Dr Joern Meissner
Department of Management Science
1
MBA Core Course – Operations Management
Module Leader and Lecturer
Joern Meissner, PhD (Columbia Business School)
Personal website: http://www.meiss.com
Email: joe [at] meiss.com
Time and Place
October 29th, 2010, Friday, 02pm–06pm, Lecture Theatre 3
November 02nd, 2010, Tuesday, 09am–01pm, Lecture Theatre 3
November 03trd, 2010, Wednesday, 09am–01pm, Lecture Theatre 3
November 04th, 2010, Thursday, 09am–01pm, Lecture Theatre 3
November 05th, 2010, Friday, 09am–01pm, Lecture Theatre 3
November 05th, 2010, Friday, 02pm–06pm, Lecture Theatre 3
Course Website
The web page for the course can be found on the Lancaster MBA bulletin board.
Course Description
This course will provide a general introduction to operations management. Along with
finance and marketing, Operations is one of the three primary functions of a firm. Looking at
these functions in their most basic form it can be said that Finance contributes capital to the
firm, Marketing creates demand for a product, and Operations produces the product. The
recurring activities of a firm that make up Operations Management generally span the entire
organization: Chief Operating Officers (COOs) are frequently in charge of Research &
Development (R&D), design/engineering, production operations, marketing, sales, support
and service. Therefore the realm of operations management expands well beyond just
managing factories. Firms may deal with sales and service support, repair services, customer
help lines, continuing product development, and any number of varying functions depending
on their products. Each of these areas requires a different set of processes, resources, control
systems, people and management style. Thus, Operations Management is an essential part of
any firm that generates value for customers through manufacturing, logistics, or service
delivery. The principles of Operations Management, however, can be much more expansive
and relate to any aspect of an organization that requires resources and processes to operate.
In order to gain competitive advantage through operations, this course intends to orient you
with the major operational problems and issues that confront managers, and to provide you
with language, concepts, insights and tools to deal with these issues. Whether you are a
student aiming for a career in designing and managing business processes, either directly
(Operations Departments) or indirectly (e.g., management consulting), or you manage
interfaces between operations and other business functions such as finance, marketing,
managerial accounting and human resources, this course is essential. In addition a working
