Overview.
In the handout in the introductory material titled About This Course I discussed how this course material had broadened from its original design. This course is no longer concerned with the calculations necessary for decision making in efficiently getting the right materials in the right quantity to the right place at the right time. We shall not do any capacity planning, manufacturing resource planning (MRPII), materials requirement planning (MRP), or production control calculations. We shall not calculate economic order quantities (EOQ), reserve stock, or service levels. Nor shall we calculate the best number of kanbans (see the Ohno reading) on the shop floor.
As we take a broader view of the systems in manufacturing we need to appreciate the expertise of those who are actually involved in the performance of the activities and the techniques necessary to efficiently get the right materials in the right quantity to the right place at the right time within the various systems. This, I think, can be accomplished by reading about the two major professional organizations involved in this area. The first can be found at www.apics.org . This organization formally known as the American Production and Inventory Control Society (hence APICS) now bills itself as the leading professional association for supply chain and operations management. The second is the old Purchasing Managers Association now called the Institute for Supply Chain Management (ISM). It can be found at www.ism.ws/ . Be careful in typing in the addresses or you could end up writing about music instruments or medical procedures.
Assignment.
Write one three page, single spaced, paper on the two organizations above. Describe what the organizations are about, what they offer their members, their certifications and what is involved with becoming certified in the various certifications they offer. It may be useful for you to begin by going to the ISM cite and finding a brief paper written by Joseph Cavinato titled Supply Management defined (it may serve us well when reading the other books for the course). However I would expect APICS shall require more space within your review. That’s because ISM is concerned with the supply chain from one organization to another whereas APICS includes the supply chain within an organization, for example from machine to machine or machine to assembly line.
