Back to 'Certificate Final Exam\' Information Laura Johnson has been charged with examining several processes at the Nelson corporation. She needs to identify where improvements are necessary to those processes, produce documentation that supports a better understanding of the processes, and implement state-of-the-art process management tools she obtained while studying for her MBA. The first process she examines is the customer ordering process. Customers, who can be either retail dealers, or ultimate-user consumers, place their orders on a website that Nelson has deployed to support customer interactions and to facilitate brand awareness and advertising. Based on her examination of the current process, Laura produced this flowchart: The next process that Laura examines is the production process for the physical irrigation systems. There are three challenges: 1. Ensuring an ongoing supply of raw materials 2. Maintaining the quality of the finished products coming out of the production process 3. Forecasting the demand for products with a high degree of accuracy Laura has a specific background in the manufacturing process, but she needs to gain more expertise in raw material procurement and forecasting. To address this, she has hired two colleagues who were classmates in her MBA program who have expertise in these areas. Together, this team at Nelson will be responsible for developing production and sales forecasts, maintaining product quality, and ensuring the ongoing supply of raw materials. The management team at Nelson has gathered information and data on the industry from several sources. Management staff regularly attend industry conferences, and the team at Nelson subscribes to and reads industry publications regularly. At the meetings, the Nelson team attends sessions hosted by industry experts and consultants who deeply understand the production process, consumer preferences, and emerging technological developments. Based on this information, the team has put together a detailed report and industry focus to guide their production and marketing plans. Nelson keeps production and manufacturing data, but the team believes this information could be more forward-looking and thus would have little value in constructing forecasts. One area in the production process that Laura and the team will look at is production efficiency. Laura was recently told that Nelson wants to expand beyond its original location. Nelson said she should perform her production analysis to improve production efficiency at the existing plant and to design how the production process would be laid out in a new facility or shared between multiple facilities. The core elements of this production process are four process jobs that each make use of two machines. This is the scheduling information for the production process: Job Machine A Machine B 1 15 20 2 20 25 3 10 10 4 15 25 Finally, Laura and the team compiled sales data for the past 36 months. The data is shown here in both table and graph format: Month Sales (Thousands) 1 2 2 3 3 4 4 6 5 5 6 6 7 7 8 9 9 10 10 12 11 14 12 16 13 18 14 20 15 6 16 5 17 4 18 4 19 4 20 3 21 3 22 2 23 32 24 34 25 45 26 33 27 37 28 38 29 38 30 43 31 45 32 52 33 35 34 33 35 21 36 23 Time left 1:36:54 Question 11 Not yet answered Marked out of 1.00 Question 12 Not yet answered Marked out of 1.00 Laura wants to develop a queuing procedure for the Nelson online ordering system that would determine the average number of customers either waiting for the server or being serviced (i,e, in the system). Which of the would achieve this objective? Select one: a. A multi-server system with a first-come first-servied exponential distribution b. A single-server system with a first-come first-served exponential distribution c. A multi-server system with a priority-based service algorithm and Gaussian distribution d. A single-server system with a priority-based service algorithm and Gaussian distribution In the ordering process, Laura is going to implement an additional reminder feature that would send an additional message to customers who have not ordered after 6 months have passed. How would this change the flowchart? Select one: a. A new diamond would lead into (C) b. A new rectangle would be put in parallel with (C) c. A new triangle would be inserted between (A) and (B) asking about customer intention d. A new diamond would be inserted after (C) with a test asking how long since the last communication Question 13 Not yet answered Marked out of 1.00 Question 14 Not yet answered Marked out of 1.00 Using the monthly sales data that Laura and the team have compiled over the last 36 months, what would the 4-month moving average forecast be at month 19? Select one: a. 4.0 b. 4.25 c. 5.0 d. 5.5 Laura wants to develop a waiting line model for the Nelson online ordering system. This web service is a single server system with a one-line queue. Which of the following statistical techniques would you select as the most appropriate to model this? Select one: a. A Poisson arrival process b. A normalized arrival process c. A Gaussian exponential distribution d. A first-come, first served queuing model Question 15 Not yet answered Marked out of 1.00 Question 16 Not yet answered Marked out of 1.00 Using the monthly sales data that Laura and the team have compiled over the last 36 months, if an exponential smoothing model is used, with a=0.1, and given that the forecast made in month 6 was 2.89, what will be the forecast for month 7? Select one: a. 2.95 b. 3.21 c. 3.64 d. 4.10 Laura has the option to start using a new set of suppliers to support the production process. She could do this either in addition to or as a replacement for the current suppliers. These new suppliers may not be the lowest cost or have the fastest delivery time. Why might Laura want to do this anyway? Select one: a. By using more suppliers, Laura will ensure that product quality is increased b. Including the new suppliers in the mix will reduce the overall cost in the long run c. Including new suppliers in the mix, even if more expensive or slower, adds diversity and will reduce the risk of downtime d. The use of new suppliers will increase the net amount of business relationships Nelson has access to and will spread the benefit of the work more broadly throughout the area Question 17 Not yet answered Marked out of 1.00 Question 18 Not yet answered Marked out of 1.00 Laura has determined that the waiting line model for the Nelson online ordering system can be modeled by a Poisson arrival process. This web service is a single server system following a First-come, First-served model and an exponential distribution service pattern typical of one-line queues. Assuming customers enter the order queue at a rate of 20 per hour and are serviced at a rate of 30 per hour, what is the average time to complete an order (that is, the time in the system either waiting or being serviced)? Select one: a. 4 minutes b. 5 minutes c. 6 minutes d. 7 minutes Using the monthly sales data that Laura and the team have compiled over the last 36 months, which time span shows the first instance of a positive relationship? Select one: a. 1 to ~14 weeks b. ~15 to ~22 weeks c. ~15 to ~31 weeks d. ~23 to ~32 weeks Question 19 Not yet answered Marked out of 1.00 Question 20 Not yet answered Marked out of 1.00 Currently, Laura has arranged for daily deliveries of supplies to the production process. The amount ordered is based on the prior day's production and the historical average for that day based on collected data. What is one of the main advantages of using such a lean production system? Select one: a. When there is a delay in receiving supplies, inefficiencies in the production process become obvious b. Having daily deliveries will make production more efficient because required supplies will always be on hand c. If there is a problem with the production process, having a limited inventory of supplies will make fixing the production problem easier d. Inventory costs will be reduced, and the costs associated with storage and moving parts in and out of inventory will be minimized. Laura notices that in the ordering process, no distinction is made between orders placed by direct consumers and dealers. How could she modify the flowchart to develop specific processes for dealers? Select one: a. A new diamond would lead into (A) b. A new rectangle would be put in parallel with (A) c. A new triangle would be inserted between (A) and (B) d. A new diamond would be inserted between (A) and (B)