bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Shape
Authors: Yorke David
Published: January 2015

Shape is a variable in the Design of packaging and is used in association with different types of packaging materials, for example, plastic, card, and metals.
Social Responsibility
Authors: Marsden David
Published: January 2015

In 1960, Davis described social responsibility as business “decisions and actions taken for reasons at least partially beyond the firm's direct economic or technical interests.” The various lines of academic inquiry and the different conceptions of the meaning of the term social responsibility, however, have resulted in a spectrum of definitions.
Societal Marketing
Authors: Marsden David
Published: January 2015

The societal marketing concept was first proposed in the early 1970s as an alternative to the traditional concept.
Strategic Business Units
Authors: Sammut‐Bonnici Tanya , McGee John
Published: January 2015

A strategic business unit (
SBU
) is an organizational subunit that acts like an independent business in all major respects, including the formulation of its own strategic plans and its own marketing strategy. An
SBU
may share its parent organization's corporate identity or develop its own brand identity, depending on the degrees of freedom allowed to the management of the division. Dividing the corporation's operations into
SBU
s increases efficiency and market focus and efficiently organizes the business portfolio of a broadly diversified company.
SBU
s would typically prepare their own financial, strategic, marketing, and sales plans. The advantage of operating through an
SBU
is that it would create a strategically focused management structure that is not detracted by the wider product portfolio of the corporation. Corporations may experience some disadvantages when organizing their divisions through the
SBU
structure. Separate units may create an additional layer of top management, which are expensive and difficult to manage.
SBU
s require coordination from head office to align with the group's overall objectives. The best results for strategy formulation for business units are derived in companies with a collaborative approach.
Strategic Control
Authors: Littler Dale
Published: January 2015

Strategic control is a periodic assessment of the effectiveness of the
C
orporate
S
trategy, business strategy, or
M
arketing
S
trategy.
Strategic Styles
Authors: Littler Dale
Published: January 2015

It has been suggested that organizations can be categorized according to their broad strategic style.
Systems Marketing
Authors: Littler Dale
Published: January 2015

Especially in organizational markets, a
C
ompetitive
A
dvantage may be secured by developing the capability to provide what might be termed “total solutions” to customer “problems” or requirements.
Transaction
Authors: Leverick Fiona
Published: January 2015

This is the transfer of ownership or use of a product or service from one party to another in return for a payment of some kind.
Trust
Authors: Littler Dale
Published: January 2015

Trust is viewed as an important influence affecting the effectiveness of interorganizational relationships because, in order to make commitments through investment in joint projects, sharing information, or engaging in other forms of partnership, organizations need to be assured that partners will not engage in opportunistic behavior.
Uncertainty
Authors: Littler Dale
Published: January 2015

Uncertainty has traditionally been defined in terms of its difference from risk, the classic distinction between the two being made by Knight.
Value Chain
Authors: Littler Dale
Published: January 2015

The value chain embraces the various activities aimed at creating value for the customer and the margin that the firm obtains.
Vision Statement
Authors: Littler Dale
Published: January 2015

The vision statement is a relatively recent introduction to the lexicon of strategic management and is generally regarded as encapsulating the desired‐for future for the organization, usually as expressed by the chief executive or senior management group.
Wealth
Authors: Yorke David
Published: January 2015

A person's purchasing power derives from
D
isposable
I
ncome and
D
iscretionary
I
ncome, resulting from employment, investments, credit, and other means.
Word‐of‐Mouth Communications
Authors: Yorke David
Published: January 2015

Word‐of‐mouth communication is a non‐commercial form of marketing communication where the sender of the message is assisted by intermediaries in attempting to reach the target buyer/customer/consumer.
Creative Consumers
Authors: Page Kelly L.
Published: January 2015

This article provides a review of creative consumers and consumer‐generated marketing, the differences between user‐generated‐ and cocreated content, and their importance to marketing.
Viral Marketing
Authors: Page Kelly L.
Published: January 2015

This article provides a review of viral marketing and how digital social technologies have added to the growth in viral communications.
Complexity
Authors: Roehrich Jens
Published: January 2015

The multidisciplinary concept of complexity has previously been explored in a number of disciplines such as economics, mathematics and physics. Although recent interest by management scholars in the study of complex systems has grown substantially, complexity as a sub‐field in the social sciences has existed for many decades. Management scholars have used a variety of dynamic systems theories to provide a more complete understanding of organizational design, network structuring and strategic adaptation. Prior studies have mainly emphasized a structural viewpoint on complexity which takes into consideration the high number of complicated interrelationships and institutional structures. The resulting structural complexity can be positively associated with innovative practice, but has also been related to several problems such as poor schedule quality, ineffective decision making, larger inventories and higher costs.
Resilient Operations
Authors: Squire Brian
Published: January 2015

