BSS052-6 Project & Operations Management: Vodafone Analysis Report

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of Vodafone's operational management, focusing on three key decision areas: quality, inventory management, and layout/process design. It discusses relevant theories such as Total Quality Management (TQM) and ABC analysis, and compares Vodafone with Telefonica UK using the 4Vs model (Volume, Variety, Variation, Visibility). The report also offers recommendations for improving operational management within Vodafone, emphasizing the importance of employee training and understanding operations. The analysis covers Vodafone's strategies, challenges (such as declining customer numbers), and potential areas for improvement in service delivery and customer satisfaction. This document is available on Desklib, a platform offering study tools and resources for students.

Project and operations
management

Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Main Body.......................................................................................................................................3
Three relevant operational management (OM) decisions areas of Vodafone and theories
related to OM..............................................................................................................................3
Comparison between Vodafone and Telefonica UK limited by using 4 Vs...............................5
Recommendations on improving operational management within Vodafone............................8
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................10
REFERNCES:................................................................................................................................11
Books and Journals:..................................................................................................................11

Introduction
Operational management consist of managing those activities in a proper way which is
conducted on daily basis within an organisation. It consist of planning, organising, controlling,
measuring and many other activities (Ravinder and Kollikkathara, 2017). Operational
management include only those productive activities which further helps to achieve
organisational goal. Project management and operational management are two different terms
with different meanings. Project management consist of managing all those activities whose
outcome helps to achieve short term goals like modification in products and many others. On the
other hand, operational management consist of conducting those activities which aims to achieve
long term goals for an organisation. Vodafone is a famous British multinational company which
deals in telecommunications sector. It is headquartered in Berkshire, UK which is founded in
1982 by Gerry Whent and Ernest Harrison. The following report covers three relevant
operational management (OM) decisions areas of Vodafone, theories related to OM, comparison
between Vodafone and British Telecommunications PLC by using 4 Vs and the
recommendations on improving operational management within Vodafone.
Main Body
Three relevant operational management (OM) decisions areas of Vodafone and theories related
to OM
Operational management is the process of managing all essential task of an organisation
which contributed to earn profit for the organisation. IT consist of planning, designing of
products and many other activities. Three relevant operational management areas within
Vodafone are explained below with their theories-
1- Quality- It is essential for every company to provide best quality products to their
customers because nowadays most most of the customers are bothered about quality instead of
quantity (Kaur, Singh and Singh, 2019). Hence, in context of Vodafone, they must check the
range of their networks and the speed of their data. Quality can also be measured by total number
of complaints and feedbacks. In case they receive less negative feedback and very few number of
complaints then they are providing good quality services to their customers. Total Quality
Management (TQM) is one of the most popular theory of quality aspect of any product or
services. TQM consist of 3 elements which are explained below-

Quality management planning- Here companies make plans that how they can maintain good
quality of products and services to satisfy their customers. In context of Vodafone, they prefer to
have similar quality of services for longer period of time (Hasan and et. al., 2018). Hence, they
are little less focused to provide that quality which is expected by their customers.
Quality Assurance- It is the term which is used to prevent mistakes and problems within
manufacturing of a product and in context of service providing companies like Vodafone, they
prefer to prevent the mistakes and problems while delivering their services. For example they
hire skilled employees who have the knowledge of providing best services to their customers by
communicating well and solving their issues in such a way that it will not arise again.
Quality control- It consist of identifying the threats and making corrective actions to mitigate
the defects or threats (Pambreni and et. al., 2019). In context of Vodafone, they have a team to
check the quality of their services which they provide to customers on regular basis. Secondly,
they also focus to solve all quarries of customers as soon as possible to improve their TQM.
2- Inventory management- It is essential for every company to manage their inventory
for future use. ABC analysis is one of the most famous model of inventory management which
states that management of inventory should be done according to their importance. Here,
inventories are managed in three categories which are explained below-
Category A- These category consist of managing most essential items of an organisation which
help them to earn more income (Mishra, Wu and Sarkar, 2021). Here, 20% of stock will provide
70% of income. In context of Vodafone they will categorized their most essential item in this
category which provide more profit after their selling. Their memory cards, sims, mobile charger
are supposed to kept in this category.
Category B- These items have medium level of consumption values. It provide 15-20 % income
from 30% of inventory. This category is helpful to manage those inventories which are not too
important for organisation neither they are too useless for organisation. Whenever companies
thought to recover their operational expenses then they supposed to sell this category of items
because this will help them to cover all expenses whether company did not earn anything but it
also aims to get least loss as much as possible.
Category C- This type of inventories have least values in market. It consist of 10 % total income
from 70% of inventories kept by the company (Muchaendepi and et. al., 2019). Here, those items
were stored which is less popular in the market. In context of Vodafone, recently their electrical

