Orphanage Education System Operations Management Analysis

by @00539418

Operations and Information Management

Professor Alin Stefaniu
The University of Salford
Salford, Manchester
13 October 2019
Effective Word Count: 3192
 ABSTRACT

This paper analyzes the operations of the education system of an orphanage in Lebanon. It

will discuss the management of the assets and inventories within the orphanage’s education

system and whether they are managed as well as they could be. The paper will also cover

the operations within the orphanage and present its operational flow. The alignment of the

operational performance measures will be criticized, and a lean approach will be suggested

to aid in any failures in the system.

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 TABLE OF CONTENTS

1 An Introduction…………………………………………………….……………………….… Page 4

2 Inventory Management……………………………………………………………………... Page 5

3 The Operational Flow…………………………………………………………………………. Page 7

3.1 The Key Operations……………………………………………………………………. Page 8

4 Operational Performance Measures……………………………..……………………. Page 10

4.1 Failure of Delivery System to Align with Operational

Performance Measures……………………………………………………………… Page 10

5 Lean Approach to Reduce Failings………………………………………………………. Page 12

5.1 The Chosen Lean Approach………………………………………………………… Page 14

6 The Lean Approach’s Potentials in Performance Measures Alignment.. Page 14

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 ORPHANAGE EDUCATION SYSTEM OPERATIONS MANAGEMENT ANALYSIS

1 An Introduction

Lebanon is a small country that hosts refugees from its war-affected neighboring

countries: Syria and Palestine. Due to their vulnerable status, many children end up needing

to live in care systems such as the orphanage this paper is discussing. As well as the orphans

and vulnerable children that come to the orphanage from these countries, the orphanage

also hosts children from its own country that have been orphaned or are in a vulnerable

state. The children are sent to live at the orphanage by court decision. Similarly, no child can

leave to live with their parents without the court’s decision.

The children living in the orphanage are in need of an education and so the orphanage has

an education system in place that is a department of its own. The education department

provides several services to the children at the orphanage, with several outcomes in mind

depending on the specific child. It has its own on-site education system to support the

children that are able to attend the public-school system. This on-site education system is

also available to support those children that are too old to attend school but need some

basic education before being let out into the world.

Therefore, it has to manage applications to schools with limited paperwork (some children

have no identification papers), it also has to ensure school supplies are available for both its

on-site school as well as supplies to send with the children in public school. The education

department also must recruit and train its own teachers for the on-site education system.

The education department has chosen to implement special classes (such as Coding and

Robotics) as well as activities (such as trips and fun days with themes) to ensure that the

children are exposed to as much of a well-rounded atmosphere as is possible.

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2 Inventory Management

Although the transformed ‘items’ are the children themselves, the orphanage’s

education department has assets of its own that are available to allow the education system

to run. For the sake of this paper, the children will be referred to as the customers in this

process and therefore they are the inventory: the transformed resources. However due to

the unique nature of how they end up at the orphanage (by court order), the children will

be treated more as actual inventory rather than paying clients for whom capacity needs to

be adjusted.

The orphanage has a space for fifty children however chooses to cap the number of children

living within its walls at forty. This can be done because the orphanage has the right to

choose not to house a child due to its limited resources. From a capacity perspective the

orphanage takes the “Level Capacity Plan” approach, in that regardless of what demand

looks like (more orphans or vulnerable children to be taken in) it will continue to maintain

its capacity at forty children. Although the orphanage can house fifty children, it will not risk

changing its capacity with demand due to the delicate nature of the ‘inventory’. The level

capacity plan was chosen with rules, regulations, and policies in mind. The orphanage is also

clearly a not-for-profit organization, and consequently will not base its inventory

management based on any gain in revenue. Although it has an infinite customer source as

well as a queue to manage, it will remain largely restrictive with regards to the number of

customers in process. Hence the orphanage is able to reject customers in the queue,

whereas the customers themselves have a low ability to object to the queue through

balking. The orphanage responds to its customers through a first-come-first-serve queue

discipline, as long as capacity has not been reached.

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It would seem logical, in the case of the orphanage, to refer to its inventory also as the

current ‘work-in-progress’.

The orphanage does not often have the power to make day-to-day inventory

decisions. If inventory is low, a low number of children living there, the orphanage cannot

simply ‘order’ more orphans and vulnerable children. Its case is unique in that its inventory

is assigned to it. Its only available inventory decision is to not accept a child when

presented. This reveals that the orphanage does not need to consider costs related to

purchasing and ordering inventory. Nor does it have to plan in advance for stock. The most

it can do is to alert the courts that there are available spots for children to be housed there

and must wait for the customer to be delivered, if any.

