Studies two Northern Ireland manufacturing companies, Shirtco and Carpetco, to generate some quantitative data concerning possible attitudinal and behavioural outcomes of quality circle (QC) participation. Attention focused on three variables: (1) the attitudes of QC participants and those of...

The conventional wisdom of managers in the US dictates that improving product quality will increase the cost of making the product which will either increase the price or reduce the profits. Shows that improving the quality of a product or service will not necessarily increase its manufacturing...

Proposes a cost model for parameter design in quality engineering. In this model the total cost is minimized to obtain the best design. The total cost includes quality loss, cost for input characteristic, and cost for objective characteristic adjustment. Presents the best mean level of an input...

Addresses the issue of the adoption of generic drugs by general medical practitioners in the National Health Service in England. The adoption and buyer behaviour of GPs is of central importance to the pharmaceutical industry and to the Government. Reports research based on the theories of...

Focuses on schemes to reduce inventory miscounts from the operational management point of view. An internal audit procedure is devised for identifying most of the data‐entry errors, which are one of the main causes of inventory miscounts during the flow of material through in‐transit...

Takes a fresh look at the nature of the problem of allocating costs and control processes for a variable product mix. Adopts a novel approach called the “Unit of Production Effort” method. The method creates a common measure throughout the production process which can then be used in all...

Retail employment is of considerable importance both to those employed and those employing. The scale of retail employment in terms of umbers and costs has ensured its central place in retail management tasks. The sheer size of the retail employment sector, nationally and internationally, makes...

Too much emphasis has been given in recent years to competition on price and not enough to building customer loyalty through strong branding based on well‐promoted product quality. While this is understandable under the pressures of recession, continuous price cutting and the consequent...

Describes how an LP‐based one‐dimensional packing algorithm can be used to minimise costs in three different multiple‐vehicle shipment planning problems. The three applications considered are: (1) shipping industrial trucks by container when weight is the dominant constraint; (2) shipping...