Course description
Put your organisational skills to the test and learn to help businesses manage the production and delivery of products and services in an increasingly globalised marketplace. Operations management is all about how to organise the production and delivery of products and services.
- Gain the knowledge and skills to ensure that processes run smoothly, particularly in the face of opportunities and challenges arising from the increasingly global reach of business
- Cover the service, manufacturing, public and private sectors, showing how operations management, project management and supply chain management work
- Opportunity to concentrate on particular aspects of operations management, supply chain management, project management and process improvement
- Prepare for a career as a professional operations, project or supply chain manager
- Strong foundation for progression to a PhD or an academic career within the field
Aims
During the course you will be taking 180 credits in all. The eight taught modules during semester one and two total 120 credits and consists of both compulsory and optional taught units which can be viewed in the list below.
By agreement with the Course Director, one elective unit may be taken from another Masters course - note that all elective units are subject to availability, timetabling constraints and what you have studied previously.
Over the summer period, you will carry out your Research Dissertation, worth 60 credits. Certain units must be chosen in order to become a member of CIPS, and the dissertation must be on a procurement and supply-related theme.
Examples of recent dissertation project topics include:
- The future green supply chain in the retail industry: a shared value strategic perspective
- Evaluation of cost performance in inventory management in reverse logistics
- Using e-procurement to improve supply chain management practices
Career opportunities
The course provides general training for those who wish to take up specialist positions in operations management. For example, one graduate works in the quality team on a variety of projects in business operations around customer satisfaction, and another graduate set up a new company, Xpediency, based in Shanghai, working with UK companies helping them to develop and take advantage of Chinese manufacturing excellence. Graduates can also pursue a research and/or an academic career.