Question: Will the use of decision tree analysis

> Develop a production schedule to produce the exact production requirements by varying the workforce size for the following problem. Use the example in the chapter as a guide (Plan 1). The monthly forecasts for Product X for January, February, and March a

> Shoney Video Concepts produces a line of video streaming servers that are linked to computers for storing movies. These devices have very fast access and large storage capacity. Shoney is trying to determine a production plan for the next 12 months.

> Alan Industries is expanding its product line to include three new products: A, B, and C. These are to be produced on the same production equipment, and the objective is to meet the demands for the three products using overtime where necessary. The deman

> Old Pueblo Engineering Contractors creates six-month “rolling” schedules, which are recomputed monthly. For competitive reasons (it would need to divulge proprietary design criteria, methods, and so on), Old Pueblo

> DAT, Inc., needs to develop an aggregate plan for its product line. Relevant data are The forecast for next year is Management prefers to keep a constant workforce and production level, absorbing variations in demand through inventory excesses and sh

> In what way does the time horizon chosen for an aggregate plan determine whether it is the best plan for the firm?

> Can a manufacturer have a service guarantee in addition to a product guarantee?

> What are the major differences between aggregate planning in manufacturing and aggregate planning in services?

> How would you apply yield management concepts to a barbershop? A soft drink vending machine?

> Refer to Exhibit 5.6. Why is it that the “critical zone” begins at a utilization rate of about 70 percent in a typical service operation? Draw upon your own experiences as either a customer or a server in common serv

> Transmissions are delivered to the fabrication line four at a time. It takes one hour for transmissions to be delivered. Approximately four vehicles are produced each hour, and management has decided that 50 percent of expected demand should be maintaine

> Define yield management. How does it differ from the pure strategies in production planning?

> What are the basic controllable variables of a production planning problem? What are the four major costs?

> How does forecast accuracy relate, in general, to the practical application of the aggregate planning models discussed in the chapter?

> Distinguish between pure and mixed strategies in production planning.

> You are the operations manager for a manufacturing plant that produces pudding food products. One of your important responsibilities is to prepare an aggregate plan for the plant. This plan is an important input into the annual budget process. The plan p

> Here are the data for the past 21 months for actual sales of a particular product: Develop a forecast for the fourth quarter using a three-quarter, weighted moving average. Weight the most recent quarter 0.5, the second most recent 0.25, and the third

> What category of forecasting techniques uses managerial judgment in lieu of numerical data?

> Could a service firm use production line approach or self-serve design and still keep a high customer focus (personal attention)? Explain and support your answer with examples.

> What is the term for forecasts used for making day-to-day decisions about meeting demand?

> What is the first step in CPFR?

> The Sun River beverage company is a regional producer of teas, exotic juices, and energy drinks. With an interest in healthier lifestyles, there has been an increase in demand for its sugar-free formulation. The final packing operation requires 13 tasks

> How many steps are there in collaborative planning, forecasting, and replenishment (CPFR)?

> What are some major capacity considerations in a hospital? How do they differ from those of a factory?

> Often times, firms will work with their partners across the supply chain to develop forecasts and execute production and distribution between the partners. What technique does this describe?

> When forecasting demand for new products, sometimes firms will use demand data from similar existing products to help forecast demand for the new product. What technique is this an example of?

> Which qualitative forecasting technique was developed to ensure the input from every participant in the process is weighted equally?

> What forecasting technique makes use of written surveys or telephone interviews?

> The following table shows predicted product demand using your particular forecasting method along with the actual demand that occurred. (Answers in Appendix D) a. Compute the tracking signal using the mean absolute deviation and running sum of forecast

> In this problem, you are to test the validity of your forecasting model. Here are the forecasts for a model you have been using and the actual demands that occurred: Use the method stated in the text to compute MAD and the tracking signal. Then, decide

> Behavioral scientists suggest that we remember events as snap shots, not movies. How would you apply this to designing a service?

> Not all the items in your office supply store are evenly distributed as far as demand is concerned, so you decide to forecast demand to help plan your stock. Past data for legal sized yellow tablets for the month of August are a. Using a three-week mo

> A supplier of instrument gauge clusters uses a kanban system to control material flow. The gauge cluster housings are transported five at a time. A fabrication center produces approximately 10 gauges per hour. It takes approximately two hours for the hou

> Assume an initial starting Ft of 300 units, a trend (Tt) of eight units, an alpha of 0.30, and a delta of 0.40. If actual demand turned out to be 288, calculate the forecast for the next period.

