Columbia’s Final Mission Essay

Analyze the role of an operations manager, and then determine three challenges that an operations manager will respond to differently within a manufacturing industry as opposed to a service industry.

1) Prepare the manufacturing staff’s calculations for the three alternatives (please refer to the attachments):

1. Identify the key factors responsible for the success of Gordon Biersch to date. What concerns, if any, do you have as the company looks ahead?

The audience’s probable attitude and personality with respect to the Board and its findings are all addressed in the document. The attitude that the audience has is one of grief and distrust in both NASA and the Government. This is made evident in the statement, “The loss of Columbia and her crew represents a turning point, calling for a renewed public policy debate and commitment regarding human space exploration.” By stating that there is a need for renewed public policy regarding NASA’s missions, it is clear that the public opinion about NASA has been tarnished by the accident. They also have the probable objections that the Board was biased and that they do not have any effective results that could help reduce the risk that another accident like this will ever occur. However, the likely attitude that the audiences will have toward the writer are that of hope for the future and America’s return to space. This is shown when the document states, “These recommendations reflect both the Boardʼs strong support for

d. How much overhead cost do you think Bridgeton and the consultants implicitly assumed they would save by outsourcing these two products?

6. Once completing your analysis, what is the opportunity represented by addressing the problem? What is the cost of poor quality? What is the impact on customer satisfaction, retention, and loyalty? How could this help increase revenues? How could this help increase our capacity? How could this improve our ability to improve our process controls?

1. From a strategic management standpoint, why do you think that corporate management at Alcoa delayed taking action for five years as the plant continued to lose money and deteriorate in other operational measures?

1) Compare and contrast the new plant to the old in terms of work design. Identify and rank order the most challenging problems and describe possible solutions.

Issue one from the McKenna text presents two divergent political philosophies from Humanities professor Wilfred M. McClay and Historian Howard Zinn regarding the concept of American exceptionalism. McClay and Zinn provide convincing arguments as they support their contrasting viewpoints with key examples from American history on the question, “Should Americans believe in a unique American mission?” On one hand, McClay offers a belief in the unique American “mission” as interconnecting with our Founding Fathers through divine providentialism. On the other hand, Zinn rejects this notion asserting that restraint from the mythical belief of American exceptionalism will suppress combative desires.

On 1st of February, 2003, the space shuttle Columbia exploded when it re-entered the Earth’s atmosphere after finished a 16 days mission in space. All seven astronauts were dead because of this incident. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) had stopped the space shuttle program for more than two years to investigate this tragedy. In the 16 days period, the astronauts did approximately 80 experiments on different categories, for example, life science and material science [1]. An investigation later has found out that the disaster was caused by a problem on the day that took off on 16th of January.

For the majority of American workers, the ultimate mission of their employer is to make a quality product, with the ultimate goal of making a profit. For my employer, the Department of Defense (DOD), the mission, “is to provide the military forces to deter war and to protect the security of our country” (About the Department of Defense, 2015). Having employees that understand how they contribute to the mission, vision, and goals of the DOD is taught from day one. With the ultimate responsibility of taking life, strong core values are also of high importance. Each component of the DOD create their own statements of how to complete their specific area of responsibility in the DOD mission. For the Air Force, each section all the way down to individual units, develop their own statements on how they fit into the overall mission. The following paragraphs will discuss the Technical Order Home Office’s, core values, mission, vision, goals, structure of the unit, and how the key leaders contribute to the overall success of the Air Force and the DOD.

Unfortunately, there is always risk when it comes to space flight. This makes it difficult to determine what constitutes an “Acceptable” risk. A space agency has many worries such as their reputation with the public and the world, the success of their missions, and most importantly the lives of their staff and astronauts. Engineers are usually technically gifted but lacking in organization. This spawns a need for non-technical managers to oversee the day to day operations of projects and companies. While the engineers worry about the functionality of the project (in this case, a space shuttle), the managers worry about the cost to the company and the infamous pick 2 triangle of good, cheap, fast. This causes a disconnect between the engineers and the management where pressure from anything whether it be the public or CEO, can cause concerns to be overlooked.

Rockwell, the shuttle’s primary contractor, did not support the launch due to the possibility of ice leaving the structure and damaging the thermal shield tiles during takeoff. Their concerns were relayed to NASA, but in such a way that NASA chose to proceed with the launch [2]. Though this was eventually determined to be a non-issue in the Challenger launch, the true nature of the problems that can occur when an object strikes the shuttle during takeoff would not be learned until 2003, when the space shuttle Columbia disintegrated on re-entry due to damage of a heat shield tile that occurred during takeoff [2]--[3].

“The Mission” is a motion picture, directed by Roland Joffe in 1986, about a Jesuit mission that is threatened by greed and imperialism in the late 18th century in the Brazilian jungle. Father Gabriel, played by Jeremy Irons, climbs the mountains of Brazil to bring Christianity to the natives. He is successful and brings about a golden age among them. Mendoza, played by Robert De Niro, a slave trader, kills his brother, Felipe played by Aidan Quinn, in a fit of rage over a woman named Carlotta, played by Cherie Lunghi. Only Fr. Gabriel's leadership prevents his suicide. Gabriel brings Mendoza to work at his mission with the natives, and Mendoza finds peace and asks to become a priest. The Church, under pressure, gives the land up to the

1. How would you do analysis of environments so that the company to be able to respond to modern conditions?