appliances are becoming less popular and it provide least profit to company. Hence, they put this
items in their category C of ABC inventory management model.
3- Lay out or process design- It consist of effective planning about how process will be
conducted within an organisation that it will provide maximum benefit to organisation. Few
models and strategies are discussed here which is explained below-
Process and capacity design- High level of productivity in minimum cost as much a possible is
the aim of every company. Hence, Vodafone also adopted those process within their organisation
which consist to provide them maximum profit in minimum efforts while focusing on quality
effectiveness. There are 4 types of process strategies which is suggested in this model and they
are discussed below-
Process focus- Here companies mainly focuses on their process of manufacturing products and
the ways of delivering services in service sector companies (Van Fan and et. al., 2020).
Repetitive focus- This strategy involves to focus on production oriented process where products
are manufactured with the help of modules. Modules are those components of products which is
manufactured before the completion in manufacturing the main product. It plays an essential part
to complete the process of manufacturing products or services.
Product focus- The main aim of this strategy is to focus on continuousness improvement of
products or services of an organisation. This will help to compete well in the industry and
achieve competitive advantage.
Mass customization- These strategy mainly focus on those processes which is adopted for rapid
production with low cost to achieve maximization of customer satisfaction (Mears and et. al.,
2017). There are many benefits of mass customization like high customer retention, best
utilization of raw material and other essential resources and etc.
From the above four strategies it is evaluated that Process focused strategies is best suited
for Vodafone because they are working under a service providing industry which mainly focuses
on the ways and techniques of providing services to customers. Hence, in case they focus on
their services and adopt little change then it will be beneficial for them to achieve success.
Comparison between Vodafone and Telefonica UK limited by using 4 Vs
There are 4V's in operational management which are explained below-
Volume- It consist of total amount of product in numerical numbers are required to fulfil
the demand of customers in market (Martani and et. al., 2021).

Variety- It consist of different types of varieties of goods and services which is produced
by a company and sell offer it to targeted customers to achieve their satisfaction level.
Variation- This element of 4 V's consist of how many times demand changes due to
external factors of a business. Nowadays, Covid 19 pandemic impacts largely on most of the
business.
Visibility- It consist of customers experience through the organisational effective process
to make their customers happy (Jabbour and et. al., 2019).
The comparison of Vodafone and Telefonica UK limited are mentioned below-
Basis of
difference
(4Vs)
Vodafone British Telecommunications
(BT) PLC
Volume Vodafone customers are satisfied
with their services. They uses 161
petabytes of data. In other words
their customers uses to watch 1,400
three minutes video every second.
The volume of Vodafone is high as
compared to any manufacturing
company.
BT is one of the most popular and
older telecommunication
company in UK which has
established a good brand image in
market by serving best services to
their customers. Their customers
are satisfied with their services.
Hence, BT has high volume.
Variety Vodafone have large number of
customers in UK but due to their
standardization techniques they are
loosing their customers. In simple
words, they are not adopting any
new service or price strategies to
attract their customers (Soyer,
Pauwels and Seggie, 2019). Their
customers are unable to find
varieties in their services for longer
period of time. Hence, their
BT provide many other services
to their customers rather than
telecommunication service like
BT customer, BT enterprises, BT
global services. Hence, their
customers have varieties in the
services of BT to use. But from
last few years they have shut
down their few businesses like
BT wholesale which was shut
down completely in the year

customers switches to other brands
due to this reason. Therefore, the
variety of Vodafone is considered as
low.
2019. Hence, due to management
or wrong business planning issues
they have to limit their services
but then also recently their
customers are happy with their
varieties of services. Hence, they
have high contribution in variety
element of 4Vs.
Variation There were total 370 million
customers of Vodafone in the year
2011 and 404 million in the year
2012. Hence, to meet the market
demand, Vodafone is required to
increase the number of total base
stations. They increases their base
station from 2,24,000 to 2,38,000
from the year 2011 to 2012. At this
time their demand is high so their
variation is considered as high.
During recent year when Covid 19
disease is attacking whole world,
Vodafone is also getting damages.
Hence, their total number of
customers decline from 18 million
customers in 2020 to 17.2 million in
the year 2021. Hence, they are
loosing their customers every year
recently and due to this they also
reduces their base stations. Hence,
recent time the variation of
There are total 29.8 million
customers of BT in the year 2020
and it roses and reached to
approximately 30 million
customers in the year 2021.
Hence, this strata is proving that
their marketing demand is
increasing rapidly every year and
to meet their marketing demand
they are serving better services to
their customers (Fenton, Fletcher
and Griffiths, 2019). They
analyse their market and then
serve according to their present
demand. Hence, the main reason
behind their success is that they
are fulfilling the market demand.
Therefore, they are contributing
high degree of variation.

