Introduction

The objective of this assignment is aimed to critically evaluate a change management towards to the world class operations at Rolls-Royce plc, ascertain a range of reasons for either success or failure to implement a world class operations management and to propose further improvements for the company’s performance. The annual Rolls-Royce report was used a primary source of business data. It was found that the firm’s strategy and operations management conforms to the current trends in the world class operations, i.e. environmental needs, customised quality of products and flexibility of production, etc.; however, certain risks and global challenges may affect a success of the business, leading to losing a share in the market niche.

 Rolls-Royce in Contemporary Business Environment

Rolls-Royce is a global company providing a world class power product, judging on a basis of customer’s demand or a niche market position – “it’s me”, for land, sea and air (Rolls-Royce, 2006). The company has a balanced business portfolio with the leading positions in civil aerospace, defence aerospace, marine and energy markets. One of key factors of Rolls-Royce’s success is continuing expansion of its business globally. In the past five year RR started work on or opened facilities in Europe, the United States and Asia. Company employs over 38,000 employees, 22,700 are in the UK with the balance primarily in the US, Asia, Germany, Scandinavia and Brazil, which represents a global expansion of business operations, human resources for implementation of process and technology, i.e. resources for the world class status.

Rolls-Royce is a highly focused power systems business, concentrating on manufacturing and services of power systems, including a gas turbine engine. There are approximately 54,000 Rolls-Royce gas turbines in service. With annual sales of around £4 billion and a forward order book of nearly £22 billion, its technology is applied over a wide range of products that generate high-value services throughout their operational lives. These operations give a value for the company’s business. In response to increased orders from the market due to A380 production will recommence and Boeing787 production begins (Boeing, 2006), the firm implements a strategy towards to the best operations for turbine engine production.

 Main Strategies in the development of the company

World Class Manufacturing (WCM) is one of the broadest philosophies focusing primarily on production (Lind, 2001). Although Hayes and Wheelwright originally defined the WCM term (B. Flynn, 1997) to describe organizations which achieved a global competitive advantage through use of their manufacturing capabilities as a strategic weapon, there is no consistent definition of WCM (Maskell, 1991). So does Rolls-Royce represents the world class operations management?

In my opinion, the answer is clearly, yes, it does. A world-class organization is an organization that had established itself as the best (RR automotive has been doing it continuously since 1906) becomes the best with new product lines (such as gas turbines) and then sustains itself as the best in its field during a life cycle. It goes beyond TQM (Total Quality Management), which is an adaptive process. It also goes beyond the "learning organization" by keeping ahead of changes. World-class organizations practice Continuous Quality Improvement (CQI) - a management philosophy which focuses on improving processes within an organization. Further these principles of the world class operations will be analysed and discussed.

Rolls Royce delivers the best value to their customers.  They look ahead to satisfy the needs of their customers throughout the international networks.  They possess world-class capabilities, experience and technical understanding to guarantee/certify suit for the market. Hence, they set themselves objectives to ensure the right way they are operating. 

 

Producing High Quality Products

 Rolls Royce main target is the production and presenting the best engine design for using in the air, at sea and on land. Not only the cost of production is minimum, but they provide the best overall value to their customers.

 “Trent 900” is the new type of engine designed by Rolls Royce in 2000 era, which is suitable for civil and defence plane. The engine is stable and saves 30% of petrol.  It is 50% cheaper than other engines. It started the flight-testing in October 2004 and the Trent 900 style entered service in 2006 spring. The customers enjoyed the high quality at low cost engine.

 

Rolls-Royce extends high technology products for its near, medium and long term needs. Rolls-Royce guaranteed that the products and services will continue to meet customer needs over the next two decades and beyond and for this reason this technology is known as ‘Vision’ technology.

 Offering High Quality Services

The group focus on customer services. They have developed an excellent technical support team in organising and supporting for different regions. They offer technical and documentation supports for assisting their clients to operate machines harmless and efficient. Also, they have set up a department for selling spare parts for equipment.

 

Rolls Royce provides training to their customers about their designs  in recent year.  They extend the life of the equipment and also try to reduce their customers operating cost, fuel savings.

Join now!

 A web site is built for their customers to search their prices, lead-times, product descriptions and technical data for a variety of products.

Caring for the Environment

Rolls Royce provides the best engine for the customers for use in the air, at sea and on land. So they understand these products can have an impact on both the local and the global environment. In order to reduce pollution and noise they have done a lot of research and development on the new products.

 

Their goal was to achieve ten percent reduction in fuel consumption of all newly designed engines ...

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