The orphanage does not have different priorities assigned to different children. Each

‘item’ in its ‘inventory’ has the exact same value and thus the ABC system is not applicable

there. However, the orphanage must update its records on the number of children it is

currently housing, with exact details on their backgrounds. Each time a new child is

admitted to the orphanage, it will update its records to account for the new addition to its

‘stock’.

It is imperative to note that the education department has no choice as to which of

the children it is to accept into its processes. All of the children living in the orphanage must

attend the education system(s) provided by the department. Although it is likely that a child

may choose not to cooperate, they will still be treated as a customer and will still take up

one spot in the ‘inventory’ and will eventually be transformed in the process. As it will be

seen in the next section titled “The Key Operations”, each child will eventually attend

vocational training before leaving the orphanage, which is one of the final processes in the

operations of the education department. This has been mentioned to stress on the point

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that each customer in the system will eventually be transformed and therefore fully

processed.

3 The Operational Flow

The operations within the education department at the orphanage works both as the

functional operations as well as the activity operations. It both transforms the children as

well as manages the processes within the education department.

The volume of production at the orphanage’s education department is low in comparison to

most other production systems. There is high variety and very low systemization in the

system. Although the system itself is defined, it is not possible to systemize a process when

dealing with human beings, especially in a welfare system. Simple tasks are repeated, such

as classes are ongoing, and teachers are continuously trained and followed-up with.

However, most tasks do not fall into the category of repeatability as they are completed on

a needs basis, whenever a certain occasion may arise with a particular child.

The education system provides the children with high variety, where it tailors its responses

to their specific needs. This is especially true when a child begins approaching the date on

which they must depart the orphanage; their vocational training is tailored to fit their needs,

abilities, and personalities. Thus, the process must be flexible in order to match the needs of

the customer with all the complexity involved.

There is little to no variation that this orphanage currently experiences. This is because it is

apparent that the crisis that the children have come from will not change any time soon.

Unless there is a sudden change in the economic and safety components of their homes and

home countries, it is likely that the variety will not change. Children will simply be sent to

the orphanage when found on the streets or extracted from an abusive situation.

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The customers (children) are exposed to virtually the entire process, and so therefore the

operations process of the education department within the orphanage is highly visible to

the customers. With the exception of planning, preparation, and staff trainings, the visibility

of the process is extremely high. The staff within the process are well trained for their high

levels of contact with the customer. Due to the delicate nature of the customer, there is a

high received variety that is experienced within the process and thus places pressures on

the education system to be able to keep up with each child’s demands (be it school supplies,

help with specific homework and projects, assistance in times of overwhelming emotions,

and so on).

3.1 The Key Operations

Figure 3.1 - Operational Flow of the Orphanage Education Department

Figure 3.1 (above) depicts the operational flow of the orphanage’s education

department in a logical style. Although there is high flexibility and variety within the

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processes themselves, the overall operational flow has a consistent and logical formatting in

which it will eventually reach its end result, no matter how slow.

The key operations involved in the production system portrayed in figure 3.1 include

the “Assessment for Education Allocation”, in which the transformed products (children) are

thoroughly tested to ensure that they are placed in the correct grade level as well as to be

given the appropriate support that they will need to guarantee their success in school. It

also will include applying for the child to attend a public school, including dealing with all of

the issues that may arise due to a child’s lack of official documents.

The second key operation is where the child is “Given Stationery and Books”. This is where

the supplies manager will process the child’s needs in order to create a

The third key operation would be the “Attending of the Public Schooling System”, where the

child begins and is processed through the part of the operations where he or she is

educated and supported up until the day of graduation.

The fourth key operation would be “Attending of Vocational Training”, where the child is

processed in order to be placed at an appropriate vocational training that matches their

abilities, skills, and needs. The child’s abilities and skills are evaluated and then depending

on the unique needs of a child, efforts are made to search for and find the most suitable

vocational training in order for them to have a head start at adult life.

The fifth key operation is “Getting Debriefed and Prepared for Adult Life”. At this section of

the operations process, the child is mentally prepared by trained staff for their journey

ahead. A job is secured for them before leaving and a sum of money is given to the child in

order to help them with their first days alone as an adult.

The sixth and final key operation is “Allowed to Leave and Begin Life as an Adult”. This is the

final stage in the process where the transformed ‘product’ is ready. The customer has

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received the service provided to the fullest and is ready to take the product of the intangible

service out with them to the world.