Operations resilience refers to the ability of an operation to recover after failure or disruption.
Supplier Development
Authors: Krause Daniel
Published: January 2015

Supplier development is a bilateral effort between a firm, in its role as a customer, and its supplier to increase the supplier's performance. Supplier development activities vary broadly ranging from evaluation and feedback to training and education, to direct involvement by a customer firm's representatives in on‐site supplier improvements. The effort can be tactical in nature, focused on one supplier that is having problems, or strategic, representing a supply base‐wide effort to create a globally aligned supply network.
Sustainable Procurement
Authors: Walker Helen
Published: January 2015

Sustainable procurement is on government and organizational agendas across the world and entails buying goods and services in socially, environmentally, and economically responsible ways. This article introduces the concept, explores the reasons for public and private organizations seeking to source more sustainably, and considers future research directions.
Build‐to‐Order
Authors: Holweg Matthias
Published: January 2015

Build‐to‐order is a customer‐centric order fulfilment strategy.
DMAICCycle
Authors: Betts Alan
Published: January 2015

The define, measure, analyze, improve and control (DMAIC) cycle is the core problem‐solving methodology that underpins of Six Sigma improvement approach.
Leveled Scheduling
Authors: Harrison Alan
Published: January 2015

Leveled scheduling involves distributing volume and mix evenly over a given production time span. It is important to schedule material movements so that each movement is coordinated with the others when work cycles repeat in the production process.
Simulation Modeling
Authors: Greasley Andrew
Published: January 2015

Simulation is the use of models of organizational systems and processes, usually computer‐based, to provide a way of experimenting in order to understand their behaviour in a number of scenarios. The model is thus designed to provide decision‐makers with detailed information on how processes behave.
Performance Measurement
Authors: Neely Andrew
Published: January 2015

Performance measurement is the process of quantifying action, where measurement is the process of quantification and performance is the result of action.
Integrated Management Systems
Authors: Dale Barrie
Published: January 2015

An integrated management system (
IMS
) deals with separate management systems covering quality, environmental, and health and safety issues, and insures that they align with the organization's strategy.
Quality
Authors: Dale Barrie
Published: January 2015

“Quality” is now a familiar term.
Quality Costing
Authors: Dale Barrie
Published: January 2015

Quality costing expresses an organization's quality performance in financial terms.
Quality Management Systems
Authors: Dale Barrie
Published: January 2015

A quality management system is defined in BS EN ISO 9000 (2000) as a “management system to direct and control an organization with regard to quality.”
Design–Manufacturing Interface
Authors: Voss Chris
Published: January 2015

One of the negative impacts of functional organization structures (sometimes pejoratively labeled “silos”) is that technical design/engineering expertise is separated from production/manufacturing expertise to the competitive detriment of the firm: the sustainable operational capability to win orders and gain competitive advantage does not come from the manufacturing function alone, but it is part of a wider set of interlinked functions.
Manufacturing Strategy
Authors: Voss Chris
Published: January 2015

The need for manufacturing decisions to be made in a strategic context has been recognized for many years.
Industrial Engineering
Authors: Karlsson Christer
Published: January 2015

Industrial engineering is a discipline that is concerned with increasing the effectiveness of (primarily) manufacturing and (occasionally).
Balancing Loss
Authors: Bennett David
Published: January 2015

This article defines balancing loss in production lines together with the related activity of line balancing that aims to minimise idle time by allocating activities more evenly across the workstations in the line.
Division of Labor
Authors: Bennett David
Published: January 2015

This article describes how dividing a large repetitive task into smaller parts and allocating each to a single person can made tasks simpler, easier to learn, and enabled them to be more quickly carried out. But there are also drawbacks including monotony of work, possible physical injury from task repetition, low flexibility and poor robustness.
International Location
Authors: Bennett David
Published: January 2015

This article describes how an international location decision is taken at the highest level by organizations involved in international operations. Such organizations can be subsidiaries of multinational enterprises, international joint ventures, licensees, or franchising. It is also relevant to consider the configuration of a company's network at an international level.
Job Design
Authors: Bennett David
Published: January 2015

Job design is a general term given to the aspect of operations system design that relates to the way in which jobs are structured and workers motivated.
Process Layout
Authors: Bennett David
Published: January 2015

This article describes one of the three basic options for laying out facilities to produce goods or deliver services. In a process layout similar production processes are grouped together in the same department or area. Advantages include specialized supervision and flexibility because the priority of batches can be changed. Disadvantages of process layouts including high work‐in‐progress levels, frequent setups, extensive material movement, and long throughput times.
Production Flow Analysis
Authors: Bennett David
Published: January 2015

