Title: The convergence of factory and service operations in the 21st century: directions for research and education

Authors: Joel Goldhar, Daniel Berg

Addresses: Illinois Institute of Technology, Stuart School of Business, 565 West Adams St., IL 60661-3691, Chicago, USA. ' Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Department of Decision Sciences and Engineering Systems, CII 5015 110 8th Street, Troy, NY 12180, USA

Abstract: There has been interest in the development of |Services Sciences| as a unique subset of Operations and Technology Management leading to unnecessary complexity and confusion. Traditional |factory| style operations have sought to eliminate inventory and to become more flexible. Services have sought to industrialise their operations to achieve economies of scale and predictability of traditional factory operations. This paper offers an Organisation Theory based-definition of |services| vs. |factory| operations and conceptual arguments for their convergence. This leads to a more unified model of Operations Management where the degree of service vs. product output is a key variable.

Keywords: service operations; process design; operations strategy; operations management; factory operations; services sciences; technology management; organisation theory.

DOI: 10.1504/IJSTM.2009.024090

International Journal of Services Technology and Management, 2009 Vol.11 No.3, pp.223 - 228

Published online: 25 Mar 2009 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article