Reference no: EM13107701

1. What factors enter into the choice of a value for the smoothing constant in exponential smoothing?

2. Describe at least 3 competitive advantages of concurrent engineering?

3. A new order has come into your department. The capability of the process used for this type of work will enable virtually all of the output to be well within the specifications for your product.

a. What benefits might be derived from this situation?

b. What alternatives might be considered by the manager?

4. What are the four main reasons for holding inventory?

5. To be more competitive, many fast-food chains began to expand their menus to include a wider range of foods. Although contributing to competitiveness, this has added to the complexity of operations, including inventory management. Specifically,provide at least 2 different ways this expansion of menu offerings will most likely create problems for inventory management?

6. In operations management, as in life, a balanced approach is often the best policy. One of the best examples of the benefits of this in operations management is the "lean approach". Explain at least four basic factors that must be in place in order to achieve a "balanced lean system"

7.Provide at least 3 different factors when comparing the concept of viewing a firm's suppliers as adversaries with viewing them as partners.

8.Why might a probabilistic estimate of the project completion time base solely on the variance of the critical path be misleading? Under what circumstances would it be acceptable?