2 Analysis of effectiveness of continuous improvement plan.................................................6
TASK 3............................................................................................................................................7
P3 Stages of PLC with business case, project plan and work breakdown structure...................7
........................................................................................................................................................12
M3 Analysis of rational for project methodologies, leadership and tools within the PLC.......12
TASK 4..........................................................................................................................................13
P4 Effectiveness of PLC in application of project....................................................................13
M4 Critical analysis of the way in which large and small scale project could be differentiated
...................................................................................................................................................14
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................15
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................16

INTRODUCTION
Operation and project management both play an essential role in organisational
development. It is considered as an administration of business practices that aim to output more
productivity in company (Basu and Wright, 2012). For the report, the chosen company is
Hotpoint that deal in home appliances as well as having good market share and reputation in
their product line. It generally sells fridges, gas etc. and also planning to expand in television
market by launching innovative product that is 58 inches TV. The purpose of this report is to
analyze the proper concepts and theories, continuous improvement plan effectiveness with the
help of operation management principles within Hotpoint. Also evaluation of project life cycle
stages as well as its contribution in development of company and choosing most appropriate
models and theories which assists PLC will also be mentioned in this report.
TASK 1
P1. The implementation of operations management principles within an organisational context
Operation management is refers to the management area at which production designing
as well as controlling are performed as per the procedures. It is related with converting and
changing raw materials into finished products. The important functions of operation management
of Hotpoint is to develop a plan of action for conducting overall activities of business in firm. In
organisation all department are interconnected with each other as well as perform various
techniques and approaches in order to accomplish the expected objectives.
Operation management principles:
Principles of operation manner are crucial in operation of business in an effectual means.
It is required to know their principles which gives the knowledge regarding the development and
growth of company. Operation management principles which are followed by Hot-point are
mentioned below:
Reality:
It is the principles which explains that firm required to concentrate on issues which are
raising instead of methods as well as techniques which aids to overcome from the issues
(Haksever and Render, 2018) . Hotpoint manager required to evaluate the issues of its clients,
according to that gives solution to them. Also, they are plan to introducing new products in
marketplace as per the requirements and demands of clients.
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Accountability:
At this principles, accountability involves rules and standards which are decided by the
manager or higher authorities. This explain issues to its workers, staff members etc. so that they
match the organisational objective and targets (Heaslip, 2013). At Hotpoint, accountability is
lacking behind because their higher authorities and managers are not more concern about
delegating roles and duties to their workers. So, this outcomes in low growth in organisational
development and also accomplishing targets.
Six Sigma
(Source: Six Sigma Approach, 2016)
Six Sigma is refers to the process of quality that assists in improving product or services
to minimise the process errors. It is applied by Hotpoint for reducing problems into production as
well as this will facilitates various techniques to eliminate errors regarding products that are
made as per the clients requirements.
 Define: In this step, an explanation of problems are explained in brief. It assists to
understand the drawbacks as well as eliminate them in order to accomplish the
effectiveness in development and growth of firm. Here, scope of project , plan of
resources should be defined in detail, Hotpoint manager required to know about the
issues acutely.
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 Measure: At this stage, Hotpoint manager required to set up the current scenario present
state. It aids them to develop a base line consequently so that a suitable map process and
gathering plan can be improved. It will also assists them to evaluate the TV requirements
into market in order to accomplish objectives in competitive edge of the marketplace.
 Analyse: At this steps, analysis of whole issues that are related to products as well as
changing and implementing of products in effective way. Manager of Hotpoint examine
overall problems that are faced by workers at workplace.
 Improve: In this, manger required to give solution of developing issues which are raised
during product development. Here Hotpoint manager required to execute appropriate plan
and procedures which aids them to reach standards in an effectual manner so their new
products TV is introduced with innovative features in it.
 Control: At this step, an appropriation examination is done through viewing outcomes
and as per that some measure are considers to correct changes. Hotpoint manager are
assessing clients requirements as per their plan for introducing new products 58 inch TV
into competitive marketplace.
By implementing six sigma, Hot-point has identified issue related to loyalty of customers,
standard quality of products at time of its manufacturers long with problems related to the
product durability or flexibility. All addresses the whole process behind manufacturing of 58
inch television also set out to ascertain the development before any defects are identified. It
impact negatively as it is a cost bearing method that can apply through only large organisation so
for small firm it is not effective.
