Module 1

Module 1: Business competitiveness and processes (6 hours)

1. Strategic positioning & operational effectiveness
2. Processes & process types
3. Process view of organizations
4. Process performance measures
5. Process competencies

Module 2

Module 2: Processes flow measures (8 hours)

1. Process flows & measures
2. Little’s law: Time, rate & inventory
3. Various flows in processes: time, customer, material, cash & service
4. Assessing financial flows using financial statements
5. Assessing operations performance using financial information

Module 3

Module 3: Process flow times & variability (8 hours)

1. Flow time measurement
2. Levers for managing flow times
3. Managing flow variability using safety inventory

Module 4

Module 4: Process flow rates and capacity analysis (8 hours)

1. Capacity & capacity measures
2. Inventory ordering decisions
3. Process Control & Capability

Course Description

Organizations achieve financial success when they provide products that meet customer expectations at a cost that is significantly lower than the value perceived by the customers. Organizations like Toyota and Walmart demonstrate that their success is closely linked to how their business processes are planned, designed, and executed. Understanding and managing processes enable organizations to align business functions with customer needs and help executives determine how to deploy, monitor, and measure company resources. When properly executed, process management has the ability to enhance efficiency and productivity, reduce costs, and minimize errors and risk – thereby optimizing results. Providing visibility into how well an organization is succeeding in meeting its goals, process management is becoming a mission-critical capability for businesses today. For students of business, particularly for those specializing in Operations, it is, therefore, worth learning how organizations understand and categorize the customer expectations that they seek to fulfil, what kind of metrics they use to monitor and manage their process performance, and how they structure their processes to deliver superior financial performance. This course helps students understand how managers can design and control processes in both manufacturing and service contexts and explore ways in which business processes can be improved to perform better using process drivers.

Course Outcomes& Learning levels

At the end of the course, the students will be able to:

1. Assess the strategic fit between the competitive priorities of a business and its process design (L4- Analyze).
2. Evaluate process flow measures (L5- Evaluate).
3. Analyze the process flows times (L5- Evaluate).
4. Assess process flow rates, and capacities (L5-Evaluate).

Evaluation Pattern

*Based on assignments / Tests / Quizzes / Case Studies / Projects / Term paper / Field visit report.

1. Managing business process flows; Principles of Operations Management, Second Edition, Anupindi, Ravi and Chopra, Sunil, Pearson.