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The marketing director of a fast-growing firm must make some decisions about the customer service department. The volume in the department has been rising steadily, eye doctors are waiting longer for orders to be filled, and morale in the department is slipping. With pressure on the firm to make a profit, the marketing director must carefully justify any request for additional people or equipment.

Spreadsheet supplement for case 681052.

Faced with growth exceeding 100% per year, James Davis, president of New Balance, must decide how to meet the need for additional capacity. Several factors contribute to a climate of extreme uncertainty. Several options are considered, ranging from a second shift to acquiring a plant in Ireland. Sufficient information is provided to allow an analysis of forecasted demand as well as the strategic financial and organizational implications of alternative courses of action.

Describes the situation faced by a young MBA with an economics background who is offered the opportunity to manage a high technology fiber optics business. Designed to facilitate exploring the skills and knowledge that the general manager of a technology-based firm needs to be effective.

Discusses the purchase and installation of automated cutting equipment in a medium-sized furniture factory. The equipment has so far failed to cut costs as expected and the management is attempting to discover what the problems are and what can be done to remedy them.

The process-product matrix can be used to explain company failures due to lack of coordination and focus on marketing and manufacturing functions. More importantly, however, it provides a framework for describing alternate business strategies. The matrix provides insight for planning product and process changes, coordinating marketing and manufacturing goals and functions, and avoiding internal problems brought about by evolving markets and technologies.

Focusing on the manufacturing process gives a new dimension to strategy. The "process life cycle," related but distinct from the product life cycle, facilitates the understanding of strategic options available. Most companies occupy a particular region on a natural, diagonal matrix of the stages of the product life cycle and the choices of production process for that product. A company may seek competitive advantage off the diagonal, but should understand the implications of each move.

SMIG, a division of G.D. Searle, was a fast growing high market-share company in the field of nuclear medical instruments. It manufactured two basically different product lines, one very successful and the other less so. Although marketing was separate for these product lines, manufacturing was not. As capacity is reached, the issue is how the company ought to expand and/or alter its manufacturing operations.

The structure and management of manufacturing should reinforce corporate priorities. The company's "manufacturing mission" is to help the company do what it wants to without wasting resources in lesser efforts. Any shift in corporate strategy usually requires changes in both the infrastructure and facilities of manufacturing. Approaches to the design of an appropriate manufacturing system range from a "product-focused" to a "process-focused" organization. While simplicity of organizational design is important, both can be allowed to operate in the same company if the operations are separated to avoid cross purposes. The proper choice between these organizational types smoothes a company's growth by lending stability to its operations.

To employ logistics as an effective competitive lever, management should adapt logistics programs to support ongoing corporate strategies in the short-term and factor logistics into the design of business operating strategies on a continuing long-term basis. Steps necessary for factoring logistics into strategy include the performance of a logistics strategy audit, possible logistics systems redesign, and the maintenance of procedures to ensure continued attention to logistics as an integral part of corporate strategy.

Presents the issues facing a high volume, high margin (but lightweight) medical products business. The company is trying to improve its inventory control to reduce inventory investment and improve service. The present multi-site inventory system is described and major alternatives for improving or replacing it are presented.

Outlines the components of Texas Instruments' low-cost digital watch. Focus is on getting the assembly line running smoothly and efficiently in order to meet production cost and delivery requirements.

Describes production task of meeting peak seasonal demands in a light manufacturing plant. Information is provided for evaluating the options of overtime, second shift, second production line, and inventory buildup.

Materials requirements planning (MRP) is a computer-based system of coordinating materials supply, demand, inventory, and production scheduling for manufacturing operations. In addition to the master production schedule 'drive file,' files are created for bill of materials, inventory status and the materials requirements planning package. The value of MRP depends on an operation's size and the efficiency of its current materials system. Its adaptability, however, promises new applications in other areas.

New political appointee with years of volunteer experience takes over highly responsible job in state government and is met with bureaucratic resistance.

Describes what a new political appointee with years of volunteer experience did in office.

Discusses a problem that confronted the appointee later--how to get a large, complex job accomplished without evident resources.

Describes how and what she did to accomplish the job.

Provides an introductory note to production processes and the use of flow diagram.

It is important for managers to realize that they cannot receive the benefits or cost reduction provided by a steep learning-curve projection and at the same time accomplish rapid rates of product innovation and improvement in product performance. Managers need to exercise care in choosing between the learning curve approach, which shows that manufacturing costs fall as volume rises, and the experience curve approach, which traces declines in the total costs of a product line over extended periods of time as a volume grows. When selecting a strategy, management investigates: the practical limit to volume/cost reduction, the pattern of changes in the organization which accompany progress along the learning curve, and the expected results when the practiced limits of cost reduction are reached.