Q Assignment #1: Operations Strategy Paper - 20 points This assignment is based on your reading the required supplemental reading by Treacy and Wiersema on value disciplines. The link is posted in Module 2 in D2L Brightspace. Once you've read the article, select a business or organization with which you are familiar, or can find some information about, stating which one of the three value disciplines you believe they operate under as their primary strategy (choose customer intimacy, product leadership, operational excellence). This model suggests that it is only possible to pursue one strategy as the primary strategy, and while you may be tempted to say why they operate under more than one, pick the one that you think is primary and save yourself the extra work. The first paragraph should introduce the business you have selected and plainly state which strategy you believe they operate under. Your next paragraphs should substantiate your choice. This paper should be two pages double-spaced, but you should fill up all of the two pages and place any additional resources used on the third page. Please follow the assignment formatting instructions listed in the Policies and Guidelines document in the Content area of this course. Submit your paper through the Assignment tool. Be sure you add your name to your paper. I recommend conducting some research on the company's to shore up your opinion, even if you know the company well. However, use statements found in external resources sparingly and make sure they are relevant to this assignment. Do not be tempted to copy and paste a lot of material from the company's Web page, especially if it does not contribute to substantiating the strategy choice you made in the first paragraph. If you choose to use any sources other than yourself, be sure you cite those sources at the end of the paper. If sources are used, but not cited for this or any paper, your homework will be returned, ungraded. When you have a lot of personal knowledge about a business and use your own information (for example, because you have worked there), you need to state right at the beginning how you have come to know this information. Other Tips: 1. Just because a company has really good customer service, don’t be quickly wooed into thinking that it operates by the customer intimacy strategy. ALL strategies can have great customer service. So dig deeper...look for other evidence that substantiates your choice. 2. If you select a company using the customer intimacy strategy, try to support your arguments with aspects of the business’ operations beyond good customer service, such as target marketing, strategies to maintain your service over the long run, data gathering, etc. Don’t just address customer service or customer offerings. Conduct research, don’t just talk off the top of your head. 3. Be careful not to slide into making support statements primarily from the perspective of a customer or employee (your own personal shopping or work experience). Of course, it is our experiences in these roles which allow us to think how what strategy a company may be using. However, in this class, and for this paper, please think this through from the perspective of management as best you can. Include not just the things you notice as a customer or employee (use much less of that) in favor of things that you can think of or find through research about how the company’s its activities and operations are set up to support the value discipline you choose. Here’s an example: If you decide on using Amazon.com as your business and decide they operate under the Operational Excellence strategy, veer away from making a lot of statements such as: • Amazon offers some services that make shopping with them more enticing • Their website is very easy to use • One thing that makes Amazon very appealing is the astronomical amount of items you can choose from Instead, think about how you can frame this up as if you researched some management practices. If there are services offered to make shopping more enticing, why has Amazon set these up – for what purpose? If you don’t know the answer or can’t think of things, then yes, do some research. You are encouraged to dig a little deeper and not strictly talk off the top of your head. 4. If you select a business which operates by the product leadership discipline, such as Apple or 3M, do not just provide examples of all the new products they release or state that they are the first to introduce these products. True, that is important, but then go on to substantiate other hallmarks of the discipline, such as the portion of their budgets spent on R&D (research and development), the type of scientists or researchers hired to develop new products, anything about their new product development cycle, or how their processes are set up to be first to market. You can find these things by doing some research. A paper simply listing many examples of their new products won’t be a quality submission. 5. Students who do some external research to support their arguments tend to get higher scores. It shows that you are thinking through the hallmarks of a particular value discipline and finding activities related to process, quality, supply chain or any operational aspect that justify the value discipline being discussed. Even if you have worked at this company, you’ll do better if you research it, or research a similar company that uses the same value discipline you’ve selected. Following all these hints will help your score immensely. Good luck!