Ops/gm571 Week 5

Throughout the class we have dealt with several countries that were to make specific parts for a key fob remote. Every country has different things they bring to the table and different cultural issues that have had to be dealt with. A process has been developed to get the parts to the consumer as quickly as possible. The company has recently added new dealerships that will all use the key fob remote with a projected sales of 150,000. Because of this increase in sales it is important that the company installs an improvement plan for their process that will help fill the increase demand for key fob remotes.

Table 1 shows the process flow chart from week 1 where the decision was made for which country was going to produce different parts of the remote.

Table 1:

The process for the decision was straight forward and left little room for error and delay. However, there is always room for improvement.

Week four assignments pointed out possible bottlenecks for the country producing the rolling transmitter which is Germany. It was determined that although it is not possible to know when a natural disaster is going to strike, it is important to have extra materials in stock. Table 2 is a flowchart for each country should they be faced with the bottleneck of a shortage of supplies.

Table 2:

Control limits are important to the process improvement plan because they will show you what might be causing the variations or if the chart is within range. Below is an example chart from Syque Quality, 2011.

Confidence intervals give an estimated range of values that may include an unknown population parameter, an estimated range calculated from a given set of sample data (confidence intervals, 2012). Based on data and forecasting, the control limits were established with a 95% confidence interval. Table 3 shows the forecast for seven periods based on forecasted demand.

Table 3:

Graph 1: control limits

Graph 2: forecast

Period 1 2 3 4 5 6 7

Demand 150 153 156 159 162 165 168

Forecast 171

Graph 3: Forecasted demand

Global factors such as natural disasters, holidays, labor laws, etc will always affect working internationally. It is something that has to be worked with and