Operations Management: Analyzing 4V Challenges & Organizing Plan

This report provides an analysis of the 4V challenges (Volume, Variety, Variation, and Visibility) faced by emergency service operations. It details how increased volume can maximize response time, the complexity arising from personnel variety, the impact of situational variations on outcomes, and the constraints caused by poor visibility. The report further proposes a plan to organize emergency service operations, emphasizing the importance of a planning team, evaluation of records, hazard recognition, regulation review, training programs, and effective communication. It highlights the necessity for emergency service agencies to maintain personnel competencies through stimulation-based exercises and operate in an open environment with strategic planning focused on procedures and policies. This ensures readiness to respond effectively to emergency events within a city, ultimately improving outcomes and reducing mortality.

Operations Management
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Table of Contents
Explanations of the 4V challenges for emergency service operations.........................................................2
Volume....................................................................................................................................................2
Variety.....................................................................................................................................................2
Variation..................................................................................................................................................2
Visibility..................................................................................................................................................2
Plan to organize the emergency service operations......................................................................................2
References...................................................................................................................................................4

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Explanations of the 4V challenges for emergency service operations
Volume
An increased volume of the ambulance will not only increase the chances of accidents but also it
will maximize the response time for the emergency vehicles.
Variety
Although the operation manager is provided with common training, still working with a variety
of personnel in high-stakes, time-critical and challenging situations leads to the complexity of the
circumstances.
Variation
The emergency services faces variations to understand the situation, risks, how they learn, react,
respond, communicate and recover from the incidents. Such type of variation could result in
increased mortality or morbidity (Brandon-Jones et al., 2016).
Visibility
Due to bad visibility at city intersections, the drivers of the emergency vehicles could face such
situations where information related to patient’s health is constrained.
Plan to organize the emergency service operations
To organize a plan to develop new emergency service operations, it becomes important for the
operation manager to follow the following steps carefully:
 Create a planning team
 Evaluate the current drill records, incident, procedures, and plans
 Recognize the hazards
 Review regulations and codes
 Provide training programs
 Effective communication plan
 Implementation of the plan
To implement the emergency services within a major city, the operation manager must ensure
the community that their personnel's are always ready to respond to the emergency events
occurring within the city. Therefore, emergency services agencies should have a variety of

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training approaches that includes stimulation-based exercises that maintain and develops the
competencies of personnel (Aringhieri, et al., 2017). Thus, the manager must operate the services
in a more political and open environment where strategic planning can create a greater emphasis
on procedures and policies.

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References
Aringhieri, R., Bruni, M.E., Khodaparasti, S. and Van Essen, J.T., 2017. Emergency medical
services and beyond: Addressing new challenges through a wide literature review. Computers &
Operations Research, 78, pp.349-368.
Brandon-Jones, A., Slack, N., Chambers, S., Johnston, R., Lysons, K., Farringhton, B.,
Stevenson, W., Russell, R., Taylor, B., Krajewski, L. and Ritzman, L., 2016. Operations
Management. Pearson Education Limited.