This article describes a technique for identifying families of components and associated groups of processes to which they can be allocated in production. The result provides a way of producing the components more efficiently in cells with fewer process set‐ups and shorter distances moved.
Service Operations
Authors: Collier David
Published: January 2015

Although the study of service operations is an increasingly important part of operations management (
OM
), it was not until 1978 that the first
Management of Service Operations
text was published; an extraordinary observation given that service industries typically account for 60–85% of employment in developed economies and that at least 50% of employment in goods‐producing industries is in
S
ervice
P
rocesses.
Design Chain
Authors: Twigg David
Published: January 2015

Design chains are a specific form of interorganizational arrangement supporting product design and development activities.
E‐Intermediaries
Authors: Ambrose Eamonn
Published: January 2015

E‐intermediaries are online organizations which facilitate buyers and sellers to trade on the Internet. They can be openly accessible fora such as e‐Bay or more commonly private fora with restricted access. The value of e‐intermediaries lies in lower sourcing, comparison and transaction costs, increased supply chain integration, community membership and added value services.
Product Platforms
Authors: Bates Hilary
Published: January 2015

A product platform is ‘a set of subsystems and interfaces developed to form a common structure from which a stream of derivative products can be efficiently developed and produced. Celebrated recent examples include the Volkswagen group Modularer Querbaukasten (Modular Transverse Matrix) platform which underpins the new Volkswagen Golf, Tiguan, Passat, Audi A3 and future generations of the Polo, Beetle and Scirocco, the Euro‐market Touran and Sharan, the next Jetta, and several Seat and Skoda models.
Esthetics (Product)
Authors: Moultrie James
Published: January 2015

Industrial goods and products are normally designed in order to offer some functional benefit, but the way a product looks can have a significant impact on consumer perceptions and consequently, market response.
Triz
Authors: Moultrie James
Published: January 2015

TRIZ
, or the “theory of inventive problem solving,” was developed by a Russian, Genrich Altshuller, in 1946 following an analysis of over 400 000 patents.
Flexible Manufacturing System
Authors: Moultrie James
Published: January 2015

A flexible manufacturing system is a configuration of semi‐independent workstations connected by automated material handling and machine loading technologies.
Empowerment
Authors: Heap John
Published: January 2015

Empowerment is an extension of the autonomy job characteristic prominent in the behavioral approach to job design.
Learning Curves
Authors: Heap John
Published: January 2015

Learning curves are the functions that predict the reduction of labor input per unit of manufactured output.
Economic Order Quantity
Authors: Mapes John
Published: January 2015

When placing an order for materials with a supplier, the economic order quantity (
EOQ
) is the quantity for which the sum of total annual ordering and stockholding costs will be a minimum.
Inventory Accuracy
Authors: Mapes John
Published: January 2015

Inventory accuracy is a measure of the extent to which inventory records are in agreement with actual stock counts.
Inventory‐Related Costs
Authors: Mapes John
Published: January 2015

The costs associated with inventory can be divided into four categories.
Best Practice
Authors: Szwejczewski Marek
Published: January 2015

Over the last decade, the notion of “best practice” has taken a firm hold in both practitioner discourse and operations management (
OM
) literature.
Design for Manufacture
Authors: Lewis Michael
Published: January 2015

The process whereby the performance of a manufacturing system is formally included as a variable in determining the effectiveness of the design of a product (i.e. how easily, cheaply, flexibly, etc. can we make it?).
Guest Engineering
Authors: Lewis Michael
Published: January 2015

The exchange of technical personnel, in either direction, between customer and supplier firms in a value chain (e.g. in the automotive industry) is often known as guest engineering. The objectives might be to enhance quality, improve technical performance or facilitate new product development, etc.
Life Cycle Effects
Authors: Lewis Michael
Published: January 2015

Operational objectives will and should evolve as products, services, and markets mature. The so‐called product life cycle model for example, argues that products typically pass through several distinct stages – introduction, growth, maturity, and decline – and therefore that different marketing, financial, manufacturing, purchasing, and human resource strategies may be necessary at each stage.
Maintenance
Authors: Lewis Michael
Published: January 2015

Maintenance is the process whereby operations actively care for their physical assets and facilities. Although often viewed as being of secondary importance in the strategic priorities (i.e. direct value creation) of an organization, proactive maintenance plays a fundamental role in insuring sustained operational performance.
Single‐Loop Learning
Authors: Lewis Michael
Published: January 2015

Single‐loop learning occurs when there is repetitive association between input and output factors in a process.
Structural and Infrastructural Decisions
Authors: Lewis Michael
Published: January 2015

One way of categorizing the various decisions that typically comprise an operations strategy is to consider those that are structural, in that they define the overall tangible shape and architecture (e.g., capacity, technology type) of the operation, and those that are infrastructural,
in that they relate to the people, systems, and culture that tie together the operations activities.
Condition‐Based Maintenance
Authors: Shulver Michael
Published: January 2015