Vodafone is considered as low.
Visibility As the record of Vodafone
mentioned that their total number of
customers are declining every year
then it means that their customers
are not satisfied with their services.
Hence, their visibility is low.
Their positive reviews and
feedbacks from customers
mentioned that they are
successful to provide better
experience to their customers.
Due to this reason only they are
able to increase total number of
customers every year. Hence,
their visibility is high.
Recommendations on improving operational management within Vodafone
There are various ways to improve operational management of Vodafone which are discussed
below-
Know the operations- It is one of the essential recommendations for Vodafone that they
must check that their each and every employee know their main operational activity or not
because understanding operational activity will help to focus more on main activities of an
organisation.
Provide more training- Regular training of employees will help the company to improve
the skills and talents of their employees (Bortoluzzi and et. al., 2017). Here, Vodafone can
mainly focus to improvement of those skills which are essential to complete organisational
activities in a effective manner.
Improve customer service- Vodafone is the company which provide services related to
telecommunication and electrical products to their customers. They are mainly famous for their
telecommunication services. Hence, their main operational activity is to provide best services to
their customers by solving their quarries and issues as soon as possible. Hence, they need to
develop a better plan to improve their customer service department.
Identify barriers and remove them to achieve success- It is essential for Vodafone
identify their barriers record what all issues they are facing to achieve success. This records can

be passed to higher authority who are responsible to make strategic decisions to remove such
obstacles and promote free flow of information within their company (Pereira and et. al., 2019).
Keep up with trends- Customers are more satisfied with those companies which follow
trendy ways to perform their operational management and offer those products and services
which are trendy in recent markets. Hence, it is recommended for Vodafone to analyse what is
going trendy within their served market and then try to adopt those services and products to
make their customers more satisfied.
Focus on employee's satisfaction- One of the most essential factor to manage
operational activities of a company is to make the employees of organisation more satisfied
because employees are the main reason to convert strategical planning into actions (Hassan and
Maitlo, 2020). Hence, their actions impact upon effectiveness of the operational activities.
Vodafone can provide many facilities to their employees such as bonus, health insurance and
many other benefits which is provided by other companies to their employees. These type of
benefits will help to achieve employees satisfaction and when employees get more satisfied then
they will perform better performance and contributed their efforts to achieve operational
objectives.
Convert the strategy from standardization to adaptation- It is clear that Vodafone
have standardization strategies for their operational management which consist of using same
kind of strategies or products and services for longer period of time. Hence, this is one of the
most risky strategy for any company in this dynamic world of business. On the other hand
adaptation is one of the most effective strategy because it consist of changing strategies and
products and services according to the current trend on regular basis. Hence, the conversion of
standardisation to adaptation will help Vodafone to manage their operational management with
new strategies.

Conclusion
From the above information it is concluded that operational management is consist of
managing all those activities which contributed to achieve organisational goal and which are
main activities of an organisation to get success. It is very essential to manage each operational
activity of an organisation. Three relevant decision making areas are opted for operational
management of Vodafone like quality, inventory management and Process design. Few models
and theories were also used in this report like TQM model for quality management and ABC
model for inventory management. There are 4V's of operational management which are volume,
variety, variation and visibility. There is the comparison of Vodafone and BT company to
identify the difference between their ways opted to satisfy their customers and the effectiveness
of their services. At the end this report covers few recommendations made to improve the
operational management of Vodafone.

REFERNCES:
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of an industry: a constructivist case. Brazilian Journal of Operations & Production
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Fenton, A., Fletcher, G. and Griffiths, M. eds., 2019. Strategic Digital Transformation: a results-
driven approach. Routledge.
Hasan, K. and et. al., 2018. Total quality management (TQM): Implementation in primary
education system of Bangladesh. International Journal of Research in Industrial
Engineering, 7(3), pp.370-380.
Hassan, M. and Maitlo, G.M., 2020. Impact of Crew Training and Safety Management System
on Operational Management in Aviation Industry of Pakistan. Amazonia
Investiga, 9(30), pp.119-126.
Jabbour, C.J.C. and et. al., 2019. Unlocking the circular economy through new business models
based on large-scale data: an integrative framework and research agenda. Technological
Forecasting and Social Change, 144, pp.546-552.
Kaur, M., Singh, K. and Singh, D., 2019. Synergetic success factors of total quality management
(TQM) and supply chain management (SCM): A literature review. International
Journal of Quality & Reliability Management.
Martani, D. and et. al., 2021. Impact of audit tenure and audit rotation on the audit quality: Big 4
vs non big 4. Cogent Economics & Finance, 9(1), p.1901395.
Mears, L. and et. al., 2017. Mechanistic fermentation models for process design, monitoring, and
control. Trends in biotechnology, 35(10), pp.914-924.
Mishra, U., Wu, J.Z. and Sarkar, B., 2021. Optimum sustainable inventory management with
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Production, 279, p.123699.
Muchaendepi, W. and et. al., 2019. Inventory management and performance of SMEs in the
manufacturing sector of Harare. Procedia Manufacturing, 33, pp.454-461.
Pambreni, Y. and et. al., 2019. The influence of total quality management toward organization
performance. Management Science Letters, 9(9), pp.1397-1406.
Pereira, A. and et. al., 2019. Improving operational management of wastewater systems. A case
study. Water Science and Technology, 80(1), pp.173-183.
Ravinder, H. and Kollikkathara, N., 2017. Project management in operations management
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Online
What is an Inventory Management System? (2021). [Online] Available through:
<https://www.brightpearl.com/inventory-management-system>