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Judging OPERATiOns PERfORmAnCE AT An OPERATiOnAl lEvEl? 57
table 2.2 examples of ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ dimensions of specification quality

Examples of ‘hard’ dimensions of specification Examples of ‘soft’ dimensions of specification
quality quality
Features Helpfulness
Performance Attentiveness
Reliability Communication
Aesthetics Friendliness
Security/safety Courtesy
Integrity

being related to interpersonal interaction, depend on the response of individual cus-
tomers relating with individual staff.

Speed
At its most basic, speed indicates the time between the beginning of an operations
process and its end. It is an elapsed time. This may relate to externally obvious events;
for example, from the time when the customer requests a product or service, to the
time when the customer receives it. Or it may be used internally in the operation; for
example, the time between when material enters an operation and when it leaves fully
processed. As far as operations strategy is concerned, we are usually interested in the
former. Part of this elapsed time may be the actual time to ‘produce the product or
service’ (the ‘core’ processing time). It may also include the time to clarify a customer’s
exact needs (e.g. designing a product or service), the ‘queuing’ times before operations
resources become available and, after the core processing, the time to deliver, transport
and/or install the product or service. Figure 2.4 illustrates some of the significant ‘pro-
cess’ times that signify the steps in customer response for two operations – a hospital
and a software producer. One issue for these organisations’ operations is how to define
the speed of delivery. Clearly, limiting it to the elapsed time taken by the core process
(though this is the part they can most directly control) is inadequate. From the cus-
tomers’ view, the total process starts when they become aware that they may need the
product or service and ends when they are completely satisfied with its ‘installation’.
Some may even argue that, given the need continually to engage the customer in other
revenue-generating activities such as maintenance or improvement, the process never
ends.

Dependability
The term ‘dependability’ is here used to mean keeping delivery promises – honouring
the delivery time given to the customer. It is the other half of total delivery perfor-
mance, along with delivery speed. The two performance objectives are often linked in
some way. For example, theoretically, one could achieve high dependability merely by
quoting long delivery times. In which case the difference between the expected delivery
time and the time quoted to the customer is being used as an insurance against lack
of dependability within the operation. However, companies that try to absorb poor
dependability inside long lead-times can finish up being poor at both. There are two
reasons for this. First, delivery times tend to expand to fill the time available. Attempt-
ing to discipline an operation to achieve delivery in two weeks when three are available
is unambitious and allows the operation to relax its efforts to use all the available time.

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