Project 3: OLC – The Future at Biotech Health and Life Products, Inc. (Week 8)

Purpose 

The third assignment covers the last three functions of the P-O-L-C, Organizing, Leading and Controlling.  Students will look at the production floor through the lens of the three elements of the P-O-L-C and write a report to the Strategic Planning Committee.

Skill Building:

You are also completing this project to help you develop skills related to critical thinking, writing a report, and assessing and applying elements of the P-O-L-C management framework. 

Skills:  Critical Thinking, Report Writing, 

Outcome Met by Completing This Assignment

• Integrate management principles into management practices

• organize human, physical, and financial resources for the effective and efficient attainment of organizational goals

• develop measures and assess outcomes against plans and standards to improve organizational effectiveness

• Identify the essential characteristics of decision making and indicate the range and types of decisions a manager makes

Instructions:

 Step 1:  Read the Case Scenario

The Boomer Bangs projects presented to the Strategic Planning Committee were accepted for production.  Roll out by the company is scheduled for January of 2019.  The first product scheduled for production is a pill that helps reduce blood sugar levels.  Market studies predict that this pill likely will be the most successful of the three products, which is why it is the first product Biotech has selected for roll out.

Upper management decided that Louis Monte of the Los Lunas, New Mexico Branch Production Team would lead this project.  The plan is for Louis to serve, as a model for organizing that will be copied by the rest of the branches so that roll out can be concurrent.  Louis knows that his production floor is set up exactly like the rest of the plants. Louis has put some thought into the fact that the new pill production will require additional production lines requiring changes to the existing set up.  Louis believes space could be a problem.  Louis estimates he will need 200 sq. ft. for the additional line set up.  In addition, he will need two conveyor belts.  Louis knows that relocation of some of the machinery or line set up is needed because the production of pills has to be protected from direct sunlight and stored at low temperatures.

Louis has concluded that there is a need for additional personnel – one pharmaceutically trained pill machine operator for the day shift and two operators for the night shift.  Trained line workers cost $3 more per hour than untrained line-workers.   Louis also knows that these new workers will need supervising.  He may have to restructure the floor staff.

Louis is expecting a shipment from Madras, India of the primary pill ingredients bitt goud, spreading hogweed, Chinaberry (mostly found in India) and burra gokhru.   Lately, sourcing of the Chinaberry has been a little difficult for Louis.  He suspects the cost of production will increase the estimated R&D cost by $0.075 per pill.   Additional labor costs and costs of the rare Indian ingredients places the overall production cost of one bottle of 60- pills at $5.65, which includes packaging. 

Louis acknowledges that there are issues with the current organization structure is problematic for production and is considering making a proposal for the plants to centralize rather than the current decentralized structure.

Biotech is known for telling workers that it want to keep people in the Biotech family.  The company encourages employees to get additional training and pays for college tuition for those who want to advance their career opportunities within the company.

During the course of production, older line staffers became aware that the pharmaceutically trained line workers made $3.00 more per hour than they did.  The workers were unhappy as they felt that it was unfair that Biotech hired from outside rather than provide training to existing workers who would want to take over the jobs and earn a higher salary.  An obvious concern began to surface among the workers.  Several workers questioned whether Biotech was being truthful with them and wondered whether the Company wanted workers to advance in the company.  Morale of plant workers began to suffer. 

One floor supervisor told Louis that one of his workers refused to help develop a new process that would increase the speed of moving the pallets on the new floor scheme.  He said, “Why should I help Biotech make more money if I don’t get any of the money?”  Louis knows that this concern must be addressed and morale needs improved.  Louis also knows that only HR in headquarters can make decisions regarding benefits so he cannot offer pay raises.  Louis wondered what he could do to motivate workers and build trust in the production department.

The chart below displays the results of the first year’s production of the new pill, Boomer 1.  The table consists of data supplied by the production department managers of the Biotech branches making the pill.   The data was collected for controlling production output.  Vice President of Production, Atticus Finch will use the data to identify areas of improvement, change, or to provide kudos for the success of the processes used by the production departments in the production of Boomer 1. 

The chart describes the standard goal (identified as standard) set by the department and the results of each branch.  A comparison of the standard to the results allows the reader to form conclusions about the success or failure of the Production Department to meet the goals envisioned by the company.  It also allows the reader to recognize patterns from the data so conclusions can be drawn as to the relationship between elements (e.g. cost expended vs time expended; those who spent more time had a higher cost).

