M.Phil. / Company XYZ is a marginal copper and nickel mine relying on emergency funding from the government in order to make it through difficult cash-flow periods. Previous change initiatives within the organisation have failed dismally. Changes within the organisation are however inevitable in order to prevent Company XYZ from closing down. This research proposes to study certain management philosophies and methodologies being used within Company XYZ, with a view to implementing change initiatives in order to ensure survival of the organisation. This was done by, comparing current management practices found in Company XYZ with literature. Topics include the direction in which the organisation is moving, the vision, management philosophies, reliability/quality and the restructuring of the organisation. A literature review of business process re-engineering was performed and a comparison to total quality management was made. Management philosophies were investigated and it is recommended that Company XYZ adopt Demings management philosophy as it focuses on quality, continuous improvement and employee involvement. Demings' 14 points were highlighted and the benefits were related to Company XYZ. The smelter is maintenance intensive and suffers from breakdown maintenance. As a result, it is recommended that reliability centred maintenance principles are implemented. Company XYZ further need to introduce design review meetings in order to improve the quality in which modifications are implemented. Along with business process re-engineering, four organisational designs were investigated, i.e. the functional organisation, the product organisation, the matrix organisation and the network organisation. Due to the size and complexity of the organisation and the need to focus on business objectives, it is recommended that Company XYZ adopt the network organisational structure and it is further recommended that the smelter focus on processes. Therefore the smelter is to be viewed as a business unit and based on the advice of BPR practitioners it is recommended that the smelter focus on processes. In order to ensure that the proposed changes are implemented successfully, the issue of change management and the importance thereof was investigated. Factors that can affect the change process were highlighted.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:uj/uj:9918 |
| Date | 10 September 2012 |
| Creators | Opperman, Shane Gary |
| Source Sets | South African National ETD Portal |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
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