> The following table contains the number of complaints received in a department store for the first six months of operation. If a three-month moving average is used to smooth this series, what would have been the forecast for May? Month Complaints M

> Historical demand for a product is as follows. a. Using a simple four-month moving average, calculate a forecast for October. b. Using single exponential smoothing with α = 0.2 and a September forecast = 65, calculate a forecast for Octob

> Consider the example in Exhibit 5.5. Can you think of anything else you might do with that example that would be helpful to the ultimate decision maker? exhibit 5.5 Decision Tree Analysis Using Net Present Value Calculations Strong growth 0.550 $31

> Assume that your stock of sales merchandise is maintained based on the forecast demand. If the distributor’s sales personnel call on the first day of each month, compute your forecast sales by each of the three methods requested here.

> The number of cases of merlot wine sold by the Connor Owen winery in an eight-year period is as follows. Using an exponential smoothing model with an alpha value of 0.20, estimate the smoothed value calculated as of the end of year 8. Use the average d

> Actual demand for a product for the past three months was a. Using a simple three-month moving average, make a forecast for this month. b. If 300 units were actually demanded this month, what would your forecast be for next month? c. Using simple expon

> The following table contains the demand from the last 10 months. a. Calculate the single exponential smoothing forecast for these data using an α of 0.30 and an initial forecast (F1) of 31. b. Calculate the exponential smoothing with tren

> The following tabulations are actual sales of units for six months and a starting forecast in January. a. Calculate forecasts for the remaining five months using simple exponential smoothing with α = 0.2. b. Calculate MAD for the forecasts

> What do you think might be some barriers to the successful, effective use of the project management software packages discussed in the chapter?

> Under a kanban approach to lean manufacturing, order quantities should be as small as possible. For a part that is manufactured in-house, what part of its manufacturing process needs to be reduced to reduce the optimal order quantity for an item?

> Given the following history, use a three-quarter moving average to forecast the demand for the third quarter of this year. Note, the 1st quarter is Jan, Feb, and Mar; 2nd quarter Apr, May, Jun; 3rd quarter Jul, Aug, Sep; and 4th quarter Oct, Nov, Dec.

> The following are sales revenues for a large utility company for years 1 through 11. Forecast revenue for years 12 through 15. Because we are forecasting four years into the future, you will need to use linear regression as your forecasting method.

> Sales by quarter for last year and the first three quarters of this year were as follows. Using a procedure that you develop that captures the change in demand from last year to this year and also the seasonality in demand, forecast expected sales for

> Mark Price, the new productions manager for Speakers and Company, needs to find out which variable most affects the demand for their line of stereo speakers. He is uncertain whether the unit price of the product or the effects of increased marketing are

> The following are earnings per share for two companies by quarter from the first quarter three years ago through the second quarter of this year. Forecast earnings per share for the rest of this year and next year. Use exponential smoothing to forecast t

> Use regression analysis on deseasonalized demand to forecast next summer’s demand, given the following historical demand data. Actual Year Season Demand 2 years ago Spring 205 Summer 140 Fall 375 Winter 575 Last year Spring 475 Sum

> Tucson Machinery, Inc. manufactures numerically controlled machines, which sell for an average price of $0.5 million each. Sales for these NCMs for the past two years were as follows. a. Find a line using regression in Excel. b. Find the trend and seas

> The following table shows the past two years of quarterly sales information. Assume that there are both trend and seasonal factors and that the seasonal cycle is one year. Use time series decomposition to forecast quarterly sales for the next year.

> The sales data for two years are as follows. Data are aggregated with two months of sales in each “period.” a. Plot the data. b. Fit a simple linear regression model to the sales data. c. In addition to the regressio

> In some JIT systems, marked spaces on a table or the floor identify where material should be stored. Supplying operations are signaled to produce more when the space is empty. What are these spaces called?

> What is the service package of your college or university?

> Zeus Computer Chips, Inc. used to have major contracts to produce the Centrino-type chips. The market has been declining during the past three years because of the quad-core chips, which it cannot produce, so Zeus has the unpleasant task of forecasting n

> After using your forecasting model for six months, you decide to test it using MAD and a tracking signal. Here are the forecast and actual demands for the six-month period: a. Find the tracking signal. b. Decide whether your forecasting routine is acce

> Your manager is trying to determine what forecasting method to use. Based upon the following historical data, calculate the following forecast and specify what procedure you would utilize. a. Calculate the simple three-month moving average forecast for

> Harlen Industries has a simple forecasting model: Take the actual demand for the same month last year and divide that by the number of fractional weeks in that month. This gives the average weekly demand for that month. This weekly average is used as the

> A particular forecasting model was used to forecast a six-month period. Here are the forecasts and actual demands that resulted: Find the tracking signal and state whether you think the model being used is giving acceptable answers. Forecast Actual

> Here are the actual tabulated demands for an item for a nine-month period (January through September). Your supervisor wants to test two forecasting methods to see which method was better over this period. a. Forecast April through September using a thr

> What are some reasons for a plant to maintain a capacity cushion? How about a negative capacity cushion?