Condition‐based maintenance (
CBM
) is a proactive approach to maintaining physical facilities that form a core part of effective
Q
uality
M
anagement
S
ystems.
Generic Manufacturing Strategies
Authors: Sweeney Mike
Published: January 2015

The purpose of this article is to suggest a means for the development of a vision for the management of the alignment or the realignment of the competitive and manufacturing strategies of a business. The content of the article includes the description of a theoretical framework for this purpose. Four types of generic manufacturing capabilities are defined. These consist of the high efficiency or caretaker manufacturing strategy, the high product variety or marketeer manufacturing strategy, the high product and process innovation or innovator manufacturing strategy and the high flexibility and fast response or reorganizer manufacturing strategy. How each of these manufacturing strategies need to be restructured to evolve into an alternative generic manufacturing strategy is graphically illustrated. The article also includes definitions of the key structural and infrastructural elements that collectively determine the manufacturing capabilities of a firm. How these differ between a national and international manufacturing strategy is also described.
Aggregate Capacity Management
Authors: Slack Nigel
Published: January 2015

Aggregate capacity management is the activity of setting the capacity levels of an organization in the medium term.
Breakthrough Improvement
Authors: Slack Nigel
Published: January 2015

The breakthrough approach to improvement (or innovation‐based improvement) sees the main vehicle of improvement as major and dramatic changes in the way an operation works.
Cost
Authors: Slack Nigel
Published: January 2015

The meaning, measurement, and management of cost have long been primary concerns of operations management (
OM
) practitioners and academics.
Delivery Dependability
Authors: Slack Nigel
Published: January 2015

Delivery dependability means keeping delivery promises.
Fail‐Safing
Authors: Slack Nigel
Published: January 2015

The concept of fail‐safing has emerged since the introduction of Japanese methods of operations improvement.
Finite and Infinite Loading
Authors: Slack Nigel
Published: January 2015

There are two main approaches to the allocation of tasks to work centers (i.e., groups of people and/or machines): finite and infinite loading.
Hierarchy of Operations
Authors: Slack Nigel
Published: January 2015

A key element of the operations management (
OM
) Transformation Model is its applicability to very different levels of analysis.
Operations Strategy
Authors: Slack Nigel
Published: January 2015

Operations strategy is a term that is often used to indicate one of the two departures from the better‐known term, Manufacturing Strategy.
P

:

D

Ratios
Authors: Slack Nigel
Published: January 2015

The
P
:
D
ratio of an operation is the ratio of “demand” time (i.e., the time a customer must wait between asking for a product and receiving it) to the whole operation production cycle,
P
(i.e., how long the operation has to manage the flow of materials and information).
Planning and Control in Operations
Authors: Slack Nigel
Published: January 2015

Planning and control processes attempt to reconcile internal operations activities with the demands of customers.
Preventive Maintenance
Authors: Slack Nigel
Published: January 2015

Preventive maintenance aims to prevent asset/facility failures caused by time‐dependent factors such as component wear.
Runners, Repeaters, and Strangers
Authors: Slack Nigel
Published: January 2015

Runners, repeaters, and strangers is a planning and control classification based on the frequency with which a manufacturing operation is called upon to make a product or deliver a service.
Sequencing
Authors: Slack Nigel
Published: January 2015

Sequencing is the decision that is taken on the order of the jobs that will be tackled by a workstation.
Transformation Model
Authors: Slack Nigel
Published: January 2015

Operations produce goods and services by coordinating “input” resources and deploying them to either “transform” other resources (or be transformed themselves), thereby creating “outputs” of goods and/or services.
Family Bill
Authors: Danese Pamela
Published: January 2015

The family bill is a planning bill supporting the forecasting activity. Frequently, companies characterized by high product variety divide products into groups or families in order to simplify production planning and control activities. In particular, to improve the forecast accuracy, many companies form families of products with similar demand patterns, thus shifting the forecast object from many end‐product configurations to few aggregate product/item groups. To use aggregate forecasts, they must develop a family bill, that is, a planning bill containing a product family as a parent and more disaggregated product families as the children.
Jidoka
Authors: Åhlström Pär
Published: January 2015

Jidoka is a technique for detecting and correcting production defects. It incorporates a mechanism to detect abnormalities or defects and a mechanism to stop the line or machine when abnormalities or defects occur.

Jidoka is not limited to machine operations but can be used in conjunction with manual operations.

