Customer Reviews

Operations Management for Competitive Advantage with Student-CD

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I have previously reviewed this book, but have recently read it again, and am reassessing my opinions on it. While I still hold most of my earlier opinions, I have a couple of other insights after the second reading.

First, the PowerPoint slides on the included CD are very useful, and are generally well done, but they do contain a number of errors, which should have definitely been caught.

Second, the book gets more mathematically oriented as it goes on, and by the time the reader gets to about Chapter 9, the book makes so many assumptions about mathematical background (that may not be safely assumed, even in Business schools) that the example problems and, more importantly, explanations given, are very difficult to grasp: the chapter on forecasting is the peak of indecipherability. Some problems will just say something like 'using calculus...' and then show what happened as a result (this is especially true in the PowerPoint slides, by the way). What I am saying is that people who have recently had advanced calculus and statistics won't have a problem, but anyone who has been away from higher math for a couple of years will struggle.

Third, many of the case studies, while very well written and illuminating, are clearly taken from company specific corporate public relations fodder. In other words, they frequently read like propaganda. Don't get me wrong, I very much like the case studies, they just seem a bit stilted, though frequently they are the strongest part of a chapter.

Fourth, the book is absolutely strewn with buzzwords. I understand the needs to use specific terms to define specific concepts, and these authors are far from being alone in this misdeed, but sometimes speaking clear English actually helps a student understand the information. I absolutely draw the line when the authors call 'eyeballing' a line on a graph "Ocular Heuristic Approximation" (OHA). (Just a tip for the authors before they write the next edition.)

Finally, the book is filled with color and expensive printing tricks throughout, like color type, inset boxes, lots of color graphs and charts (some of which are redundant), and the like. My point here is that this stuff, while generally nice to look at is not value added, and dramatically raises the price of the book (mine was $135.00) with no increase in value to the students. For Mr. Chase and the rest of the authors: read your own book. Understand what the consumer (in this case students) want and need, and write that book. Don't fill a book with tons of color and fancy typographical tricks and drive the price through the roof. There are many other Operations Management books available for half the price and I recommended a couple of specific titles in my course critique. The book may look nice, but it isn't worth this price.

In summation, I now give this book three stars. It is very comprehensive, and there is a lot of good information between it's covers. If you can grasp the advanced math, put up with the buzzwords, and deal with paying $135 for a single book, this really isn't too bad.

Very repetitive information, which may or may not be a good thing. If you like to skip around a lot, it will be good, because each chapter gives you a tiny background that you will need for the subject matter in that specific chapter. Unlike the other review, I felt that the example problems were terrible. They didn't cover the variables present in the chapter end problems, they were not clearly set off from the text, and they were short on explanation as to why they were using the formulas that they were using. Many of the examples were shown in exhibits that covered several pages, meaning you had to page back and forth to figure things out, which was a pain. Probably the best sections were the technical notes, which were every few chapters. These provided a more practical approach instead of tons of theory and information you'll never use.

Probably the best thing were the definitions, which were highlighted in the text and provided in a summary at the end of the chapter.

Overall, if you are seriously into the manufacturing side of production, it is OK, but if you want good examples to show you the application of what you are supposed to be learning, find a different book.

Honestly, it felt as if the authors couldn't figure out it they were gearing this book toward a production manager or a general business manager, therefore tried to shove everything possible into one long, long, long wordy book. I think they must have been paid by the word. :)

This is the classic university production book. It's not very friendly, not very actual but it has all what a process student needs to know, including some exercises and examples for each topic. Due to this I consider it a classical operation book, there are better books but all or almost all of them have at least one reference to this one.

The text book covers many of the topics of interest in Operations Management. This text book was purchased as part of a MBA program. Unfortunately, the professor is spending all of his time on waiting line theory and linear programming. However, the text book covers forecasting models, product design, job design, facility layout, materials management, production simulation, and many other topics. There is no shortage of material for this topic. All material is introductory.

Great transaction, prompt shipping, book was international just as advertised, 80% off US book and has the same information.

As an MBA student this book was required for my operations course taught by one of the authors. This textbook has problems, the most significant are errors (definitions and formulas) and key omissions (essential formulas and definitions). I recommend avoiding and finding another operations textbook.

Excellent book. Very complete, clear, helpful and easy to apply for those of us that are in the Operations field. Highly recommended.

This is an excellent textbook. We are using it as part of our MBA program. I purchased it used, but is in excellent condition. this was definetly a very good purchase.

Good book / bad class. I'm an MBA student who had a last minute instructor change. Glad I picked up this book cheap, as the instructor was never organized enough to use it effectively.

This book gave me an opportunity to discover a diferent view of the operations management. The development of my career in the company where I've been working for the last five years increases my knowledge and experience to manage a munltinational company.