Optimizing Resource Availability for Lean and Agile Supply Chain Responsiveness

Responsiveness for both, relies on the availability of resources to meet demand. Differences In Lean and Agile Supply Chain Strategies: Lean Agile A lean strategy helps the firms to reduce the time and costs of transport for work in process by almost 10% but lean does not deal much with regards to uncertainties from customer demand in particular emergency or special orders. An agile concentrates on maximizing the responsiveness to customer demand.

A lean strategy is capable of dealing with problem of unnecessary movement of raw material and work In process effectively, the other two problems, long lead time for order delivery and production quality, must be dealt with by using agile strategy.

An agile strategy can help the firms, alleviate these customer demand problem, but it does not eliminate Inefficiencies along the production processes. The main objective of lean is on eliminating waste. An agile system signifies flexibility and hence heightened responsiveness to changes. 2. Explain how manufacturing has evolved.

The manufacturing concept was evolved with the success story of lean production, leading to the difficult situation faced by the US and European manufacturers since 970, since then all major players in the industry have adopted the set of techniques that were then first introduced at Toyota in Japan, the Toyota Production System (TIPS), as “lean production” by it Is more widely known.

Automotive Industry Manufacturing: The automotive industry in the new millennium has also seen the advent of three key challenges: rationalization, saturation and fragmentation of markets, challenges that few manufacturers have addressed successfully to date.

New capabilities are required to deal with this competitive situation and return to profitability. There Is an increasing number of countries In the world today that have mastered the skills of producing cars with acceptable levels of quality, and often at a much lower cost compared with the US, Europe or Japan. One might get the impression that for every factory that closes in the West, (at least) one is opening in Eastern Europe, India or China, suggesting that the days of the motor industry in the western world are numbered.

In Japan, several corporate crises and even threats of bankruptcies have been averted, most prominently in the case of Ionians. 3. What is mass customization? Give examples. Mass customization known as “collaborative customization”, where customer is enable to decide the exact specification of a product or a service at a price which is close to that for an ordinary mass produced alternative then that product or service supplied to them.

For Example; Hunch web, where one can Just the use of Backbone profile to inform Hunch before the use give you ideally answer a few questions about himself (e. G. What kind of laptop you use, or which party you vote for) and based on their data about a large number of people and their preferences and how these compare to you. Thus Hunch recommends products, activities, websites and much more to you. 4. How does a leakage supply chain work?

A Leakage supply chain is a combination of the both lean production and agile organization, which combines the benefits of both supply capabilities, it is also the case for the benefits of the sustainable supply chain. In leakage a supply chain, which currently utilizing its resources efficiently and have a flexible production capacity to meet surges in demand or unexpected requirements. With this kind of approach, companies can improve both their sustainability and their overall performance of heir business. Figure: A Leakage Supply chain workflow 5.

Explain how a lean strategy can work for a service firm (for example, American Express). Lean manufacturing, lean production, or lean enterprise can often simply say as “lean”, which is a production practice that considers the expenditure of the resources for any goal other than the creation of value for end customer’s to be wasteful and thus a target for elimination. Working from the perspective of the customer who consumes a product or a service and “value” is defined as any action or the process that a customer would may willing to pay.

For Example; An American Express Company, which United States based multinational financial services corporation where adopted goals of lean manufacturing systems increasing profit for the organization and claims the improvement in business: The lean strategic elements which are quite complex and comprised with multiple elements. Four different notions of lean strategies for this corporation have been identified as below: 1. Lean as the fixed state or goal: being lean.