ASSIGNMENT

Course Code : MS - 56
Course Title : Materials Management
Assignment Code : MS-56 /TMA/SEM - II/2020
Coverage : All Blocks

Note: Attempt all the questions and submit this assignment to the coordinator of
your study centre on or before 31st October, 2020

1. What is the need of implementing materials management quality improvement

process? How does TQM support in creating customer value in materials
management?

2. “Ethical conduct in purchasing depends, to a large extent, on the local culture to

which the purchasing agents and suppliers belong”. Comment!

3. Discuss the various types of inventory carried by a manufacturing organization. In

what types of inventories can the EOQ and order level polices be used, and in
what types of inventories will the use of MRP be more effective?

4. What do you understand by the term codification? What type of information

should be built into a code? What are the objectives of codification? List the
different systems used to codify materials.

5. Explain how a performance appraisal system can be used in the context of

materials management. What are the metrics of performance appraisal in
materials management?

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ASSIGNMENT REFERENCE MATERIAL (July20 to Dec20)

MS-56
MATERIALS MANAGEMENT

Q1. “Product development and design is basically a research and development activity”.

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Elaborate the statement with suitable examples.

Ans:

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Research and development, innovation, new product development and product design are
often used interchangeably, but they each have quite distinct meanings.

Research and Development (R&D) is the process of creating new knowledge about products
or processes.

Innovation:- Technical or industrial innovation is used to describe a new breakthrough in a

process or production technique or a novel product and it is used widely by economists.

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Innovation, therefore can involve the exploitation of a new market opportunity, or on the
other hand, the development and marketing of a technical invention; however it usually
involves a combination of both since many inventions have no market demand and so do not
constitute an innovation.

1 New product development

New product development is a term often used by the management and marketing department
of firms. It describes the process of changing the form, components, materials, marketing or
packaging of a product, and it differs from innovation in that it does not usually involve
invention.

2 Design

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Different cultures perceive and see various roles for design. For instance the UK is seen as
having a more analytical and marketing approach to design, whereas in Japan, design is more
concerned with what 'could be'; therefore in Japan design is seen as being more of a creative
process (Evans, 1986).

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Design covers a broad spectrum of activities: architecture, fashion design, craft work, product
design, graphics and typography.
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Q2. “Job design is the consciously planned structuring of work effort performed by an
individual or a team of persons”. Explain the statement.

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Ans:- Job design is the consciously planned structuring of work effort performed by an
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individual or a team of persons. Good job designs must answer the job-related questions such
as what work is to be performed, who is to perform the work, where the work is to be done,
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when the work is to be done, why the job is necessary and how should the work be
accomplished. Job designers usually attempt to minimise the amount of physical human
effort. Years ago, employers looked for workers with the physical capabilities to suit a given
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task. Today jobs are designed to suit an average worker and capability distinctions are more
likely to be on the basis of education and experience.
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For organisational purposes, we divide job design into two basic elements, a human element
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and a work element. Physiological, social and psychological considerations are important
human factors relating to job design. The work element has been considered in detail in the
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previous unit. We shall, however, include some relevant points that we had deliberately left
out while discussing work design. There is increasing evidence that poorly designed jobs are
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a pervasive societal problem affecting the mental and physical health of the worker both on
and off the job. The objective of job design is therefore to develop work assignments that
meet the requirements of the organisation and the technology, and at the same time also
satisfy the personal and individual requirements of the job holder. The smallest work
activities involve various elementary movements called therbligs (Gilbreth spelt backwards),
e.g. reach, grasp, position, release, search, select, transport, empty, hold, release, load,
inspect, assemble, disassemble, use, plan etc. Micro motions are made of therbligs whereas
an element is an aggregation of two or more micrornotions. Two or more elements taken
together form a task whereas the set of tasks that must be performed constitute a job the
operator is to perform. Job design is a complex function because of the variety of factors that
coalesce to create the ultimate job structure.

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Q3. What do you understand by the term “batch production”? Explain the advantages
and disadvantages of batch production.

Ans:- Batch production involves the production of identical products made in groups
(batches). The group remains together as it passes through each stage of production until all
processes are complete. Changes may be made between batches. For example, clothing may
be produced in batches of different sizes and colours. The process, therefore, includes a delay
between batches while equipment is changed or recalibrated; this is known as downtime.