> Which phase of the generic development process involves construction and evaluation of multiple preproduction versions of the product?

> The tracking signals computed using past demand history for three different products are as follows. Each product used the same forecasting technique. Discuss the tracking signals for each and what the implications are. TS 1 TS 2 TS 3 1 -2.70 1.54

> What term refers to the concept of doing things right the first time, and when problems occur, stopping the process to fix the source of the problem?

> Historical demand for a product is a. Using a weighted moving average with weights of 0.60, 0.30, and 0.10, find the July forecast. b. Using a simple three-month moving average, find the July forecast. c. Using single exponential smoothing with Î

> Do you think a service operation can be successful by developing a system that combines characteristics from the three contrasting service designs presented in the chapter? Why or why not? Please provide examples.

> Demand for stereo headphones and MP3 players for joggers has caused Nina Industries to grow almost 50 percent over the past year. The number of joggers continues to expand, so Nina expects demand for headsets to also expand, because, as yet, no safety la

> All forecasting methods using exponential smoothing, adaptive smoothing, and exponential smoothing including trend require starting values to get the equations going. How would you select the starting value for, say Ft-1?

> From the choice of simple moving average, weighted moving average, exponential smoothing, and linear regression analysis, which forecasting technique would you consider the most accurate? Why?

> Why is forecasting necessary in OSCM?

> Causal relationships are potentially useful for which component of a time series?

> What implications do forecast errors have for the search for ultra-sophisticated statistical forecasting models?

> Discuss the basic differences between the mean absolute deviation and mean absolute percent error.

> It is a common saying that the only thing certain about a forecast is that it will be wrong. What is meant by this?

> Which objections might a marketing manager have against uniform plant loading?

> What is capacity balance? Why is it hard to achieve? What methods are used to deal with capacity imbalances?

> What sorts of risks do you see in reliance on the Internet in the use of Collaborative Planning, Forecasting and Replenishment (CPFR)?

> At first glance, asking the customer to provide their own service in the self-service approach may not seem very consumer friendly. What are some of the characteristics of self-service operations that have led to their acceptance and significant popular

> How is a seasonal index computed from a regression line analysis?

> During the past month a firm shows the following metrics: Compute the cash-to-cash cycle time. Round to two decimal places in all of your calculations. Average days of accounts recelvable 6.75 days Average daily cost of sales $ 35,000 Current tota

> What company is the largest ERP vendor?

> Which common ERP module category is typically the largest and most complex?

> ERP systems from different vendors vary quite a bit, but typically they will focus on at least what four major areas?

> Is it true that for an ERP system to be effective, it must be completely purchased from a single vendor?

> What term relates to the posting and tracking of activities that document a business?

> Why must lean have a stable schedule?

> What supply chain metric measures how many complete orders were filled and shipped on time?

> What part of SAP gives users personalized access to a range of information, applications, and services supported by the system?

> What are the four major categories of projects based on the type of change involved?

> Identify the high-contact and low-contact operations of the following services: a. A dental office b. An airline. c. An accounting office. d. An automobile agency e. Amazon.com

> In what respects is facility layout a marketing problem in services? Give an example of a service system layout designed to maximize the amount of time the customer is in the system.

> What term refers to the sharing of information with partners to coordinate production, enabling everyone to work together to increase visibility and responsiveness?

> What are the four main functions within SAP’s supply chain software?

> What is the term for a computer program often used to facilitate database queries that are not part of a standard ERP system?

> ERP systems provide a wealth of information that can be used and analyzed in a wide variety of ways. What is an inherent risk with so much information?

> Describe how an ERP system fits into the overall information system structure in a firm.

> One way to help achieve lean production systems is to employ flexible automated manufacturing equipment and automated material handling systems. A natural result of such a move is that fewer people are required in the process, an issue addressed regular

> Stopping waste is a vital part of lean. Identify some sources of waste in your home or dorm and discuss how they may be eliminated.

> Quality Parts Company supplies gizmos for a computer manufacturer located a few miles away. The company produces two different models of gizmos in production runs ranging from 100 to 300 units. The production flow of models X and Y is shown in Exhibit 14