Operations Management

Course Description

Operations Management surveys the tools and techniques used in the ten important decision areas related to operations, familiarising students with fundamental concepts in operations management within engineering contexts, and including realistic case studies for best practices in decision making and operations management.

Within the SCNS taxonomy, ETI is the Engineering Technology (Industrial) prefix. Daytona State publishes this at 3 credits, offered spring, with MAC1105 as prerequisite, giving approximately 45 contact hours at the prefix's unsuffixed convention.

Operations management is the discipline of how an organisation actually produces what it sells, and its decisions are the ones that determine cost, quality, and delivery. The case study method named in the description is the right one for this subject — operations decisions involve trade-offs with no correct answer, and arguing a position from evidence is the skill being built.

Daytona State does not publish a lecture and laboratory split for its ETI courses, but the prefix convention is consistent: unsuffixed courses run at 15 contact hours per credit (ETI1000, ETI1411, ETI1628 and ETI1644 are all published at 3 credits and 45 hours) and C-suffixed courses at 20 (ETI1110C, ETI1701C, ETI1810C and ETI1830C are all 3 credits and 60 hours).

Learning Outcomes

Required Outcomes

• Describe the scope of operations management and its strategic role.
• Describe the principal decision areas in operations.
• Describe product and service design and its operational implications.
• Describe quality management within an operations strategy.
• Describe process design and capacity planning.
• Calculate capacity, utilisation, and bottleneck throughput.
• Apply the theory of constraints to identify and manage a bottleneck.
• Describe location strategy and the factors driving it.
• Describe layout strategy and its types.
• Design a layout for a given process type.
• Describe human resources and job design in operations.
• Describe supply chain management and sourcing decisions.
• Describe make-or-buy analysis.
• Describe inventory management and its costs.
• Calculate economic order quantity and reorder points.
• Describe independent and dependent demand and their different treatments.
• Describe material requirements planning.
• Describe scheduling approaches and sequencing rules.
• Describe just-in-time and lean operations principles.
• Identify waste in a process and propose its elimination.
• Describe maintenance and reliability strategy.
• Describe forecasting methods and select appropriately.
• Calculate and interpret forecast error.
• Analyse an operations case and defend a recommendation.

Optional Outcomes

• Describe project scheduling with network methods.
• Describe queuing theory and waiting line analysis.
• Describe simulation in operations analysis.
• Describe sustainability in operations.
• Describe global operations and offshoring decisions.
• Describe service operations and their distinct characteristics.

Major Topics

Required Topics

• Scope and strategic role of operations
• Principal decision areas
• Product and service design
• Quality within operations strategy
• Process design and capacity planning
• Capacity and bottleneck analysis
• Theory of constraints
• Location strategy
• Layout strategy
• Layout design
• Human resources and job design
• Supply chain and sourcing
• Make-or-buy analysis
• Inventory management and costs
• Economic order quantity and reorder points
• Independent and dependent demand
• Material requirements planning
• Scheduling and sequencing
• Just-in-time and lean
• Waste identification
• Maintenance and reliability
• Forecasting methods
• Forecast error
• Case analysis and recommendation

Optional Topics

• Project network scheduling
• Queuing and waiting lines
• Simulation
• Sustainability in operations
• Global operations
• Service operations

Resources & Tools

• ASQ — American Society for Quality (asq.org) — certification bodies of knowledge and quality standards; the CQT and CQE credentials are recognised in manufacturing.
• ASME, SME, and IISE — the professional societies for mechanical, manufacturing, and industrial engineering technology; student membership is inexpensive.
• NIST Manufacturing Extension Partnership (nist.gov/mep) — free practical resources on manufacturing improvement.
• OSHA (osha.gov) — free standards, guidance, and the OSHA 10 and 30 construction and general industry cards.
• ASTM and ISO standards — the testing and quality standards manufacturing actually works to; check library access before buying.
• Materials Science and Engineering: An Introduction (Callister) — the standard materials text.
• Your programme's laboratory and its measuring and testing equipment — the reason to take these courses in person.
• ABET (abet.org) — free accreditation lookup; worth checking for any engineering technology programme you are considering.
• APICS / ASCM (ascm.org) — the CPIM and CSCP supply chain credentials, widely recognised in manufacturing and distribution.
• The Goal (Goldratt) — a novel about a factory, and the most effective introduction to the theory of constraints ever written; short and genuinely worth reading.