Lean Production:
This is referred as a tool of management which concentrate on cost with standard product
and services quality. It is applied in overall designing area from manufacturing to distribution
(Karlsson, 2016). The aim of this approach is to increase operations which aids into provided
production process value. Five principles of lean production that assists to maximise the
efficiency of manufacturing and also carry off the defects.
 Define value: In firm, the first principles concentrate to value its clients as well as know
about the consumers expectation from company. Hotpoint manager required to create its
products as per choices of clients. It is launching new product TV into its product line in
order to meet upcoming requirements also customer value are added.
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 Map the value stream: In this, marketers determine its product value in customers mind
as well as applied that value as a reference point into product manufacturing. Also aids
manager of Hotpoint to eradicate those activities which are not adding any value. So, they
have to focus on value adding in their new goods like creative features in order to enjoy
effective experiences of clients.
 Create flow: Here, proper value is not facilitated to business activities in company. The
main purpose is to eradicate useless activities on specified time. For this, Hotpoint
managers need to applied effective strategies that consists structure of work break down
as it develop value within firm.
 Establish pull: At this step, inventory are reviewed as huge wastage in manufacturing
process. The main objective of it is to set stock limits as well as task items into working
progress so that this will be ascertained with suitable information and flow of material
with Hotpoint manager. Along with this a pull based system is modified for on time
delivery and manufacturing at which products are developed as well as determine to
satisfy the demands of clients so firm is planning to launch new product TV into
marketplace.
 Pursue perfection: it is crucial process that aids in continuous improvement into
products. This assists Hotpoint manager in product development as well as encourage
workers so that it perform effectively into firms success.
Lean production impact Hotpoint positively as it is easy to monitor, save cost as well as
time also enhance business sustainability. It impact negatively as it do not use more equipments
due to this company can not consistently deliver their products.
From the above discussion it has been determined that all the operations are managed and
operated by Hotpoint in effective manner. Merits of the operational process are high level of
control over business, proper way of monitoring, strategies for future improvements etc. The
whole procedure is highly effective because with the help of it organisation tries to reach all its
long term business goals. From the analysis it has been identified that the organisation is required
to enhance its quality and improve the delivery process. For this purpose a continuous
improvement plan could be formulated. With the help of it all errors which may affect business
activities could be resolved.
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M1 Review and critique of operation management in relation to six sigma methodology and lean
principles
Six sigma and lean principles are two different techniques which are used in operation
management. With the help of them effectiveness or errors in the process could be determined. If
both the models are implemented in systematic manner then it can help the organisation to run
the operational activities appropriately. In order to use them within the company an enterprise
requires skilled and experienced workforce which may result in very high cost for the business.
Managers in Hotpoint are required to pay attention towards the implementation process so that
they can ignore the possibility of adverse situation in future.
TASK 2
P2. Continuous improvement plan based on the review and critique of operations management
principles within an organisational context.
BASIS APPROACH/PRINCIPLE IMPLEMENTATION
Quality
To develop quality of television, hot-
point has option to opt for total quality
management approach to develop
effective quality of their new TV more
flexible and suitable.
This approach will allow hot-point to
structure the complete action planning
that will taken to ensure quality of TV
product more suitable and perfect.
Cost
For devising effectiveness in the cost,
firm will decides cost of the television
along with making recommendations
on the basis of an improvements in
their existing products.
Hot-point will go for adopting principle
of rising cost effectiveness for their
television of 58 inches. This will also
helpful in reducing cost burden.
Delivery
With delivery purpose, Hot-point
apply method of Six Sigma to manage
delivery and development of their
product at the profitable extent.
The stage of six sigma includes define,
measure, analyse, improvement and
control which will helps the Hot-point to
proactively delivers product from the
phase of manufacture till delivery.
Safety Lean principle is the best method in Lean principle will help Hot-point to
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case of deciding and ensuring safety
while using of the bigger TV.
Moreover, principle helps Hot-point to
ascertain electrical electric faults and
damage into the TV.
eradicate any kind of damage or
hazardous factor to make product
effective.
In order to create continuous improvement plan Kaizen theory could be used by the
managers of Hotpoint to enhance quality and improve delivery process of TVs and other
electronic items which are sold by it to the customers. With the help of it, organisation can create
strategy to make positive changes in organisational processes to over come issues of lower
quality and improper delivery system. All the steps in the implementation of a plan with the help
of this theory are as follows:
 Identifying the problem: In order to implement the plan managers in Hotpoint have
identified the problems with the help of operation management process which are
required to be focused. These are lower quality and ineffective delivery system.
 Analysing the process: At this stage managers are required to assess both the processes
delivery and quality control to determine causes of problems. They analysed that shortage
of experienced staff is resulting in the issues.
