Operations Strategy: An overview

Introduction

Operations Strategy is an extremely important and valuable tool which is mainly used in shaping long term vision, objectives and capabilities of the operation and its contribution to overall strategy. The main reason why it is important to make an appropriate strategy for the firm is because many companies who were performing well in their business operation are now facing so many problems which lead to lay off, downsizing and sometimes failure. So, to avoid these kinds of obstacles which many operational businesses are facing, a firm must adapt innovative operations strategy for their company.

Dresding Wilson, originally called Dresding Medical was founded by the Dr. Laura Dresding in 1991. The Company was mainly known for supplying medical equipment like cardiovascular and heart monitoring devices. After few years the company started selling their own products which was produced in their very own laboratory. The company’s main strategy was to make and sell innovative products in the market. The company was doing very well because they know how to use their ideas very well. In the past few years the company managed to establish three division are The Technology Development, Dresding Assurance and The Medical services. These popular divisions of the company had tend to manage their business but at a certain point.

Statement of the problem

Dresding Wilson Company had exerted extra effort in order to compete with its rivals. So in this case the Company came up with innovative ideas and plans which were considered best compare to its competitors products. In this way the company was performing well but in order to achieve success the Company expanded their business and divided themselves into three. Without having sufficient funds and few employees, the company was suffering a lot, because the company decided to split up into the three without having adequate knowledge of operating and managing large scale business in a very short period of time. Secondly, the Company expanded too fast, and hired too many staff for the production of newly designed technology which they failed to test some subcomponents of the system, especially in the areas that were new to them such as diagnostic software. Thirdly, they were unable to fulfill demands of the market in the given time which leads to bad image in the market. Unfortunately, in some amount of time the company managed to fulfill the demands of the market and regained its title of leading medical equipment manufacturer.

After having the sense of confidence and attitude towards business the Company again took the step to launch a new brand-building initiative which will emphasize the quality of its products in all major market called Dresding Assurance. Apart from the sales growth and distributing their products in the Asian market, The Company has also the fear of losing trust from their customers it is because they’ve changed themselves to provide wide range of medical products than concentrating on their main line of products which might be a big problem for the company. More than that, they’re using the same approach that was used in their Technology Development division.

On the other hand, The Company acquired Ryder Wilson Company which has its own medical management activity. According the Dresding, merging with Ryder Wilson was an asset rather than a liability but after some time The Company realized that merging with Ryder Wilson lead to some problems like, Ryder Wilson had created lots of publicity just at the time when outsourcing, monitoring and surveillance activities were all hot topic in hospital management. The Company found out that they are not only designing and installing systems, but also arranging leasing agreements and they are also providing agency staff and training programs with little or no experience. In this case they are not pleasing the customers by their service which was being provided by Ryder Wilson Company. Dresding Wilson Company was unaware of the risks behind acquiring the Ryder Wilson Company, Now they are challenge to deliver service and they are being forced to cut their costs of their medical equipment in order to compete with in-house and other clinical service companies.

Recommended Solutions

The Dresding Wilson Company has to follow specific kind of operational strategy which will completely define their long term goals. The Company has a clear goal at the beginning but when the Company started progressing, their goals are becoming more complex and their strategy of operating the business was slowly facing downwards after acquisition of Ryder Wilson Company because they were oblivious about the challenges that they are going to encounter after the acquisition. So, in order to overcome with this problem and to achieve their goal, the company has to improve its five long-term performance objectives i.e. quality, speed, dependability, flexibility and cost. Secondly, the company has to fulfill its operational resources so that they will have the knowledge to deliver their services on time. Thirdly, the Company should also concentrate in their performance objectives in order to attain high level of performance in the future. Lastly, The Company has to focus on their particular area where they know they are performing poor than the rest. In this case, it is clearly shown that they are poor in delivering services to customers because the staff member had little or no experience in performing that job. So, the first step will be they have to increase the performance level by increasing quality as the conformance with which the product or service is produced. If this level of performance are attained the company will surely be successful company in future and will have the ability to compete with other clinical service companies.

Conclusion

There are so many ways to accomplish operations strategy but sometimes many companies don’t know how to strategize their operating system of doing business. To deliver tangible and intangible products, every business has to follow different operating steps in order to produce it in an efficient and effective manner. So, it recommended that every business must have a powerful operation strategy to achieve long term goals. When I worked in Goodyear Philippines Inc. which was a Manufacturing Company I found out that they are following different operations strategy time-to-time because they want to produce innovative products which matches their customers’ expectations and also help them to compete with their competitors in the market. Overall, It was a great experience studying and learning in the class, I was extremely surprised when I came to know about the operation being performed to produce numerous kind cuisines for Singapore Airlines flights, and also the production process of Foxconn Company was very innovative and they are using very good operation strategy for their business.