Operations Management Of KFC Australia †MyAssignmenthelp.com

Question: Discuss about the Operations Management Of KFC Australia. Answer: Introduction In any business organisationoperations management deals with the functions by which the company runs the business on a daily basis. Creating efficiency among the employees to improve the process of daily operations is the primary role of the operations management department. This is essential as the people working in the organisation who perform the daily tasks should be monitored and managed in order to make sure that their efforts are providing the organisation a way to achieve the objectives.Operationsmanagement is responsible for using the resources that are available at the disposal of the company and generate products and services. The approach attempts to balance the costs with revenue to achieve the highest net operating profit of the company.Supply chain and logistic play an important role in the daily operations of the business as inventory of the business will ensure the process of output (Jacobs et al. 2013).Inventory management through supply chain is an important functi on of the operations management, which is achieved with the help of analysis of the local and international trends, requirements of the customers and the available resources for production.The internal resources of the organisation directly impact the quality of the product and services as well as the process by which the company can improve the operations of the business. Operations management can be described as the portion where business process, finance and technology meet (Jacobs et al. 2013). In order to undertake the analysis of this assignment the organisation that has been taken to study is KFC Australia. Overview of the company Kentucky fried chicken or KFC is an American multinational fast food chain of restaurants which has gained popularity in the food and beverage industry due to the quality, availability and the strategic management decisions that is followed by the company. The organisation holds a significant position in the market and has stores in almost 20,000 locations internationally the company operates in approximately 123 countries (Kfc.com.au 2018). Yum! Brands is the parent organisation. Established in 1930, the company has come a long way in the business operations keeping up with the quality of the product and meeting the requirements of the consumers (Kfc.com.au 2018). Components of operations management in KFC Operations management plays a very important role in a business model like KFC, in order to ensure an efficient performance the company employs and integrates the operation process. With the help of constant management control and co-ordination operations the company drives to achieve the objectives. Product evaluation, product distribution, advertising and promotion, sales and service and product development are some of the activities of the operations management in the company (Davis et al. 2018). The objective of the operations management of the company is to improve balanced food choices for the organisation is committed to reducing sodium and sugar as well as trans-saturated fats to less than 0.5% without compromising on taste or quality of the products (Brown and Bessant 2013). The company is driven by the quality of the products, timeliness of the commitment and requirements of the customers and in order to deliver all of this operations management plays an important role the components of operations management in the organisation are as follows: Procurement process To deal with the changing and diverse menu that the company offers the raw materials are essential part of the operations process. The raw materials that the company uses can be divided in to two sections edible raw materials and non-edible raw materials. Furthermore, this can be divided into simpler sections in edible raw material section the company has dry items and wet items. The company has its own warehouse in the region of operation, in order to keep the materials fresh. In the warehouse the perishable items are kept in order to ensure that there is continuous supplies of resources for the branch to operate. These include the burger bun, chicken, spice mix, vegetables, oil among others (Chen et al. 2015). The non-perishable material that is used is mostly for packing purposes. The materials are gathered from the vendors who are third parties and then these are stocked in the warehouse. From the warehouse these materials are sent to the branches as per the order that has been placed by the manager based on the forecast of the demand of the items. This process is ideally done thrice a week and the transportation and the management is looked after by the employees of KFC. The warehouses of KFC are placed according to the region of operation in Australia so that the processes of delivery to the branches are quick in order to retain the freshness and the quality of the product (Mok et al. 2013).The company follows a DRP approach which enables them to control the inventory fluctuations and also determine the time-phased inventory necessities. Some of the prerequisites of being the supplier of the core ingredient of the menu chicken are that the supplier has to be a member of the Australian Chicken Meat Federation and has to diligently obey the Model Code of Practice for the Welfare of Animals, Domestic Poultry(Csr.kfc.com.au 2018). The company ensures that 85 percent of the raw materials that are used in the operations of the output of the products and services are sourced from Australia. Inghams, Steggles and Golden Farms are some of the key suppliers in the region. 