Page 210 - Cambridge IGCSE Business Studies

Cambridge IGCSE Business Studies Section 4 Operations management

TEST YOURSELF
1 Define the term ‘production’.
2 With the aid of examples, explain the difference between ‘goods’ and ‘services’.

3 State three ways of improving labour productivity.
4 What is the main objective of lean production?

The main methods of production

The production of goods and services has traditionally used one of the following

methods:

■ job production
■ batch production
■ flow production.

Job production

KEY TERM In job production an individual item is completed before another is started. Th is
method is normally used for the production of single or one-off /unique items,
Job production: the production large or small, such as a ship or designer dress. Job production usually needs highly
of items one at a time.
skilled workers and specialised equipment.

208

Job production

Batch production
KEY TERM
In batch production a group of items is completed one stage of the production
Batch production: the process at a time, through to completion. A good example of batch production
production of goods in batches.
is the making of bread in a bakery (Figure 15.3). Once stage 1 of the process
Each batch passes through
one stage of production before has been completed, the baker can use the mixer to start the production of

moving onto the next stage. another batch of products such as a different type of bread, or a diff erent product
altogether such as doughnuts.