Operations Strategy

Catalog description

A firm's operations are the processes, resources, and capabilities that together produce its goods and services. The long-term design and control of a firm's operations to accomplish its strategic goals is referred to as its operations strategy. In this course, we discuss how to understand, analyze, and design effective operations strategies. We consider how different operational choices can lead to different levels of performance along four (at least) critical dimensions: cost, quality, flexibility, and speed. We also introduce a framework that structures the most important operational decisions into three categories, and discuss how to make decisions in these categories that align each dimension of operational performance with the firm's strategic goals. Finally, we apply this framework to analyze a series of critical problems faced by modern firms, such as developing resilient operations strategies, integrating social and environmental responsibility into operations strategy, scaling operations strategies in start-ups, and integrating breakthrough technology into an operations strategy. This course is for Global Executive MBA and Weekend Executive MBA students.