Introduction - Operation And Quality Management Issues In Zara
Are you looking for Expert Assignment Writers in the UK? Native Assignment Help boasts a team of highly qualified writers who are ready to assist you with your academic needs. With our commitment to excellence, you can rest assured that your assignments are in good hands.
One of the main motives behind conducting this study is to evaluate the concept of operation and quality management issues faced by the selected company named as Zara. The study will use various tools and techniques in order to explain the issues properly. Based on the issues identified in the study some improvement measures will be suggested and also recommendations will be provided so as to address the issues in detail. The report will be presented to the top executive of Zara with proper proof and adequate research so that they can understand the issues in detail and take actions based on them.
Brief about the company
Zara is one of the biggest Spanish retail giants whose headquarter is located in Arteixo, A Coruña, Galicia, Spain. Zara deals in quick-trendy fashion as well as items that are mainly comprised of apparel, jewelry, boots, and many other cosmetics and deodorants. Zara is also recognized as the biggest fir within the Inditex team with Bershka. The company was founded by Amancio Ortega in the year 1975. The company is also known for its strict manufacturing and supply chain process which gives tough competition to its competitors which are H&M, Chanel, Christian Dior, and Burberry (Ferdows 2003).
Brief literature on operation and quality management
Operation and quality management are two concepts that are identified as the tactics deployed by persistent business companies. Operation management usually pacts with the techniques for manufacturing on the other hand quality management finalizes the manufacturing technique by facilitating client satisfaction. With the implementation of proper quality and operation administration Tools Company facilitates maximum client satisfaction thusly superior business, augmented flow of funds, pleased workers, a healthy place to work as well, and many other safety-related things. Both concepts help a company in making a good place to render services (Truong 2014). In companies usually, both operation and quality management are looked after by two different departments but their motive is common which is to provide better products to their clients. In general, the quality is usually looked after by the administration of the firm, and the quality of the products is usually attained if the entire company segments have properly concerned about attaining it. The various tools and techniques used by a company to maintain the work are:
Cause and effect diagram
Quality planning
Quality assurance
Quality control
Continual improvement (Bamford 2005)
Current operations and quality management issue facing Zara
It is a known fact that Zara has been functioning in the clothing segment since a long time offering its clients with various apparels of a bearable class in addition to nominal costs. On the other hand, Zara has been facing issues in its quality and operations management segment too. A lot of research has shown that though Zara is identified to be as one of the top fashion brand still they face various operations and quality management issues due to which they face tough competition from its competitors. Below mentioned are some of the identified issues and challenges in the segment of quality and management segment.
Outside outsourced production: It has been noted that Zara hugely relies on the exterior outsourced production although maximum functions as well as stock settlements n addition to tactics are yet held, accepted as well as relied in the main office located in Spain. Each time they receive an order the entire of the products are shipped to Spain for last design adjustment as well as inventory supplying. With the deployment of digitalization as well as affiliation with their shop executive Zara might manufacture simple what is presently trending which effect the decrease of unsold products (M, 2013).
Higher inventory costs: In spite of increasing its business within new sectors, Zara actually keeps up with all tasks in their base camp in Spain. With an intention to keep up with its driving position, Zara needs to adjust persistently and enhance its product offerings to satisfy client's needs and pReferences as indicated by their geological area. The outcome is that Zara's functioning expenses will more often increment because of the rising changeability in their orders, which will more often than not bring about higher related stock expenses too. For instance, stock of clothing ought to be sent to Spain for quality evaluation prior to being delivered back to China to conveyance stores; as a result, Zara needs to manage a costly undertaking across its inventory network.
Inferior quality rates: The inferior quality rates reflected by the association make it ready for the contenders to have its spot in the modern business sectors. As the contextual investigation depicts, Zara has been experiencing expansion in the movement of copycats. The peculiarity above might be credited to the way that the organization doesn't make enough of an effort to make garments that can't be imitated without any problem (J, 2009).
Innovation and Change: It can be noted that Zara is always criticised for its same pattern cloth which is almost same as compared to its competitors in that case it can be said that they do not follow the change process. Considering the point of innovation it can be said that Zara make use of old technology due to which their inventory and quality management lags behind and slow down the quality clearance process. This shows that from the technological point of few Zara is way much behind as compared to some of its biggest competitors like Chanel and Christian Dior (T, 2011).
