FROM THE BOOKSHELF ANDREW RUPPEL,
Feature Editor, University of Virginia
Kaizen or Copycat?
by Andrew Ruppel, McIntire School of Commerce, Among this season's new crop of POM textbooks are the perennial updates of previous editions, as well as new blooms reflecting cross-pollination with current business buzz words. Examples of the former include new editions by Dillworth, Heizer & Render, Krajewski & Ritzman, and Stevenson. Among the new blooms are those by Melnyk & Denzler, and Starr. Fresh `bouquets' of cases have also appeared in case collections by Wharton's Flaherty and Harvard's Hayes, Pisano & Upton. First, some short comments on these two casebooks, then on to the introductory texts. M. T. Flaherty McGraw-Hill, 1996, 598 pages The most magical of contemporary business themes, globalization, clearly characterizes this textþindeed, it is more global than it is POM in focus. A compact book, it contains five useful chapters, 22 cases, and four readings (these provide nice reflective closers to the chapter-case combinations). In addressing the concerns of general managersþthe chapters deal with overall business strategy and improving performanceþsupply- chain issues draw heavy attention. One might say that this is a book for the mature student, that is, one who has business experience and is capable of reflecting on (rather than just recalling) that experience. But the book is also more historical than technical. Thus, the typical 20-year-old undergraduate business student might benefit greatly by reading what has happened in his or her lifetime concerning the dramatic globalization of business. This aspect might be the book's greatest value, and so this text might work in a second POM course for talented undergraduates, as well as for MBAs and executives.
Organized into six parts, this book has less accompanying text
but more cases (27) and readings (5) than the Flaherty book.
Hayes, Pisano & Upton's theme is that the manufacturing process
itself should be a central component of corporate strategy, one
that develops specific competitive advantage. They feel that the
attention given (legitimately) to process performance enhancement
efforts, via such programs as TQM and JIT, has resulted in
neglect of big-picture concerns. More strategic thinking is
needed, say the authors. This book is clearly aimed for the MBA
student.
New Introductory Text Arrivals...
Some Observations on the Textbook Scene
With all the introductory texts before you, one is struck by
their similarity: four-color photographs and artwork, inside-
cover diagrams and memory aids, elaborate cover art (the Melnyk &
Denzler book cover reproduces a Diego Rivera mural). One is
bemused to see an elementary flowchart or PERT diagram tarted up
in 4-color, 3-D format, with drop-shadow effect.
Striving to be pedagogically perfect, they each offer every
variant of end-of-chapter problem, exercise, case, discussion
question, and worked-out example. All manner of instructor aids
are offered by the publishers: overheads done in PowerPoint,
plant tour videos, data disks and software, hotlines, Web pages,
test generators, and full lecture materials on CD-ROM. Fearing
loss of adoptions if something is left out of the text , nothing
is. And so texts balloon to over 800 pages, with commensurate
price and weight gains (now I know why students carry
backpacksþpretty soon they'll have to use roll-on luggage to
schlep all their texts around). Some faculty feel that
introductory texts are providing too much 'hand-holding' for
students (and for instructors as well).
Hard-nosed quantitative topics migrate to end-of-chapter
supplements. At meetings, one hears grumbling about the "dumbing
down" of courses.
I would like to think that all of these `pedagogical features'
are the doings of the authors and publishers striving to
continually improve, Kaizen-like, from one edition to the next.
My sense of reality is telling me that the add-ons are being
mostly made copycat-fashion out of an anxiety not to lose an
adoption because of one single missing feature. "If so-and-so's
text has definitions in the margin, then we've got to have them."
This may help the sales reps in the field, who have the difficult
task of knowing the attributes of their product line (in all the
functional areas of business that the publisher covers, not just
in POM), and that of their prime competitors as well. But it's
really not the basis for sound competition because it's based
more on packaging than on content. Authors and publishers should
exhibit more courage and spend less `packaging' money that needs
to be recovered in
excessively high textbook prices. Courage is needed to identify
what today's business students really need to know about POM and
the ways they can go about learning that material. Let's hope
that some will defy convention and the lure of the mass market
and come up with something that works for the students.
(For an in-depth assessment of the approaches of introductory POM
textbooks, see John Leschke's article that appeared in this
column in the December/January 1996 issue.)
DR. ANDREW RUPPEL is a professor in the QM/MIS area at the
University of Virginia's McIntire School of Commerce. His Ph.D.
is from the University of North Carolina. Dr. Ruppel has received
faculty fellowships from the American Society for Engineering
Education and the American Assembly of Collegiate Schools of
Business, and has served with NASA and the International Atomic
Energy Agency (with diplomatic rank). He teaches in the areas of
statistics and operations management.
Dr. Andrew Ruppel |