Human jidoka allows operators to stop the process in the event of a problem. This would often involve visual control, which is the means of assessing, at a glance, the status of production processes and the visibility of process standards.
Just‐in‐Time
Authors: Åhlström Pär
Published: January 2015

The article provides a definition and short description of just‐in‐time. Just‐in‐time developed out of the practices employed by certain Japanese manufacturing companies, particularly Toyota, in the 1950s and 1960s. A core feature of a just‐in‐time production system is the production of the necessary products in necessary quantities at the necessary time. To enable this customer pull production, setup reduction becomes essential. Just‐in‐time production is also characterized by the elimination of waste – everything that does not add value to the final product. Another important part of just‐in‐time is continuous improvement, the relentless pursuit of perfection.
Kanban
Authors: Åhlström Pär
Published: January 2015

The article provides a short description of kanban, which is essentially a tool to help achieve just‐in‐time production. Kanban is essentially an information system that informs processes of the necessary timing and quantity of production. The term in itself means “card” or “signal”. The various types and usage of kanban is described.
Bill of Materials
Authors: Burcher Peter
Published: January 2015

The bill of materials (
BOM
) is a file or a set of files that contains the “recipe” for each finished product assembly in a material requirements planning (
MRP
) system.
Closed‐Loop
MRP
Authors: Burcher Peter
Published: January 2015

Closed‐loop material requirements planning (
MRP
) is a system that grew out of
M
aterial
R
equirements
P
lanning and that primarily allows plans to be checked against capacity to determine whether they are realistic and achievable.
Manufacturing Resources Planning
Authors: Burcher Peter
Published: January 2015

Manufacturing resources planning (
MRPII
) is a structured approach to manufacturing management in which an integrated business system is used for the effective closed‐loop planning of all the resources of a manufacturing company.
Material Requirements Planning
Authors: Burcher Peter
Published: January 2015

Material requirements planning (
MRP
) is a computer‐based set of planning technique that looks at a future requirement for a finished product in terms of a Master Production Schedule and uses this, together with the Bill of Materials, inventory status data, and lead time information, to generate the requirements for all the subassemblies, components, and raw materials that go to make up a finished product.
Bow‐Tie and Diamond Perspectives
Authors: Romano Pietro
Published: January 2015

Cooper reported an analogy attributed to the late Sam Walton according to which firms can choose between the bow‐tie and the diamond approaches to interfirm relationships.
Continuous Replenishment Programs
Authors: Romano Pietro
Published: January 2015

When sales occur through retailers, there are several industry practices that result in single‐point control of replenishment.
Network Techniques
Authors: Levene Ralph , Lewis Michael
Published: January 2015

Techniques designed to determine the sequence for carrying out project activities and thus their scheduling.
Project Control
Authors: Levene Ralph , Lewis Michael
Published: January 2015

Project control is the set of activities that form a cycle of the planning, monitoring, and controlling of projects.
Work Breakdown Structures
Authors: Levene Ralph
Published: January 2015

A work breakdown structure (
WBS
) is a systematic way of defining the scope of a project.
J
uran
Authors: Silvestro Rhian
Published: January 2015

This article provides a profile of
J
oseph
J
uran and his main contributions to quality improvement concepts and practices. One of the early exponents of Total Quality Management, Juran promoted a customer focused, preventive approach to process improvement and advocated the application of statistical process control techniques.
Blueprinting
Authors: Johnston Robert
Published: January 2015

The term “blueprinting” refers to the documentation of a service process: it is a means of evaluating, developing, and designing service processes.
Service Design
Authors: Johnston Robert
Published: January 2015

Service design is the process of specifying the characteristics of a service and designing out its fail points. It requires a clear understanding of customer needs and expectations and a clear and shared service concept. It also involves the detailed design of the service delivery system, service package, service process, and the service environment.
Business Excellence Model
Authors: McAdam Rodney
Published: January 2015

The Business Excellence Model (
BEM
) is a broad management model which seeks to incorporate
T
otal
Q
uality
M
anagement
P
rinciples within a measureable framework. The model, with contextual modifications, has been applied across a wide range of organisational types and sectors. It is the framework used for a considerable number of
Q
uality
A
wards within the
E
uropean Union and is consistent with the Baldrige Model in the United States.
Productivity
Authors: Schmenner Roger
Published: January 2015

Productivity is one of the major topics uniting research in operations management. In concept it is simple enough, but defining it precisely can be difficult and confusing for the manager. Many things can contribute to productivity gain, from investments in the inputs of capital and labor, to the way a process is managed. A recent theory, the theory of swift, even flow, helps to clarify what affects productivity and what does not.
Global Manufacturing Network
Authors: Shi Yongjiang
Published: January 2015

The global manufacturing network is a geographically dispersed production or an operations subsidiary, similar to a factory, network for a product family, and owned or partly owned by a multinational corporation.
Innovations in Service Companies
Authors: Conway Steve
Published: January 2015