97 percent of the chicken that is used by the restaurants are non-frozen and are fresh which helps in retaining the quality of the product (Csr.kfc.com.au 2018). The flour, burger buns and tortillas is also supplied by local vendors such as George Weston Foods, Manildra and Allied Mills (Csr.kfc.com.au 2018). The potato that is used is the process is supplied from Tasmania and Victoria. On the other hand, lettuce and tomatoes are sourced from the east and west coasts of the country. The organisation states that every week the company uses around 32 tonnes of lettuce, 16 tonnes of tomatoes, 70 tonnes of fresh burger buns and 16 tonnes of fresh dinner rolls in the restaurants throughout Australia (Csr.kfc.com.au 2018). Product and service There are a number of employees associated with one branch of KFC restaurant. Every branch has a manager and there are people who are responsible for taking the orders making the orders, serving the orders and dealing with the issues of the customers. The operation of a branch in Australia is based on the menu that is being served in the restaurant. The manager of the branch is responsible for coordinating with the distribution and the warehouse department. The finance and the management of each branch is also dealt by the manager (Brandenburg et al. 2014). Customer service The role of operations management in the company in the customer service sector is to enhance the process and develop the operations as is possible with the given resources. Maintaining the quality of the product the service that is offered has to be consistently good in order to achieve the objective of the business. The operations management also analyses the demand trend of the products and innovates the menu accordingly. The company invests in training the employees to improve their skills and speed. The operations management also develops innovative ideas every year 40 on average. The above stated components are some of the most important aspects of the business strategic management decisions and policies of the company are built on the basis of these operations. Decision making in operations The DRP (Distribution resource planning)processes have some of the following aspects: the main demand planning, inventory files, supply the resource files; procurement plans, distribution plans (Hoch and Dulebohn 2013). Planning: in order to meet the targets and achieve the objects of the company the management has to look out for scope of development and changes, this requires planning. In KFC operations planning play an important role in strategically locating a place to build a restaurant, apart from that planning of the course of the operation for a week in case there is pressure and excessive demand. The company uses Total quality management approaches in the daily operations of the business to ensure the best quality and best service. Following the principle of continual improvement recommended by Schonberger planning is essential in every step of operations from distribution to procurement to customer service among others. Another principle of operation management is focus, it is one of the major aspects in the planning process, and the company has to align the objectives along with the operations process so that the effort is concentrated and organized in a streamline. KFC management ensures that every operational function of the organisation is structured and is executedefficiently (Schonberger and Brown 2017). Scheduling: The process of distribution, procurement and the timeliness of the service to the customers are all based on the way the process is scheduled. There should be provisions made by the company in case there is an overflow of work to maintain the timeliness of the process. Distribution of the raw material is something that is scheduled by the branch managers according to the requirement of branch. The management of the company will ensure that there is a continuous flow of resources this brings to the principle of organisation of the resources which will help in scheduling the operations in an effective manner (Hoch and Dulebohn 2013). Inventory management:The inventories of the company are discussed above.The restaurant follows a First In First Out approach to manage the resources and the inventories as the company deals with the perishable items. This is the part of the Distribution resource planning approach that the company implements in order to ensure the process of Distribution and procurement are effectively implemented. The principles that are followed in this process are forecasts of the demand, the restaurant reports to branch distribution center on the basis of the demand forecasts, the distribution center procure the items from various suppliers in Australia that are mentioned above (Hoch and Dulebohn 2013). The role of operations management in the strategic management Strategic management is the process by which a business organisation forms the policies and the decisions of the business. Some of the basic functions of strategic management of a business is to formulate the goals and objectives of the organisation based on the business as well as the operations. This further helps in formulating the policies and decisions of the business. it is the way in which an organization manages the business organisation as well as the daily operations of the business. The responsibility of operations management is to effectively perform in order to reach the objectives that are created by the strategic management process. Strategic management ensures that every decision that the management takes is based on a rational reasoning and is backed up by sufficient data. Improvement of the efficiency, development of the effectiveness and increasing the flexibility of the operations are the major objective of the operations management of KFC. The foundation of strategic management can be described in the following functions: It helps in defining the business by documenting the vision and mission statements as well as states the values and principles The definition of the organisation is followed by the measurable objectives which is formulated by the values and principles of the company Organizing a plan in order to achieve the objectives with the help of marketing, administrative, financial as well as operational strategies Implementation of the strategies Evaluation of the impact of the strategies in achieving the objectives This indicates the role of operations management in strategic management, KFC is a multinational organisation that has set target market to meet. The company uses strategies like differentiation in order to achieve an advantage over the competitors any of the strategy the company formulates have to be back up by a strong operational function base. (Hoch and Dulebohn 2013). Conclusion It can be concluded from the above discussion that KFC Australia is very well structured in terms of its supply chain which includes distribution, procurement customer service. The company ensures that most of the products that are used as raw materials are sourced from Australia. The organisation is also a large contributor towards employment in the area of location in terms of suppliers, restaurant workers, branch managers, warehouse keepers etc. The operations management of the company ensures, quality, timeliness and loyalty among the customers. References: Brandenburg, M., Govindan, K., Sarkis, J. and Seuring, S., 2014. Quantitative models for sustainable supply chain management: Developments and directions. 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