Tools and techniques to analyse the issue
To address the issues that have been identified in the above section, it is very important for the organisation to continuously focus on creating a quality management philosophy that will help them in serving as a foundation which will focus on building relationships with the suppliers of the company along with catering to the needs of the customers. It is very important for the management of the company to focus on increasing the product quality which is delivered by Zara (Song, 2021). Once there is an increase of the product quality, the operational aspects of the company will end up meeting the quality standards of the customers and of the company and will set aside a competitive advantage for the organisation in the longer run. One of the necessary steps that is required for the error to be implemented is a tool for improved communication with the suppliers which will help in creating a coherent QA approach (Xuejie et al., 2019). This can be implemented in the supply chain management of the organisation and will be directly linked to the product quality which will help them in transferring a new communication strategy by increasing the customer satisfaction rates and triggering profitability within the business environment.
However, it can be significantly stated that promoting an improved communication tactic with the suppliers will not even guarantee an immediate rise in the product quality offered by the company. For the purpose of gaining a strong competitive advantage and improving is recognisability among the target section of the audiences, the management of the company will have to apply different too such as quality planning, quality control, quality assurance, and many more that will directly result in affecting the quality of the product delivered by the company (Duoyan, 2021). In order to deliver innovative and unique products to the customers, the management of the company will have to focus on communicating with the suppliers and compelling them to follow an approach which is focused on implementing rigid set of rules. Innovation and change within the business organisation can be brought if the management focuses on implementing transformational leadership style which will help in conducting and monitoring different changes that takes place at all the levels of supply chain and will keep their focus on designing separate traditional behaviour patterns within the organisation of their employees and staff members (López et al., 2021).
Quality planning: The primary function of quality planning is to design a process that will be helpful in meeting the goals that have been established by an organisation under operating conditions. It is a methodology that can be utilised by the organisation when a situation exhibits one or more of the characteristics that can cause difficulty in the business environment (Hyun Park et al., 2017). Quality Planning can be beneficial for them in terms of identifying and analysing several problems that are encountered by the company in their production department along with providing them with standard resolution to address the issue. It can also be beneficial in terms of improving the quality of products along with the following operations that take place within the business aspect of Zara so that the management of the company can focus on allocating several tasks and finishing it off within the right time by developing various aspects of the production department (Hyun Park et al., 2017). It can be said out loud that everyone benefits from planning the quality of services and products offered by the organisation. It is very important to understand and meet the expectations of the stakeholder by providing them with quality products. With the help of quality planning management, Zara will be able to reduce the impact it has on several business areas such as planning of cost, scheduling, project display and many more where it will help in satisfying the stakeholders of the company by providing them with final deliverables.
Quality assurance: Assuring quality will be helpful for the organisation in terms of improving their process controls along with moving the regulatory audits. It will be helpful in creating an improvement and collaboration culture by providing better training to the employees in the management which will also improve workplace engagement and will help them in attaining the goals of the organisation which will bring a sustainable and competitive edge to the business organisation (Hyun Park et al., 2017).
Quality control: Quality control is another effective measure that can be implemented by Zara in order to encourage quality consciousness and provide satisfaction to the consumers. It has been helpful in reducing the cost of production which will mitigate the high inventory cost of the company. It will not only focus on increasing the goodwill of the organisation but will also enhance the morals of the employees along with the relationship between the employer and employee which will enhance efficiency of the staff and bring in productivity. Quality control will effectively reduce over utilisation of resources and will focus on improving inspection costs (Vergara, 2016).
Continual improvement: Continuous improvement within the business organisation and operational aspects of Zara will improve the quality of products along with their efficiency and productivity of the employees. it will also decrease the cost of operational aspects along with reducing waste (Vergara, 2016). It will help in fostering employee satisfaction and create a teamwork culture that will effectively bring a sense of accomplishing the goals established by the organisation. It will eventually focus on providing the customers with satisfaction and will be one of the major aspects which will help the company in gaining loyalty of the customers.
Improvement options
It should be kept in mind that technological utilisation is one of the essential factors that helps in improving effectiveness and efficiency of the company. It is very important for Zara to make a note of improving the efficiency by utilising smartphones and computers so that they can focus on determining effective ways of protecting the business and client information without exceeding their established budget. They can utilise software programs that are particularly designed to improve effectiveness of the organisation and is one of the major strategies that has been particularly designed in improving the efficiency of the organisation without further reducing the product or service quality. It is very important for the leaders of the company to realise that their active participation is very much required in the decision-making processes of the business (Borowiak, 2015). Discussing several ways to reduce the time required by the employees to accomplish a specific set of goals is one of the factors that focus on improving the final product quality. Organisational leadership will also be one of the major aspects which will improve growth and success within the business environment as the leader will be focused on understanding the strengths and weaknesses of these professionals before they make a plan of action and will be helpful in improving the effectiveness of the organisation. It is very important that the leaders understand the skills and strengths of each and every employee in order to mitigate the issues that have been identified in the report. Efficiency is one of the major aspects of the company which requires an understanding of different professionals who are working for Zara and their responsibilities within the business environment so that it can specifically help in improving the abilities and unique skill of the individuals (Berbiche et al., 2020).