Service innovation has until recently been a relatively neglected area of research, despite the importance of the service sector‐to‐developed economies. Alternative perspectives of innovation within the service sector argue that it is: (i) driven largely by technology from outside the sector; (ii) distinct from product innovation; (iii) increasingly intertwined with product innovation; or (iv) highly varied across the sector. The new service development (NSD) process within service organizations has long been shown to be less formalised, more dynamic, and more adhoc, than that for new products, with innovation often emerging out of service practice. However, ‘service engineering’ or ‘service design’ within operations management are emerging attempts to formalize this process.
Bottlenecks
Authors: Armistead Colin
Published: January 2015

Bottlenecks are the parts of an operation or process that are the constraints on its capacity. A question that arises for operations managers is the extent to which bottlenecks are fixed or movable as the variety or mixture of products or services alters.
Fixed Position Layout
Authors: Brandon‐Jones Alistair
Published: January 2015

Fixed position layout is one of the four basic layout types commonly discussed in Operations Management. In this layout, often associated with the assembly of products that are too large or fragile to effectively move to a location for completion, the transformed resources remain stationary while the transforming resources (staff, supplies, and equipment, etc.) are brought to the site where the product will be assembled.
Organizing for Innovation
Authors: Conway Steve
Published: January 2015

A key challenge for many organizations is the design and adoption of a mode of organizing that encourages innovation and creativity, allows flexibility and agility to respond in a timely manner to changes in the environment, and facilitates integration and coordination both internally, between functions and divisions, and externally, with users, suppliers, and universities, for example. The findings of studies since the 1960s provide us with a great deal of guidance as to the nature of the modes of organizing that can either encourage or hinder innovation and creativity within organizations and teams. What emerges from these insights is the importance and interrelatedness of leadership, organizational structure and culture, and the innovation process itself, to the successful management of innovation. These themes are explored.
Modular Bill
Authors: Danese Pamela
Published: January 2015

A modular bill is a planning bill that groups subassemblies and parts based on whether they are unique to a specific product option or common to all product configurations. Thus, the generation of the modular bills implies the identification of the product options and the grouping of the product components related to each individual product option. Moreover, the components common to all product configurations are grouped in a “common item” modular bill. When all components have been grouped, it is possible to associate a code with each group of components. The resultant modular bills can then be used to build the Super Bill.
Healthcare Operations Management
Authors: Roehrich Jens
Published: January 2015

The healthcare sector is characterized by ever changing complex relationships between patients, physicians, hospitals, insurers, employers, communities, and governments. A myriad of factors including the emergence of intense, dynamic competition and consolidation, increasing expectations of demanding, sophisticated consumers, and decreasing funding and utilization have generated an increasingly challenging healthcare environment. Governments around the world experiencing tremendous pressure to not only control the escalating costs while at the time trying to improve the quality and securing access to health services. There is a strong resonance between the need for dealing with the issue of improving the efficiency and effectiveness of the healthcare delivery process and the ability of operations management (
OM
) concepts to mitigate the situation. Key
OM
themes such as capacity management, process flow, design and layout, quality management, lean principles, and supply chain management are discussed.
Supply Chain Alignment
Authors: Cousins Paul , Matthews Lee
Published: January 2015

Supply chain alignment concerns the fit between an organization's supply strategy and its overall corporate and business strategies and policies.
Supply Network Information Systems
Authors: Howard Mickey , Romano Pietro
Published: January 2015

Supply network information systems, also known as interorganizational information systems (IOIS) or Inter‐organizational systems (IOS), are systems based on information technologies that cross organizational boundaries. The introduction of the Internet and subsequent widespread use of web‐enabled computers from around 2000 onwards, means that it is now common practice for buyers and suppliers to exchange information using systems spanning more than a single organization. As part of a supply network strategy, IOS continue to proliferate as companies become aware of the potential of these systems to affect inter‐organizational interactions in terms of economic efficiency and strategic conduct (Bakos, 1991). For example, inter‐organizational systems enable firms to participate in electronic markets, offering considerable benefits in terms of improving transaction efficiency (e.g., elimination of paper‐based systems), eliminating uncertainty, and competing in electronic bids for new business (Gadde and Hakansson, 2001). At the ultimate level of integration, IOS enable all firms in the supply chain to be continuously supplied with information in real time.
Failure Analysis
Authors: Johnston Robert , Brandon‐Jones Alistair
Published: January 2015

Failure analysis is the activity of identifying the root cause of a failure in order to understand why the failure occurred and to take steps to prevent it from happening again.
Logistics
Authors: Croom Simon
Published: January 2015

Logistics is the management of material and information flows throughout a supply chain. Material flows include raw materials and components from suppliers into the organization and distribution of the physical outputs of the organization to customers. Information flows are required to plan, coordinate, and manage the movement of physical resources.
Supply Chain Management
Authors: Roden Sinéad , Croom Simon
Published: January 2015