 Development of optimal solution: At this stage solutions are formed to overcome the
challenges. Managers in Hotpoint have decided to hire experienced employees who can
manage the processes properly.
 Implementing the solution: In order to implement the solution they have conducted
interviews and recruited some knowledgeable individuals.
 Studying results and applying the solution: At this stage, they analysed the processes
again to measure that the solution which is being implemented is resulting positively or
not. The assessed that the errors are being decreasing as higher attention are paid to the
areas which are creating problems.
M2 Analysis of effectiveness of continuous improvement plan
In order to analyse the effectiveness of the continuous improvement plan performance
measurement theory could be implemented. With the help of it managers can determine that the
plan which is being formed by them will be able to deal with the problems which are affect the
operational procedures. This theory have provided a result that the plan is highly effective and it
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will be beneficial for Hotpoint to overcome the problems of lower quality and improper delivery
procedures as appropriate solutions could be implemented with the help of plan.
TASK 3
P3 Stages of PLC with business case, project plan and work breakdown structure
Project life cycle:
The project management life cycle describes the processes of delivering a high level
project successfully. It includes five stages such as Initiation, planning, execution, monitoring
and control, closure.
 Initiation Phase: A solid initiation is very necessary to set up a successful project and
for its high level set up too. It is the foundation stage for all other stages. In this stage the
feasibility and value of project is measure to determine whether it is worth or not. Always
a common problem is arises because of insufficient alignment of interest of all the
involved parties (Nixon, Harrington and Parker, 2012). It will be very important to have
everyone on board. As this project is based on making of new TV of 58 inch by the hot-
point, here in this first stage, idea generation of big TV such as shape, size, outlook etc.,
will be decided to go for market test or response to that idea. Before going for the market
test or check, screening of an idea process is to be done. While in this initiation process,
Authoritarian Leadership style for defining the needs and objectives to its workers. The
autocratic approach can be a good one when the situation calls for rapid decisions and
decisive actions. However, it tends to create dysfunctional and even hostile environments,
often pitting followers against the domineering leader. As the company Hot-point
introduce its new product 58 inches TV. The need and objectives is identified by the
company at this stage. Issues of feasibility about new TV launch project is determined by
the Hotpoint.
 Planning Phase: This is the second phase of project life cycle , in that stage Hotpoint
company plans to develop the solution to possible steps which are necessary to meet
project's objectives. In this phase of the Plc, planning for idea improvement or market
check is the major preference, in which idea after the screening is undertaken to know
whether product is applicable to identify market or not. Furthermore, respective changes
will be communicated to R&D Dept. to implements into the real market condition.
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Hotpoint have option to use situational leadership style to analysis the capabilities of their
employees, because without knowing the capabilities of their workforce they can't work
on planning process. Moreover, here risk is related to failure of an idea in accordance to
its prospective customer.
 Execution Phase: At this stage the whole prepared plan about launching of 58 inches TV
is implemented and project work is performed. In this stage, final R&D and production of
the big screen size TV is going to be undertake. R&D Dept. first confirm the idea and
then passed it to production Dept. to make it into the final product. Hotpoint company
uses the democratic leadership style to implement the planed project work. Democratic
leaders offer guidance to group members, but they also participate in the group and allow
input from other group members (Wilson, 2012).
 Monitoring and control phase: This phase is usually implemented at the execution
phase, but sometime managers take it as different phase. At this stage, hot-point company
will undertaken final product testing to estimate durability, long working along with
display durability in every critical condition or problem. In this stage, Laissez faire style
of the leadership will be applicable. The laissez-faire leader leaves workers to make
decisions on their own and only updates the team on progress. Highly skilled workers
succeed under a laissez-faire leadership style.
 Closure: In this stage of the closure, hot-point will launch its new TV of the 58 inch as
one of the final product for the purpose to acquire new strategic position into the market
of the UK. Hot-point company here uses Charismatic leadership style because according
to that leadership style the leaders command subordinate for follow up final action.
Business case:
Company Overview
Hotpoint Company is an organisation which produce, market and
sell various range of home appliances. Such as fridges and
freezers, gas and electric cookers, washing machines and electric
friars. Now respective company is going to launch large screen TV
ranges whose minimum size television screen is 58 inches.
Vision and Mission Vision statement of respective company is to improve and enhance
lifestyle of their customers.
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Mission statement of Hotpoint company is to provide appropriate
quality of home appliances which make their life easy.
