In this assignment you should analyze a sub-optimal service process. You can identify any sub-optimal process of interest to you, whether it be a service process you have personally experienced or a r

In this assignment you should analyze a sub-optimal service process. You can identify any sub-optimal process of interest to you, whether it be a service process you have personally experienced or a recent news story. A sub-optimal service process is one in which the intended outcome or value of the service was not properly delivered and there was a distinct gap between the service expected and the service delivered. You should critically assess this gap in terms of why it happened, what were the costs and how it should/could be remedied. You should apply the course concepts learnt during the first four weeks of the course. Good examples to use are where you can identify a significant sub-optimal service delivery, and you can clearly identify ways to improve on the ‘value’ currently provided to customers.

Your discussion in Assignment 1 should address the following:

· The ‘service’ you have identified and the ‘value’ it delivers to customers, in the context of the service, and its industry

· How the service is designed, or the core value/‘job’ the customer wants done by the particular service.

· The gap between what is currently offered and what your service design does not do/should do

· Quality of the service, and its role in the competitive advantage of the service and its industry (e.g. reliability, responsiveness, assurance, empathy, tangibles)

· Your suggestions as to how operations management can be used to improve the service

To guide you in this task, you should draw from the following course materials:

1. The lecture slides, textbook and readings from weeks 1-4 of the course

2. The above points that will be used to grade your final work (as well as a general grading guide on the following page).