Saturday, February 29, 2020

Case study Of Fairview Distribution Centre

Supply Chain and Logistics Management forms one of the most integral parts of any business organization whereby the company manages its resources and sees to it that all the resources are utilized effectively and the organization incurs the minimum amount of cost. In the given report, such a case relating to the Fairview School Board has been presented (Christopher, 2016).   The company presently holds a distribution center whereby it distributes all the stationery to the different organizations from one center. This has led to extremely high costs for the company and hence, it has been advised to give away the distribution centre and manage on its own. The given case explores all available ideas and then roots for one of them. At the distribution center, an area of 30000 square foot was used which has to purposes. Various school`s inventories were kept at the warehouse for the supply given to the schools. This stock included office supplies, papers and other stationery items. Such a large stock was kept in order to see to it that the bulk purchases could be made which would lead to decreased costs and also balance the lead time in case of deliveries (Islam et al., 2013). The inventory levels fluctuated to a great extent throughout the year. At the warehouse, various equipment of the board house was also kept which consisted of special teaching supplies and could be loaned by the various schools on different time period basis (Wang et al., 2016). The delivery system of the board was also taken care of by the authorities in the distribution centre which comprised of an interdepartmental mail, supplies and other educational services. The deliveries were made to various schools and offices as and when required . According to Jim Knox, that the board had forecasted certain deficits and thus, certain adjustments had to be made to various units in order to overcome the deficit problem. He suggested that along with giving away early retirement to various staffs and cuts, the distribution centre could be done away with (Mangan, Lalwani & Lalwani, 2016). The schools should be allowed to handle their own supplies and the center could be sold away along with selling the vehicles owned. The reason why closing the distribution centre was taken in as a more attractive than cutting down other program budgets was because the schools could manage their supplies on their own. According to him salaries of around $500000 would be saved if the distribution centre was given away. Along with the same rent could also be saved. The alternative option to the given scenarios cold is as follows: The distribution centre is a huge warehouse where all the equipment fit in adequately. Hence, due to this the area of the distribution centre could be reduced considerably and the entire excess inventory could somehow be reduced by keeping lower levels of stock (Stadtler, 2015).When the case comes up of the discounts which would be received then, the purchase of stocks can be made at once but the delivery can be made later. Adding to this, the staff could work on rotational basis and the teachers could also contribute some of their help in order to manage the supplies. Various other adjustments could be made which would help in altering the problem of the budget and even not hamper the distribution system aspect. The most suitable scenario in the given situation would be taking up the alternative path. This given path would follow the `avoidance of wastage idea` an idea similar to that of the Kaizen Distribution, where all unnecessary costs and wastes would be avoided in order to see to it that the distribution centre does not incur the huge amount of costs that it is incurring at the moment (Jacobs, Chase & Lummus, 2014). The alternative plan has been elaborated in detail: In terms of ethicality, the stakeholder’s need also needs to be considered while any particular decision is being made. When the distribution centre would have been given away, it would have caused inconvenience to various stakeholders. These stakeholders include various stakeholders like teachers, staff, the personnel working at the centre, and the maintenance staff. The staff has been working in the distribution centre since a very long time and therefore, it is extremely important that the people who are working there are also considered before any rash decision is made. Hence, it can be clearly stated that the benefits of following this idea is much more than the costs which are incurred. This also serves to be a middle path and helps in removal of any consequences for the board as well as the stakeholders involved in the board Therefore, it can be stated that there were two clear alternatives available to the company which was giving away the distribution board or keeping it. The third was an additional alternative which would have helped the board to reduce certain costs. All the ideas were well explained and then the case for an alternative idea was built which was reducing excess wastage and keeping the distribution center but decreasing it in size and operations. The reduced operations will not only help in saving the costs but also help in saving the interests of the various stakeholders involved. Christopher, M. (2016).  Logistics & supply chain management. Pearson UK. Coyle, J. J., Langley, C. J., Novack, R. A., & Gibson, B. (2016).  Supply chain management: a logistics perspective. Nelson Education. Islam, D. M. Z., Meier, J. F., Aditjandra, P. T., Zunder, T. H., & Pace, G. (2013). Logistics and supply chain management.  Research in Transportation Economics,  41(1), 3-16. Jacobs, F. R., Chase, R. B., & Lummus, R. R. (2014).  Operations and supply chain management  (pp. 533-535). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill/Irwin. Mentzer, J. T., DeWitt, W., Keebler, J. S., Min, S., Nix, N. W., Smith, C. D., & Zacharia, Z. G. (2013). Defining supply chain management.  Journal of Business logistics,  22(2), 1-25. Mangan, J., Lalwani, C., & Lalwani, C. L. (2016).  Global logistics and supply chain management. John Wiley & Sons. Rushton, A., Croucher, P., & Baker, P. (2014).  The handbook of logistics and distribution management: Understanding the supply chain. Kogan Page Publishers. Stadtler, H. (2015). Supply chain management: An overview. In  Supply chain management and advanced planning  (pp. 3-28). Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. Simchi-Levi, D., Simchi-Levi, E., & Kaminsky, P. (2016).  Designing and managing the supply chain: Concepts, strategies, and cases. New York: McGraw-Hill. Wang, G., Gunasekaran, A., Ngai, E. W., & Papadopoulos, T. (2016). Big data analytics in logistics and supply chain management: Certain investigations for research and applications.  International Journal of Production Economics,  176, 98-110.