Objectives
The objective of respective company is to provide new range of
large screen television to their customers which minimum size is
58 inches.
Strategy
Manager of respective company make strategies and plan to attract
customers in appropriate manner and produce products accordingly
which satisfy customers.
Executive summary:
The Hotpoint company wants to launch its new project about 58 inches TV in the market.
The main objective behind launching the new TV in market is to attract more and more
customers by providing new features and unique product. The objective of the company is to
capture market as well as to build its reputation also.
Business problems:
While launching the 58 inches TV in market respective organization face various
business problems such as risk of rejection of product by customers, quality related issues, etc..
Opportunities:
There are various opportunity in market for new project about launching 58 inches TV by
the company. There was not any similar product in the market prior launching of that TV, so
consumers attract more towards this product.
Solution to business problems:
The company can face the problems and resolve the issues by taking extra research about
market condition, consumers choice, quality testing and etc.. so that the issues will not occur in
future.
Project plan:
Cost Cost which is required by respective company to conduct process of
manufacturing large screen television id near about £18,000- £ 20,000.
Communication For communicating new objective of company the respective company
manager conduct meeting with their employees and discussed about
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objective and procedure. For communicating with customers they use
appropriate promotional method which help in attracting customers and
encourage them to purchase product.
Quality
To maintain quality of product the respective company use appropriate
strategies, methods and techniques which reduce wastage and produce
product in standard quality (Yang, Chen and Wang, 2012). Manager of
Hotpoint company try to maintain standard quality of product.
Scope
This refers to activities which is related to achieving goal and objective
in appropriate manner. For achieving goal respective company hire
manpower according to requirement and adopt new technology which
manufacture product in appropriate quality and with minimum wastage.
Work breakdown structure:
Work breakdown structure refers to the process in which work is divided into small
components or parts. This help a company in conducting work in more appropriate manner by
fulfilling achieving goal step by step (Taj and Mousavidin, 2015). It also provide framework to
company in estimating cost of products and services in appropriate manner.
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Gantt chat:
It is develop by Henry L. Gantt in year 1917, it is a horizontal bar chart which is used for
managing project. It provide graphical illustration of programmes which help in planning,
coordinating and conducting specific task of a project in appropriate manner. Simple Gantt chat
may be design on graph paper but complex can be develop at project management application
such as excel and so on. Gantt chat which is develop by respective company is given below:-
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M3 Analysis of rational for project methodologies, leadership and tools within the PLC
In order to complete a project successfully it is very important for an organisation to
implement project life cycle. While following all the steps of PLC it is very important to the
managers to use proper methodologies, tools and leadership as it will help the staff members to
be aware of all their responsibilities. All of them are also significant for successful completion of
the project because they can help to perform all the tasks in a systematic manner.
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TASK 4
P4 Effectiveness of PLC in application of project
In company, effectiveness of project life cycle should be explain in proper manner with
the help of leadership style. For launching the product into market successfully, hot-point
corporation applied various techniques. Different stages of PLC are needed to introduce new
product that is television in market (Venkataraman and Pinto, 2017). Various steps that are
useful in introducing product in marketplace such as initiation, planning, execution, monitoring
and controlling and closure. All product performance can be enhanced through PLC, Gantt chart
and work breakdown structure. Few leadership style are used in every phases of project life cycle
that explain the effectiveness of PLC are democratic, laissez-faire, Charismatic, situational.
Performance management is considered as a procedure that are applied to collect analysis and
report data in context of team, company etc. through this manager of hot-point can measure its
workers performance so accordingly they can plan programme for training and development. It
can be done by different manner like benchmarking, performance evaluation and so on. In this
assessment, application of the waterfall model will be utilised, which is majorly used for large
project.
The waterfall model is a clear and concise project management methodology that majorly
consists of five stage that follows into strict order. This model is useful there is the large project
such as manufacturing of the TV. The explanation of this model is as follows:
Requirements: In this, project manager of the hot-point is need to gather all different
kind of an information on basis of which beginning for this project will be initiates. During this
stage, other stage are needs to be planned even without further customer involvement and phase
will not be begin until unless product would be complete.
Design: In this phase, design including internal and external design will be included.
Logical design is possible, when solution is brainstormed & theorised. The physical design is one
of the sub-phrase, when theoretical ideas and schemas is completely based into concrete specs.
Implementation: In this phrase, when programmer assimilates requirements and specs
from the specification from previous phase & produce actual code. In context of hot-point,
change implementation will be led into by making out suitable alteration into products.
