Overview

In this assignment, you will apply what you have learned about key concepts regarding operations management. You are encouraged to leverage your work and instructor feedback on this assignment in your course project, which is due in Module Seven.

Scenario

You work as the chief supply chain officer at NationaliTeas, a large international corporation that manufacturers and sells tea worldwide. Its mission is to Make the world more awake through rejuvenating and refreshing beverages and sustainable practices that uplift workers, communities, and souls. You have recently hired the companys first project manager and have given them their first project: Revise current workflows related to packaging at one of your tea factories to be more sustainable and more lean. As this is their first project, you will be helping them complete their task.

Prompt

Read through the Project Charter for Workflow Improvement Word Document, then review the Process Workflow for Tea Production Word Document graphic. A text-only version is available: Process Workflow for Tea Production Text-Only Version Word Document. Based on these documents, recommend removing a total of four steps from the process flowchart that can help make the process more efficient and sustainable. Explain the implications of the proposed changes, and then help the NationaliTeas team address current items in the Issue Log located in the project charter.

Specifically, you must address the following rubric criteria:

• Process Changes: Explain the positive and negative implications of removing or changing the steps from the process flowchart you identified in the previous two bullet points. Also, explain how those changes would help alignment to the triple bottom line (TBL).
• Issue Log: Analyze all entries in the Issue Log from the perspective of a project manager and explain the recommended course of action based on the project charter, noting the impact of the issue on scope, planning communications, and resourcing.
• Operations Management Techniques: Discuss how operations management techniques, including project management and lean manufacturing, can add value to Nationali Teas.

The flowchart covers the steps involved in picking, processing, and packaging and shipping tea. The outline below detasils these steps at each stage of the process.

1. Farm
   1. Workers pick usable tea leaves from the field
   2. Picked tea leaves are weighed and grouped into 50 kg bags
   3. Bags of weighed tea are moved to a processing area
2. Processing
   1. Bags of tea are reweighed at the processing facility
   2. Tea leaves are spread across pans and troughs
   3. Tea leaves are withered on pans
   4. Tea leaves are cooled
   5. Tea leaved are removed from pans and reweighed
   6. Tea leaves are moved onto special trays and put through a rolling machine
   7. Tea leaves go through their first drying
   8. Tea leaves are cooled
   9. Tea leaves are removed from special rolling trays and put into new trays to go through a second drying machine
   10. Tea leaves are removed from trays and reweighed; poor-quality leaves are thrown away
   11. Tea leaves are visually inspected
   12. Poor-quality leaves are thrown away
   13. Tea leaves are moved to an oxidizing area
   14. Tea leaves are oxidized
   15. Tea leaves go through their final drying to complete the oxidation process
   16. Tea leaves are cooled
   17. Tea leaves are sent to packaging and shipping
3. Packaging and Shipping
   1. Tea leaves are weighed
   2. Tea leaves go through the first sorting machine; small, misshaped, or discolored tea leaves are discarded
   3. Tea leaves are weighed
   4. Tea leaves go through a second sorting
   5. Tea leaves are put into paper tea bags and sealed
   6. Tea bags are wrapped in paper packets
   7. Tea bags are sealed
   8. Wrapped tea bags are sorted into cardboard packs of 20
   9. Cardboard packs are sealed and wrapped in plastic
   10. Boxes are sorted into shipping boxes
   11. Shipping boxes are wrapped and sealed, ready to be shipped