Organizations do not exist in isolation – they rely on resources and capabilities that are provided by the wider network of suppliers, customers, partners, and other actors in their environment.
Overall Equipment Effectiveness
Authors: Brandon‐Jones Alistair , Chambers Stuart
Published: January 2015

The overall equipment effectiveness (OEE) measure is a method of judging the effectiveness of individual parts of the operation and incorporates the concept of capacity leakage.
Anchoring
Authors: Fellenz Martin R.
Published: January 2015

Anchoring is a cognitive bias that influences how individuals use initial cues and information in subsequent judgment and decision‐making. Anchoring effects arise because of insufficient anchor adjustment as well as priming effects and can be ameliorated by deliberate attempts to use conscious analysis and mindful engagement with judgment and decision‐making tasks.
Authentic Leadership
Authors: Coetsee Wilhelm J.
Published: January 2015

This article introduces and discusses different perspectives of authentic leadership. Despite the popularity of the concept, there are still diverse and competing theoretical perspectives. Themes such as high levels of self‐awareness, a clear understanding of values and convictions and a demonstration of those values in practice, are associated with authentic leadership.
Corporate Social Responsibility
Authors: Gao Yuhui , Wang Shuo
Published: January 2015

This article provides some general discussions on the issue of corporate social responsibility (CSR): (i) a few definitions of CSR, (ii) the discussion of corporate context in the CSR area, (iii) CSR‐related strategy, such as risk management, marketing management, and the stakeholder relationship management, and (iv) the outcomes of CSR, such as corporate reputation, corporate social performance (CSP), and corporate financial performance (CFP). In addition, practitioners and researchers devote considerable attention to CSR issues as well formulated CSR policies and practices help firms to enhance their environmental management, sustainable development capabilities, corporate reputations, and financial performance.
Work Engagement
Authors: Bakker Arnold B. , Schaufeli Wilmar B.
Published: January 2015

Work engagement is defined as a positive, fulfilling, work‐related state of mind that is characterized by vigor, dedication, and absorption. Engaged workers are full with energy (vigor), strongly involved in their work (dedication), and often fully concentrated and happily engrossed in their work activities (absorption). The most often used instrument to measure engagement is the Utrecht Work Engagement Scale (UWES), which has been validated across the world and shows good psychometric properties. The Job Demands–Resources model is one of the most often used models to explain engagement. Accordingly, job and personal resources are the most important predictors of engagement, and these resources become more salient and gain their motivational potential when employees are confronted with high job demands. The possible consequences of engagement are positive job‐related attitudes, health and well‐being, extra‐role behavior, and job performance. Organizations can increase employee work engagement by using particular HRM‐strategies, e.g., job redesign. Also, job rotation and changing jobs might result in higher engagement levels because it challenges employees, and stimulates learning and professional development. Employees may also actively change the content or design of their own jobs through ‘job crafting’ in order to stay engaged.
Engagement and Performance
Authors: Sparrow Paul
Published: January 2015

The article examines the assumptions made about performance within discussions about employee engagement. It argues that each model abd conceptualisation of engagement brings with it a set of implicit assumptions about this. However, these models differ. It is also unclear what causal direction should exists between engagement and organization performance. The job attitudes literature is used to consider the likely answer. Finally, questions are raised about the range of performance outcomes that engagement should be expected to impact.
Evidence‐Based Management
Authors: Rousseau Denise M. , Olivas‐Luján Miguel R.
Published: January 2015

Evidence‐based management (EBM) is the use of the best available evidence to improve the quality of managerial decision making. It comprises four fundamental activities that can be applied to the everyday exercise of management judgment and decision‐making: (i) use of the best available scientific findings; (ii) gathering of and attending to organizational facts, indicators, and metrics in a systematic manner to increase their reliability and usefulness; (iii) on going practice of mindful, reflective judgment, and use of decision aids to reduce bias and improve decision quality; and (iv) consideration of ethical issues including the short‐ and long‐term impact of decisions on stakeholders. It reflects a broader trend in professions including medicine, education, public administration, and so on for evidence‐based practice; that is, the increased and more effective use of scientific findings in practice‐related decisions. EBM builds on the body of management and social science research to make more systematic decisions that incorporate the best available organizational and scientific evidence.
Individualism–Collectivism
Authors: Ramamoorthy Nagarajan
Published: January 2015