Verification: This stage of the waterfall is majorly customer review the product to make
sure that it meet necessary which is laid out at the beginning of any project. In the hot-point,
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clear and concise verification would be gather by launching complete product to business
customer's.
Maintenance: During this, maintenance phase will be undertaken for this hot-point TV,
when customer's are using this television product, getting bugs from customer's using feedback
and also find out error's out of the product for its rectification.
There are different method that can be utilise to evaluate employees and group
performance are comparing actual and standard performance and so on (Welborn and Singer,
2013). Evaluation is considered as crucial for company as through this manager of hot-point
corporation can do comparison among product quality and workers performance. Accordingly
they plan strategies in order to develop the product. An organisation do project which is of two
types large as well as small project. Large project is usually performed by public firm where as
small project is done by private organisation. Also, non profit organisation can performed any
type of product whether it is large or small projects. For doing both the projects a firm can utilise
many theories. Few of them are laissez-faire, Charismatic, situational and democratic theory.
With the help of this they can capable to plan some strategies more effectually through
conducting analysis and evaluation of market.
In order to determine effectiveness of all the stages of project life cycle effectiveness
measurement theory could be used by managers in Hotpoint. According to this theory all the
processes which are used by company to develop and complete the project successfully it is very
important to critically evaluate all the stages properly. By implementing it, it has been reviewed
that all the stages were followed by the managers effectively which has resulted in successful
completion of project. The negative aspect which is being identified with the help of this theory
is that it has resulted in very high cost for the company because the compensation which is paid
to the project manager is very high.
M4 Critical analysis of the way in which large and small scale project could be differentiated
In most of the business entities different types of theories and models are used by
managers to implement the project life cycle. All the large sector organisations receive very big
projects so that managers pay high attention towards the implementation of all of them. As there
is lack of funds and resources in small enterprises so management do not focus on the
implementation of different theories as all of them take very high time to get monitored.
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CONCLUSION
From this report it concluded that management of operation and project plays crucial role
in product development. an effectual application of operation management aids firm to gain
competitive advantage. Various principles of operation assists organisation for identifying its
bases. Also the techniques assists firm to introduce its products into market. Along with this PLC
are helpful for product improvement as well as evaluated to measure performance while using
different model that is situational, democratic and so on is applied to expand new products ability
and scope.
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REFERENCES
Books and journals
Basu, R. and Wright, J. N., 2012. Quality beyond six sigma. Routledge.
Haksever, C. and Render, B., 2018. Service and Operations Management. World Scientific
Books.
Heaslip, G., 2013. Services operations management and humanitarian logistics. Journal of
Humanitarian Logistics and Supply Chain Management. 3(1). pp.37-51.
Karlsson, C. ed., 2016. Research methods for operations management. Routledge.
Lee, H. L. and Tang, C. S., 2017. Socially and environmentally responsible value chain
innovations: New operations management research opportunities. Management Science.
64(3). pp.983-996.
Martinelli, R. J. and Milosevic, D. Z., 2016. Project management toolbox: tools and techniques
for the practicing project manager. John Wiley & Sons.
Nixon, P., Harrington, M. and Parker, D., 2012. Leadership performance is significant to project
success or failure: a critical analysis. International Journal of productivity and
performance management. 61(2). pp.204-216.
Preiss, K., 2012. Shop floor control-A systems perspective: From deterministic models towards
agile operations management. Springer Science & Business Media.
Taj, S. and Mousavidin, E., 2015. Using discrete event visual simulation to teach process
modelling in MBA operations management courses. International Journal of
Simulation and Process Modelling. 10(1). pp.45-64.
Venkataraman, R. R. and Pinto, J. K., 2017. Operations management: Managing global supply
chains. SAGE Publications.
Welborn, C. A. and Singer, M. G., 2013. Operations Management: Is There a Disconnect
Between College Textbook Content and Employer Needs?. Journal of Education for
Business. 88(1). pp.1-7.
Wilson, R., 2012. The Operations Manager's Toolbox: Using the Best Project Management
Techniques to Improve Processes and Maximize Efficiency. FT Press.
Yang, L. R., Chen, J. H. and Wang, H. W., 2012. Assessing impacts of information technology
on project success through knowledge management practice. Automation in
construction. 22. pp.182-191.
Online
Operations and Project Management. 2019. [Online]. Available
through:<https://www.beds.ac.uk/research-ref/bmri/centres/bisc/opm>.
Six Sigma Approach. 2016. [Online]. Available through <http://www.tqmi.com/blog/importance-
data-collection-six-sigma-dmaic-approach/>
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