Production is less personal in that products are not individualised to customer requirement;
the focus is on making high quality products at an affordable price. Workers specialise and
are less likely to be highly skilled or multi-skilled. Specialised equipment is probably used
since it is possible to get higher capital utilisation. Products are cheaper, but capital cost is

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significantly higher than for job production.

Typical products produced in batches include bakery products, clothing, 'fast-food', shoes and
pharmaceuticals.

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Q4. Critically examine the following statement: “value engineering is more of a human
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relations, team building and motivation programme than anything else”.

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Ans:- As mentioned earlier, the major advantage of the approach is that it is a systematic and
organised approach that examines all aspects of a problem employing a questioning attitude.
Thus a formal approach has to be adopted to go through the VE programme. This formal
procedural model of VE process is called VE Job Plan. In the beginning, when Miles
proposed VE Job Plan, it was, just a modified form of the steps involved in work study.
Subsequently, it has been modified and a number of approaches have emerged which are
essentially similar. These job plans have various steps and phases with their associated VE
techniques at each phase. In one of the job plans the seven steps involved are: (1) preparation,
(2) problem selection, (3) information, (4) evaluation, (5) creation, (6) selection and
presentation, and (7) implementation and follow up.

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In this unit we shall briefly outline the salient features of three different approaches to
conduct a VE programme. These are:

a) Job Plan due to Mudge

b) DARSIRI method

c) FAST (Function Analysis System Technique)

Since the Job Plan due to Mudge is a very well recognised approach, we will deal with it in
this section. The seven phases of Job Plan are:

i) General phase

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ii) Information phase

iii) Function phase

iv) Creation phase

v) Evaluation phase

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vi) Investigation phase

vii) Recommendation phase.

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Each of these phases comprises or is supported by one or more techniques. There are work-
sheets for each phase. The practice of Job Plan and the application of VE techniques should
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be made on properly selected project. Thus selection of VE projects is important. Those
products should be chosen for the study which are significant in terms of cost reduction
potential. In step-by=step application of the Job Plan the project unfolds from the information
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phase right up to recommendation phase.

The general phase plays vital role throughout and provides a good base for other phases to
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succeed.
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Brief description of each phase together with associated VE techniques are given in the
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following sub-sections.
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General Phase

Throughout the application of the entire Job Plan the techniques of this phase must be
diligently applied to create the right environment for Value Engineering job plan to be
effective. There are five techniques associated with this phase:

a) Use good human relations: It will be seen that considerable personal contact is necessary
throughout the Project. The use of good human relations means assistance in place of
resistance.

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b) Inspire team work: This is one of the easiest to talk about, yet one of the hardest to
accomplish. It calls for subordinating personal prominence or ego in the interest of the group
as a whole.

c) Work on specifics: We should avoid generalities and work on specifics.

Q5. “Inventory management for slow moving expensive items should focus more on lead
time reduction than anything else”. Critically examine the statement.

Ans:- Nature of Slow Moving Items

As stated earlier, slow moving materials are those which are not regularly demanded and
their movement off the shelf is very occasional, say once in six months or so.

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Examples of slow moving materials can be -- spare parts and some special purpose materials
for projects required only for a certain kind of project activity. Inventory models valid for fast
moving models are not applicable for slow moving items due to lack of regular demand
pattern. Generally slow moving items are quite expensive and therefore one has to first
decide whether to keep them all in stock and if to keep them in stock then in what quantity

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further difficulty of slow moving parts is that initial over-buying decision could take years to
remedy the situation due to rarely occurring demands.
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Some Inventory Policies for Slow Moving Spares

We shall illustrate our approach to manage the inventory of slow moving items with spares

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inventory problem as a substantial percentage of spares come under the slow moving
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categories. Some of the strategies that could be possibly adopted for efficient inventory
management of slow moving spares are as follows:
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a) If spares are required only at pre-specified time such as at the time of major scheduled
maintenance for replacement, then it is better not to stock them but to place procurement
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order sufficiently well in advance, keeping lead times in mind, so that these arrive just in time
when these are needed.
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b) If the part gives adequate warning of impending break down, then also the best policy is to
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place an order the moment we get the warning. Adequate warning refers to the case when the
lead time required is less than the warning time. This shows that major improvements in slow
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moving inventory are possible by cutting down the lead times.

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