During the past three decades, interest in national cultural values and how these values impact the effectiveness of managerial practices has gained prominence. In this respect, the cultural level variable of individualism–collectivism (IC) has been researched extensively. Research on
IC
has treated
IC
as a dichotomous cultural level variable to study its influences on management practices such as nature of employment relationship, job design and teamwork, recruitment and selection practices, employee training and development, performance appraisal and feedback, organizational reward systems, career management, employee tenure, and other work‐related values such as job satisfaction, organizational commitment, and organizational citizenship behaviors. In addition, research on
IC
has also treated it as an individual difference variable and has examined its impact on employee work values and attitudes. In this article, the nature of
IC
and how this important concept has implications for managerial practices in the areas of job design, recruitment and selection employee training and development, performance appraisal, organizational reward systems, and career management practices is highlighted.
Intuition
Authors: Hodgkinson Gerard P. , Sadler‐Smith Eugene
Published: January 2015

This article outlines the principal advances in the scientific study of intuition that have a bearing on organizational behavior and related subfields of the management and organization sciences. Following major developments in the social neurosciences, personality, and individual differences, especially dual‐process conceptions of human cognition, the notion of intuition has moved from the fringes of academic respectability to the center ground in the analysis of organizational decision processes.
Lean Systems
Authors: Cullinane Sarah‐Jane
Published: January 2015

Lean systems are now regarded as a culture, which incorporates technical tools and management philosophies that are oriented toward the incorporation of value and waste elimination into the work process. This article outlines the evolution of the term “lean” and presents recent operationalization of lean manufacturing from both a technical and human perspective. Findings of research which examine the employee implications of lean manufacturing are also outlined.
Environmentally Sustainable Work Behavior
Authors: Davis Matthew C. , Challenger Rose
Published: January 2015

Promoting environmentally sustainable work behavior has rapidly increased as an area of interest in recent years for Organisational Behavior (OB) scholars. This article summarizes how the field has emerged from the broader sustainability agenda, describes the most influential theories and discusses the behavioral techniques employed in intervention studies. Major challenges and opportunities for research into environmentally sustainable work behavior are identified in particular, the need to integrate the diverse literature and utilize common methods and measures to aid theoretical advancement.
Prosocial Motivation
Authors: Cardador Maria T. , Franz Gentz
Published: January 2015

This entry first summarizes the psychological research on prosocial motivation in general and describes what is known about prosocial motivation within work settings. With respect to the research on prosocial motivation in general, we describe trait and state forms of prosocial motivation and highlight their individual‐ and group‐level correlates. With respect to the research on prosocial motivation in work settings, we describe what is known about the levels of workplace prosocial motivation, highlight the individual, job, leader, and organizational factors that contribute to prosocial motivation in the workplace, and summarize outcomes associated prosocial motivation in work settings.
Reemployment
Authors: Trif Aurora
Published: January 2015

Reemployment refers to obtaining a job after losing a paid employment position. Reemployment encompasses reinstatement and reengagement with a former employer as well as getting a new job with another employer. The process of transition from unemployment to reemployment is often very challenging. The main aspects that affect the success of reemployment can be categorised in three sets of interrelated factors. First, the personal aspects that contribute to reemployment success are the job seeker's human capital (i.e., having job‐related knowledge, skills and abilities), social capital (i.e., having a large social network of friends) and personality traits (i.e., extroversion and self‐efficacy). Age, racial, ethnic and gender discrimination may limit the reemployment success. Second, an intense job search process using a diversity of formal and informal sources of job information is associated with faster reemployment. Finally, situational aspects, such as the availability of jobs in the labour market as well as accessibility to outplacement(s) programmes and job (re)training affect the success of reemployment.
Relational Coordination
Authors: Gittell Jody Hoffer
Published: January 2015

Relational coordination is a theory of coordination that makes visible the relational process underlying the technical process, arguing that coordination is not only the management of interdependence between tasks but also the management of interdependence between the people who perform those tasks. First, relational coordination theory starts by conceptualizing coordination as occurring through a network of relational and communication ties among participants in a work process, where a work process is a set of interdependent tasks that transforms inputs into outcomes of value to the organization. Second, this theory identifies three distinctive dimensions of relationships – shared goals, shared knowledge, and mutual respect – that together are argued to underlie the effective coordination of work. Third, these dimensions are conceived as existing between work roles rather than between individual participants. Fourth, the theory explains how relational forms of coordination influence quality and efficiency outcomes, and how this influence is weaker or stronger depending on the nature of the work. Fifth and finally, the theory explains how formal organizational structures can be designed to support relational forms of coordination, rather than suggesting that formal structures are necessarily substitutes or impediments to relational coordination.
Corporate Social Performance
Authors: Wood Donna J.
Published: January 2015

Corporate social performance is a construct that encompasses principles for and processes by which business organizations interact with their stakeholders, as well as the outcomes and impacts of these interactions. The term constitutes a broad view of corporate responsibility, instead of a narrow view focused on owner wealth.