London School of Business & Finance (LSBF)
Module Assignment Title Assignment Type Word Limit Weighting Issue Date Submission Date Issued by (Assessor) Internal Verifier Plagiarism

Masters in Business Administration

Systems and Operations Management
Systems and Operations Management - Critical Evaluation of the Competitive Factors Report 4000 - 4500 words 100% 5th May 6th June S M A Hashmi Junaid Shaikh When submitting work for assessment, students should be aware of the LSBF guidance and regulations in concerning plagiarism. All submissions should be your own, original work. You must submit an electronic copy of your work. Your submission will be electronically checked. The Harvard Referencing System must be used. The Wikipedia website must not be referenced in your work. On successful completion of this assignment you will be able to:

Harvard Referencing Learning Outcomes

LO

Learning Outcome Description

Knowledge and Understanding Critically appraise ways in which the operations and Information Systems functions contribute to an organisation’s competitiveness and strategic direction. Synthesise and evaluate complex information on IT related issues.

LO1

LO2

LO3

Identify and justify the information required to establish and implement effective operational decisions, with particular reference to change management. Describe and critically assess organisations information and business process perspective. from systems,

LO4

LO5

Appreciate how key organisational behaviour concepts such as structure, motivation, culture and work groups & teams impact on and influence the role of people within the broad operations of the organisation.

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Scenario You have been appointed as a consultant of an organisation of your choice (manufacturing or service based). The company is about to embark on commencing it’s business in the UK. You have been asked to recommend as to how the organisation should competitively develop and run it’s systems and operations with the help of people in the organisation.

Your Task In light of the above, carry out research on the competitors and real business environment in which the company is going to operate and do as following:

1- Critically evaluate a suitable operations framework for the chosen organisation whilst focusing on the relevant operations areas (e.g, strategy, operations design, capacity planning, resource planning, quality, supply chain, or any other). (LO1, LO3, LO4) (40%).

2- Integrate an Information System within the organisations operations giving particular focus on CRM, supply chain and knowledge management. (LO1, LO2, LO4) (40%). 3- Give recommendations as to how the organisations employees can be managed to enhance their contribution towards the competitive running of the broader operations. (LO5) (20%).

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Guidelines GUIDANCE ON ASSESSMENT

All materials must be properly referenced. Length required is advised above. Longer work will not be penalised. However it should be noted that a concise and professional style which is well focused and clear in the points being made will gain good credit. Originality, quality of argument and good structure are required. What I want to see is that you can take a body of theory, understand it, choose what you want from it, apply it in a reasonable fashion and hence evaluate it. Your submissions will be expected to demonstrate the following qualities: 1. 2. Answering the central focus of the assignment topics. Company you choose can be from any sector but you must provide some background and justification of your rational. You will need to make assumptions where information is not available and this need to be clearly outlined. 3. A critical appreciation of relevant literature and its use to support argument, substantiate model(s) and other aspects of the assignment. 4. Taking ownership of the content, being prepared to debate and argue a personal position, evidences evaluative skills. A submission made up of extracts from published sources which is descriptive and just theoretical, is not acceptable. Your submission must have interpretation and consideration of the challenges and issues of taking theory into practice (using cases and/or personal experience). 5. Ability to analyse relevant theoretical concepts in a critical manner, evaluation of material, indication of gaps in the literature. 6. Logical flow of ideas and treatment; imaginative approaches; appropriate

selection of real world factors related to the model(s) or specific assignment topic. 7. Evidence of additional personal research, and the ability to analyse material from a variety of appropriate relevant perspectives. A clear listing of references and/or bibliography. 8. Presentation, structure, appropriateness of methodology, breaking into section headings/subheadings, tidiness. 9. A strong conclusion.

Please ensure that you reference material which you take from text books, published documents, internet etc… in the main body of your report, at the place you use it, as well as listing the publications in an appendix. Also, try to evaluate and critique this material and the experience you get from applying and using it. Such personal critique gains high reward in postgraduate level work!

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Please note that just providing a summary of current published works on your chosen topic will not receive a high grade. Ensure that your writing style is one in which you take ownership of the content. Evidence personal evaluation – this can often be achieved by evaluating prior experience or a case study within the context of the theory.

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GRADING CRITERIA Weightin g 100% 70%+100 Comprehensive and correctly structured assessment. Style of Generic skills: writing is very fluent communication and develops a and coherent and logical presentation. argument. Excellent referencing. Criteria

Knowledge & Understanding

Demonstrates excellent knowledge of theory and provides critical theoretical underpinning. Very good interpretations and summarising of main themes.

Analysis

Synthesis/ Creativity/ Application

Excellent use of theoretical and conceptual models to guide analysis linked with a critical discussion of main themes. Deconstructs the major themes used in the argument. Logical presentation of themes with appropriate examples being demonstrated. Very good demonstration of synthesis. Models have been clearly applied to the argument.

60-69% 50-59% 0 -49% Fail Well structured Good report in most Very poor report report which aspects but suffers which is incorrectly follows from variations in structured and appropriate quality and the layout contains major errors format but some contains some and omissions. Style aspects of layout inadequacies. Style of of writing lacks and referencing writing is satisfactory. coherence and could be Referencing needs fluency. Poor improved. Style improving. referencing. of writing is fairly fluent. Good referencing. Wide range of Good range of Very poor range of knowledge knowledge knowledge demonstrated and demonstrated but demonstrated and evidence of good weaknesses in key there are major understanding of areas. Some weaknesses evident the topic. understanding in interpretation and displayed of the topic. understanding. Ability to interpret and summarise Summary and No clear succinctly. interpretation are interpretation of satisfactory. main themes. Very good use of Use of theory and Very poor use of the theoretical concepts limited but theory and very little and conceptual relevant. Application application of models with good could be improved and concepts. critical discussion there is a tendency and application. towards description. Very little description with not much Good evidence of Must provide more evidence of analysis. deconstruction. evidence of deconstruction. Very good Good account of main Very poor account of account of main themes with some main themes with themes with attempt at application. little or no sound application. Limited application. No links Good attempt at evidence of synthesis. between models and applying models argument. to the argument. .Fairly good attempt at synthesising the salient points.

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Evaluation

Shows clear evidence Shows evidence of Shows some evidence of in-depth critical critical reflection of critical reflection reflection and and evaluation but could have been evaluation of the and a fairly developed. argument by cohesive defence providing a robust of the argument defence of the opinions presented in the assessment.

Shows little or no evidence of critical reflection and needs to be much more developed. There is no defence of the opinions presented.

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