Organization in lines

Choice of competitive priorities—In its simplest form this choice is between seeking high profit margins or high output volumes. Some companies consistently prefer high margin products, even when this limits them to relatively low market shares. Others feel more comfortable with a high-volume business, despite the fact that this commits them to severe cost-reduction pressure and often implies low margins. An interesting article describes David Packard’s attempts to redirect Hewlett-Packard away from the latter approach, where it was nose-to-nose with Texas Instruments, and back toward the former approach.³
This concept can be expanded and enriched, however, since companies can compete in ways other than simply through the prices of their products. Some compete on the basis of superior quality—either by providing higher quality in a standard product (for example, Mercedes-Benz) or by providing a product that has features or performance characteristics unavailable in competing products. We intend here to differentiate between an actual quality differential and a perceived difference, which is much more a function of selling and advertising strategy.
Other companies compete by promising utter dependability; their product may be priced higher and may not have some of the competitive products’ features or workmanship. It will, however, work as specified, is delivered on time, and any failures are immediately corrected. IBM has been cited as an example of a company that competes on this basis; in a sense, so do AT&T and Sears, Roebuck.
Still others compete on the basis of product flexibility, their ability to handle difficult, nonstandard orders and to lead in new product introduction. This is a competitive strategy that smaller companies in many industries often adopt. And, finally, others compete through volume flexibility, being able to accelerate or decelerate production quickly. Successful companies in cyclical industries like housing or furniture often exhibit this trait.
In summary, within most industries different companies emphasize one of these five competitive dimensions—price, quality, dependability, product flexibility, and volume flexibility. It is both difficult and potentially dangerous for a company to try to compete by offering superior performance along several competitive dimensions. Instead, a company must attach definite priorities to each that describe how it chooses to position itself relative to its competitors.
Practically every decision a senior manager makes will have a different impact on each of these dimensions, and the organization will thus have to make trade-offs between them. Unless these trade-offs are made consistently over time, the company will slowly lose its competitive distinctiveness.
Without such consistency, it does not matter how much effort a company puts into formulating and expounding on its “strategy”—it essentially does not have one. One test of whether a company has a strategy is that it is clear not only about what it wants to do but also about what it does not want to do—what proposals it will consistently say no to.
3.
Practical Examples of Continuous Production Management System
1. Production Management System of Oil Refineries
Crude oil is converted into various common products of petroleum i.e. diesel, gasoline, etc. Liquids being used in plastics and chemicals are also produced by a refinery. Multiple units are used in complex and large oil refineries to disintegrate crude oil. Further, the process starts for reconfiguration of the disintegrated crude oil into new products using different chemical-based processes. Large tanks are arranged to store finished products before making them available for transport at different places. This process is a continuous process that functions every day and 24/7 hours in a year.
2. Production Management System of Food and Beverage manufacturing industry
Unlike small organizations where batch production system is more suitable due to limited quality of production, large organizations are required to produce products in high volumes in the most efficient way and so, the continuous production system is more effective in these. Such as Coca-Cola, Amul’s Milk, etc. produces products in large volumes and also, these big brands have enough capital for investment purposes and they use the advanced and latest technology for mass productions of products.
3. Production management system of the paper manufacturing industry
Manufacturing paper is considered a complicated process and includes different processes and machinery in order to convert logs into finished products i.e. paper. This industry adopts a continuous production manufacturing system so that it can produce a huge quantity of standardized products. The continuous production management process in paper manufacturing includes different steps. It starts with putting logs in machines to eliminate the bark and further ground into chips of wood. A special solution is there to cook wood chips and the solution is placed in a large vas known as a digester. The design of digester is made in such form that it is able to tackle large volumes and run in continuous form. Through this running process, wood chips are turned into a pulp effectively. The next step is related to the pumping of the pulp into automated machines and moving it by rollers for pressing and drying.
4. Production management system of the Cement manufacturing industry
A continuous process is an essential requirement in the cement manufacturing industry for ensuring the transformations of the right chemical. Usually, cement is manufactured by crushing raw materials like clay and limestone. After that combining crushed rocks with other types of materials like iron ore takes place and ground with each other. After mixing properly, it is further forwarded into a kiln where it is being heated at a certain temperature. Once there are chemical changes, then materials further run under different other automation processes until the finished product (cement) is produced.

1.1 Mass Production System

This includes producing standardized components of a product in bulk or a large scale. Economies of scale can be achieved through mass production systems due to a large volume of output. Uniform and high-quality products are manufactured due to the mechanization and standardization process.