Career Pathways

• Industrial engineering technologist or technician — SOC 17-3026.
• Quality control inspector and quality technician — SOC 51-9061; a common entry route with clear progression.
• Manufacturing production technician and process technician.
• Industrial production manager — SOC 11-3051; the usual destination of the management courses in this prefix.
• Operations and supply chain roles — planning, scheduling, and continuous improvement.
• Technical sales engineer — SOC 41-9031; frequently the best-paid route out of a technical background, and the reason ETI3690 exists.
• Occupational health and safety specialist — SOC 19-5011.
• Aerospace and space systems technician — a distinctively Florida sector on the Space Coast and through the aerospace supply chain.
• ⚠ Many aerospace and defence roles require U.S. citizenship and some require a security clearance — find out early if that pathway interests you.
• Quality management and Six Sigma — certification-driven and well paid.
• Continue to a master's in engineering management or industrial engineering — ⚠ note that an engineering technology degree is not the same as an engineering degree for professional licensure purposes; check requirements before assuming.

Special Information

⚠⚠ Improving anything other than the bottleneck improves nothing

• This is the single most useful idea in operations, and it is counter-intuitive enough that organisations violate it constantly.
• A process is limited by its slowest step. Making a non-bottleneck faster produces more work-in-progress in front of the bottleneck and no additional output — it costs money and looks like improvement.
• Find the bottleneck by looking for the inventory. Work piles up in front of the constraint, which makes it visible on the floor before any calculation.
• Never let the bottleneck idle. An hour lost at the constraint is an hour lost by the whole system; an hour lost elsewhere costs nothing.
• Local efficiency measures encourage the wrong behaviour. Measuring every machine on utilisation drives operators to run parts nobody needs, because idling looks bad — and that is how factories fill with inventory.
• Subordinate everything else to the constraint, then elevate it, and then find the new one — because relieving a constraint always creates another somewhere.
• Inventory hides problems. That is why lean systems reduce it deliberately: with less buffer, problems surface immediately instead of being absorbed.
• Measure the system's output, not each part's activity.

⚠ Forecasts are always wrong — the question is how wrong and what you do about it

• Every forecast is wrong; the useful question is by how much and in which direction. Planning that assumes forecast accuracy fails predictably.
• Measure forecast error and track it — a forecast whose error is never measured cannot improve.
• Aggregate forecasts are more accurate than detailed ones, and longer horizons are less accurate than shorter ones. Plan accordingly.
• Safety stock exists to absorb forecast error and variability, and sizing it is a trade-off between holding cost and stockout cost — not a guess.
• Distinguish independent from dependent demand. Forecasting dependent demand is a mistake — it should be calculated from the schedule, which is what material requirements planning does.
• Beware the bullwhip effect. Small demand variations amplify up a supply chain, and each tier's safety stock makes it worse — the cure is sharing actual demand information rather than orders.
• Judgement can beat a model when something has changed that the history does not contain, and models beat judgement the rest of the time.

⚠ This prefix spans PSAV certificates and a bachelor's degree — know which you are in

• ETI at Daytona State runs from 0000-level PSAV clock-hour courses through to 4000-level bachelor's coursework, which is an unusually wide range for one prefix.
• The 0000-level courses carry no college credit. ETI0450, ETI0456, ETI0481 and similar are PSAV clock-hour training measured in hours, not credits — a different credential entirely.
• The 1000- and 2000-level courses carry lower-division college credit and feed associate degrees.
• The 3000- and 4000-level courses are upper division, forming part of a bachelor of applied science in engineering technology.
• ⚠ A 1000- or 2000-level course does not substitute for a 3000- or 4000-level one, even where the subject overlaps — compare ETI1420C (Engineering Materials and Processes, lower division) with ETI3421 (Materials and Processes, upper division).
• Confirm with an advisor which lower-division courses feed the BAS, and in what sequence.

How Florida course levels affect transfer

The first digit of an SCNS number denotes the year of offering, not transferability. Courses at the 1000 and 2000 levels transfer transparently between Florida public institutions, and 3000 to 4000 is unproblematic since both are upper division. The boundary that actually matters is 2000 to 3000, where lower-division credit generally cannot satisfy an upper-division requirement.

ETI4640 is 3 credits and approximately 45 contact hours, offered spring at Daytona State, with MAC1105 as prerequisite.

Expect case analysis as the principal assessment. It pairs with ETI4635 (Technical Administration), also offered spring.