Introduction
<\/strong>The growth of information and telecommunication technologies has contributed to an increase in production capital, a reduction in transaction costs, and an increase in consumer choice. In an era of strongly marked globalization, expressed by an expanded market and thus intensified competitive conditions, Polish enterprises should develop appropriate “techniques” for building manufacturing strategies. Based on existing external constraints (production volume and product range diversification) and internal ones (resource and positional potential), these should provide a lasting competitive advantage. Thus, the process of global strategic management creates a matrix, the most important elements of which are:<\/p>
-
globalization – the necessity to formulate a global mission and goals<\/div>
<\/li>analysis of global resources, competencies, and activities to achieve added value<\/div>
<\/li>analysis of the global business environment<\/div>
<\/li>development of global and transnational competencies and strategies.<\/div>
<\/li>
<\/ul>Parallel to the above, the problem of the possibility and purposefulness of adaptation to the changing environment, changing expectations, and the perception of value delivered by the enterprise arises. The primary goal of the presented work will be to present possible paths for building a manufacturing strategy through the identification of process management procedures.<\/p>
The profit sphere and the manufacturing mission
<\/strong>The goal of an enterprise is to generate profit, and this is possible through building a long-term competitive advantage. Conducting analyses regarding the area of shaping the profit sphere should take place at two levels:<\/p>-
the strategic level, which determines the proper assessment of the possibility and purposefulness of meeting market expectations, which is to condition the sustainable development of the enterprise<\/div>
<\/li>the process level, i.e., the ability to adapt at the operational level to the strategic vision.<\/div>
<\/li>
<\/ul>The enterprise must therefore know the answer to the questions:<\/p>
-
what the value of the product for the customer should be<\/div>
<\/li>whether it is capable of producing this value<\/div>
<\/li>how it can achieve the assumed value<\/div>
<\/li>how it can “plastically” adapt to changes in the level of this value while operating in a changing environment<\/div>
<\/li>how it can achieve the assumed value so as to generate long-term profit (where profit = price – costs).<\/div>
<\/li>
<\/ul>To at least approximately know the answer to the questions posed, one must examine:<\/p>
-
mechanisms of environmental change<\/div>
<\/li>conditions of consumer decision-making processes<\/div>
<\/li>external constraints (availability of resources and conditions for acquiring them, legal restrictions) and internal constraints (resources in the enterprise’s possession and the ability to use them).<\/div>
<\/li>
<\/ul>A graphic interpretation of the above is presented in Figure 1. The adaptability of structures means the adjustment of existing resource structures to perform tasks (functions) other than the previous ones. Maintaining the readiness to perform these functions costs money, which entails a decrease in economic efficiency. It is therefore not surprising that enterprises in turbulent environments, instead of relying on resource adaptability, prefer their mobility, that is, the possibility of their immediate application to achieve any goals. The implementation of analyses must therefore be multi-stage and should be based on the strategic architecture of the enterprise, which is provided by Porter’s value chain. Following Góralczyk, the total value of a product, considered in the space of this strategic architecture from the perspective of the enterprise, is the ratio of the value perceived by the customer to the costs incurred by the enterprise to produce this value. At the same time, from the customer’s perspective, this value is expressed by the ratio of the perceived product value to the costs incurred by them in connection with the purchase of said product. In accordance with the assumptions presented above, the scope of the work will be limited to identifying the “nature of value” perceived by the customer and the consistency between the possibility and necessity of creating this value at the lowest possible cost, which will allow for the formulation of an optimization model of process management. Achieving the above goal will be possible through the analysis of structural links (starting from the value chain) and their impact on the final quality of production, which allows for the construction of quality plans. In accordance with the procedure for building quality plans for each of the enterprise’s activities, a quality plan narrowed down to the production area was built for the purposes of the analysis. Using the translations of dependencies within the value chain, planes of connections and influences of individual components conditioning the creation of the profit zone were created, which ultimately allowed for the identification of a criterion pattern of production quality.<\/p>
The article comes from the journal “Logistyka” 3/2008.<\/p>