Free samples written by our Native subject experts for taking a cheap assignment help in the UK
Recommendation of how to address the issues
In order to achieve significant improvement within the operational aspects of Zara, it is very important for them to analyse their quality framework. Considering the significant improvements of the quality framework which is one of the key concerns of the company presently, it is very important that the organisation and the management focuses on applying the Six Sigma approach and DMAIC tool. This can be one of the most effective means of reducing waste introduction and provide the company with sustainability in their business organisation which can help them receive competitive edge in the marketplace. The various issues that have been identified by the company should be carried out on the supply chain level. In other words, it can be stated that it is the responsibility of the leaders to utilise their leadership approaches which will be helpful for the organisation in redesigning their staff concept of quality management along with promoting the idea of repeatability to enhance the entrepreneurship context within the business aspects of the company. One of the major aspects of improving relationships with the suppliers of the company, it is very important to facilitate proper communication that will focus on transferring relevant data in a successful manner and can be established as a key objective. It can also help in implementing technological devices within the business environment as a means of coordinating activities and work of various departments that can enhance goal attainment and foster business development. It is also recommended that Zara focuses on applying different strategies which is aimed at increasing the standard of their quality as communication improvement is one of the major aspects which is likely to help the organisation gain a competitive advantage in the business environment which is competitive in nature as well as in its target environment. With the improvement in leader designs that focuses on creating value and aims at enhancing responsibility of the staff members, there will be a rapid increase in the efficacy of the supply chain.
Conclusion
So, from the overall discussion it can be said that proper operation and quality management plays a very important role in not only maintaining the company reputation on the other hand it also helps in maintaining class of the production too. The study has also revealed that Zara being one of the top notch fashion brand, still they face various operation and quality management issues due to which they are losing their position in the market. But if they follow proper operation and quality management tools which has been discussed in the study they might fight back their position and retain their clients.
Bibliography
Bamford, DR 2005, 'The use of Quality Management Tools and Techniques: A Study of Application in Everyday Situations', International Journal of Quality & Reliability Management, vol 22, no. 4, pp. 376-392.
Berfield, S., & Baigorri, M. (2013). Zara’s fast-Fashion Edge. Retrieved May 23, 2022, from https://bambooinnovator.com/2013/11/20/zaras-fast-fashion-edge/#more-33581
Ferdows, K 2003, 'Zara', Georgetown University.
Gallaugher, J. (2009). Information Systems: A Manager's Guide to Harnessing Technology: Zara: Fast Fashion from Savvy Systems. New York: Flat World Knowledge, L.L.C
James, T. (2011). Operations Strategy. Bookboon.com.
Truong, H 2014, 'The role of quality management practices in operational performance An empirical study in a transitional economy', University of Minho, Braga, Portugal.
Yide, S., Value Creation Strategy Analysis of ZARA since Internationalization. Academic Journal of Business & Management, 3(11), pp.13-19.
Berbiche, N., Hlyal, M. and El Alami, J., (2020), April. Exponential success through integrated supply chain optimization, ecomotional intelligence and reputation-based leadership: Zara model. In IOP Conference Series: Materials Science and Engineering (Vol. 827, No. 1, p. 012058). IOP Publishing.
Vergara, R.A.G., (2016). Process and Facility Design and Improvement: A Case Study on the Lean Production Management of the Spanish Fashion Retailer Zara.
Borowiak, A., (2015). A Comprehensive Framework for Analyzing Competitiveness in a Case Study on ZARA (Doctoral dissertation, ????? ?????).
Hyun Park, S., Seon Shin, W., Hyun Park, Y. and Lee, Y., (2017). Building a new culture for quality management in the era of the Fourth Industrial Revolution. Total Quality Management & Business Excellence, 28(9-10), pp.934-945.
Song, X., (2021). Research on Cost Control of Enterprise Supply Chain——Taking ZARA as an Example.
Xuejie, C., Chang, Q. and GuangHao, Z., (2019), August. Research on innovation supply chain management in fast fashion industry—A comparative analysis of ZARA and H&M. In Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Education, Culture and Social Development (ICECSD 2019), Guangxi, China (pp. 29-30).
López, T., Riedler, T., Köhnen, H. and Fütterer, M., 92021). Digital value chain restructuring and labour process transformations in the fast?fashion sector: Evidence from the value chains of Zara & H&M. Global Networks.