Thursday, February 13, 2020

Opportunity Analysis of New Business Venture 03068 Essay

Opportunity Analysis of New Business Venture 03068 - Essay Example Where there are many competitors also, it should be able to present the idea of the business venture in a way that uniquely identifies untapped opportunities on the market (Oladeji, 2008). This is the basis for the report, where a new business venture is being critiqued for its viability as an innovative business idea. This is being done with the opportunity analysis approach where a feasibility study is being performed in the areas of self-analysis, venture description, market research, industrial analysis, technical feasibility, financial feasibility, scenario versions, and scalability analysis (Mambula, 2002). Once these areas are analysed, it will be able to conclude on the feasibility of the business idea and how innovative it is to succeed on the saturated market. The entrepreneur is considered an important authority and stakeholder for the introduction of any new business idea that becomes the basis of a venture creation. This is because the ideologies, motivation, vision, and inspiration of doing business are mostly dependent on the entrepreneur and what he or she brings onboard the new venture (Schaper, 2002). What is more, there are some core entrepreneurial qualities and competences that have been considered critical for the overall management of the venture (McMillan & Naughton, 2012). Based on the entrepreneurial behaviour theory, there are three major human capital requirements that may be assessed from the entrepreneur leading the idea of starting the new venture. These are general human capital, entrepreneurship specific human capital, and venture specific human capital (World Bank, 2010). The general human capital includes such qualities and requirements as education, managerial human capital, capabilities, and demographic control variables (Charles, 2002). The entrepreneurship specific human capital also includes entrepreneurial

Saturday, February 1, 2020

Art History Project Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Art History Project - Research Paper Example Additionally, the participation in domestic and community affairs helped women to influence the political system at the time. There was a limitation on women to express their political views against their husbands. Moreover, women could not publicly condemn the established political order in the era. The women that went against the established norms in the society risked their lives through death. In this period, there was limitation to women that wanted to venture in art. Most of the women lacked access to sophisticated training required to be an accomplished artist (NMWA 1). The period only saw few successful women artists. Such women were children, nieces, or spouses of the successful male artist in the period (NMWA 1). The family connections helped them to acquire skills and network to establish their careers. On the other hand, the country of origin of women conferred them with some advantage. Those that came from Northern Europe had some advantage as compared to their counterpa rts in the south. The Roman Catholic played a significant role in support of the artist in the period (NMWA 1). The church focused on devotional images that could only be possible through artistic skills and techniques. This significantly disadvantaged women as they were prohibited from getting such skills and techniques. In contrast, the Protestant north focus on art was based on activities and experiences of their daily lives (NMWA 1). As a result, women artists benefited as they produced still life and genre paintings that appealed to the patrons (NMWA 1). Despite these challenges, there were various successful and professional women artists in the period. Women for a long time have been defined by history. One of the periods that depicted the position of women in society was Baroque. The period lasted began in the last decade of 16th century and lasted up to 1750 (Schneider 1). The period was characterized by religious and political turmoil (Schneider 1). The religious and