Specifications Standard Wittlich Detroit Los Lunas Sao Paulo Melbourne

Cost per 60 pill bottle 5.65 4.97 5.87 5.65 5.52 4.59

Time 7.36 6.89 7.46 7.31 7.32 7.70

Quality Control Problem Ratio (per 500 bottles) 1 1.75 2 3.5 4.75 1.52

Shipping Problems/Damage (per 10,000 bottles) 1.0 1.51 0.222 1.133 1.178 0.149

Total Number of bottles Produced per year 450,000 600,000 500,000 650,000 401,000 750,000

Step 2:  Company Profile

Use the Biotech Company Profile in completing this assignment.

Step 3:  Write the Introduction

The introductory paragraph is the first paragraph of the paper but is sometimes written after writing the body of the paper (Questions students responded to above).  View this website to learn how to write an introductory paragraph:  

http://www.writing.ucsb.edu/faculty/donelan/intro.html

Step 4:  Organizing

• Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of a centralization versus decentralization organizational structure. Use the course material to support your reasoning.

• Discuss whether Louis should recommend moving to a centralized organizational structure.  Explain why using the course material to support your reasoning.

Step 5:  Leading

• Identify and discuss the reason for the morale problem using the course material to support your reasoning.

• If there is no money in the budget to spend on formal training or methods of motivation, explain what Louis can do to motivate existing employees that would build morale while ensuring production levels stay on track or improve.  Support your reasoning using the course material

• How will moving to a centralized organizational structure affect Louis’ ability to motivate employees?  Support your reasoning using the course material.

Step 6:  Controlling

Compare the standard specifications data set with the results from each of the results for the five branches. 

• Interpret the results with detailed explanations for problems areas as well as positive areas.

• Based on the results, should Atticus Finch take corrective action?  Provide an explanation supporting the reasoning with the course material.

• What results present potential concern for the long-term future of the project and company?

Step 7:  Report Requirements & Format

You will write the report using Times New Roman, 12” font, single-spaced with double-spaces between paragraphs and headings.  The paper should be approximately three pages excluding the title page and reference page.  It is important to write clearly and concisely.

 Use the following Report Format. 

• Introduction (the introduction does not have a heading)

• Organizing

• Advantages of a centralized organizational structure

• Disadvantages of a centralized organizational structure

• Advantages of a decentralized organizational structure

• Disadvantages of a decentralized organizational structure

• Louis’ recommendation

• Leading

• Morale problem

• Motivation

• Impact of centralized organization on motivating

• Controlling

• Results of Data

• Corrective Action

• Potential Concerns

The following requirements apply to the Report:

• Use the grading rubric while completing the project to ensure all requirements are met that will lead to the highest possible grade. 

• Third person writing is required.  Third person means that there are no words such as “I, me, my, we, or us” (first person writing), nor is there use of “you or your” (second person writing).  

• Contractions are not used in business writing, so do not use them. 

• You are expected to use the facts from the case scenario paired with the weekly courses material to develop the analysis and support the reasoning.  No more than two (2) external resources can be used in completing the assignment.  You are expected to use a wide array of course material.

• Use direct quotation marks for primary sources.  For all other source material used in the analysis, you will not use direct quotation marks but will instead paraphrase.  What this means is that you will put the ideas of an author or article into your own words rather than lifting directly from a source document.  You may not use more than four consecutive words from a source document, as doing so would require direct quotation marks.  This requirement include facts from the case scenario.  Changing words from a passage does not exclude the passage from having quotation marks. 

• Use in-text citations and provide a reference list that contains the reference associated with each in-text citation.

• You may not use books in completing this project.

• Provide the page or paragraph number in every in-text citation presented. 

Step 8:  Complete the Report

You will write a report addressed to Mr. Atticus Finch, Vice-President of Production.  In answering the elements of organizing, leading and controlling, pay particular attention to your audience, Mr. Finch.  The report is informational only so you are not making recommendation but providing information to Mr. Finch.  It is necessary to explain concepts and issues supporting the reasoning.

USE THESE LINKS

https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/agile-project-management.htm

https://www.managementstudyguide.com/introduction-to-agile-business.htm

https://www.managementstudyguide.com/relationship-planning-controlling.htm

3 Major Relationships between Planning and Controlling Functions of Management

https://courses.lumenlearning.com/boundless-management/chapter/internal-analysis-inputs-to-strategy/  (you can use the search button on Lumen, to find more materials)

ONLY TWO EXTERNAL SOURCES ARE ALLOWED