4 Operational Performance Measures

“Getting good performance measures in place is the first step a company should take

on the path to improving quality, productivity, sales, and profits” (Kaydos,W. 1999. p. xi). Of

the five main operational objectives (quality, speed, dependability, flexibility, and cost) that

any production system may aim for, the orphanage’s education system focuses on three

main objectives: quality, dependability, and flexibility.

Operations Performance Process Design Objective

Objective
Quality Qualitative education
Highly capable staff
Ensure customers have what they need
Successful graduation from school
Useful skills gained by customers to be used as adults
Dependability Be available for customers when needed
Ensure customers will successfully receive full service
On-time delivery of each process within the operation
Flexibility Change easily with unique customer demands and needs
Ability to cope with unexpected events
Adapts to changes when needed
Table 4.1 – The Orphanage Education Department’s Operational Performance Measures

4.1 Failure of Delivery System to Align with Operational Performance Measures

The delivery system of the education department’s operations may fail to align its

operational performance measures (outlined in table 4.1) at some points in its production

system (displayed in figure 3.1). This section will identify two points where this may occur.

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 The first point at which failure to align to operational performance measures within

the production system may occur is at the parts of the operations where the customer is

sent to external public schools to educate the children. Although it is more cost effective to

have children sent for formal schooling to outside contractors, it is a large risk on the

“quality” performance measure. The education department considers quality of the utmost

important, however continues to outsource its main purpose, the education of the

customer.

When the child is sent outside the orphanage’s education department to be educated, there

is a high risk that the child is not educated properly and is treated wrongly by people with a

lack of training on how to deal with orphans and vulnerable children. In fact, it has already

been the case on several occasions that the children have experienced low-quality service

from those external contractors that they are sent to receive schooling services from. The

educators in those organizations have no prior knowledge or training on how to speak with,

educate, and interact with children from underprivileged backgrounds and trauma. This has

caused a number of issues for the children that the orphanage education department has

had to deal with.

The second point at which failure to align to operational performance measures

within the production system may occur is at the parts of the operations where the child is

sent for vocational training. As with the public school, the vocational training is outsourced,

and the transformed resources are sent to the training center. This is both costly and risky in

terms of quality and dependability. Although it aligns with the flexibility performance

measure.

Sending the children to an outside organization for their vocational training needs poses a

risk for dependability. This is because it is unknown whether the child will receive the

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correct training within the right timeframe before having to officially leave the orphanage.

This is a large risk when it is the lives of the customers that are at hand.

For the sake of less repetition, it shall only be mentioned here that the vocational training

poses the same risks to the quality performance measure as does the public-school

education.

5 Lean Approach to Reduce Failings

The lean approach has plenty of revolutionary and clever concepts that have without

a doubt assisted plenty of organizations to smooth out their production processes as much

as possible. “The ultimate goal is to provide perfect value to the customer through a perfect

value creation process that has zero waste” (Lean Enterprise Institute, 2019). However, the

lean approach is ‘approached’ differently within a service organization, and even more

uniquely within a not-for-profit orphanage such as the one being analyzed in this paper.

Consequently, the lean approach will be tailored to fit the organization at hand, in almost

the same way as it would probably have been tailored to fit any organization.

This section of the paper will discuss the potential reduction of the failings discussed in

section four of this paper by using ideas and methodologies from the lean approach.

Both of the possible failings in the delivery system that were discussed in section

four could potentially be reduced by the lean approach’s concept of “Involving Everyone”,

“Continuous Improvement”, and by “Eliminating Waste”.

By involving everyone in the process, there will be a chance to have current staff trained to

be multi-skilled and thus possibly be able to both fully educate the children at the home

rather than send them off to public school, as well as to train them with useful skills rather

than send them off to vocational training. By including everyone in team problem solving

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sessions, the staff can also come up with unexpected methods of reducing the lack of

quality in the public education system’s dealing with the children. Taking advantage of job

rotation means that the current staff at hand may possibly rotate within the new skills that

they have gained to provide all the services in-house, rather than outsource education and

vocational training.

Continuous improvement itself is a belief system. If the organization aspires to involve

everybody in continually improving the systems and processes, there will always be

something new that is adjusted and streamlined. This is simply a concept, albeit an

important one. It can be used as the driving force behind unceasing progress in refinement

of the processes. The most useful way to take advantage of continuous improvement would

be to work towards getting the orphanage’s education department certified to be able to

provide graduating children with at least a nationally recognized diploma.

Due to the orphanage inherently being a not-for-profit welfare service, there is a

uniqueness when considering how to or from where to eliminate waste. Of all the possible

options available, waste could probably be eliminated through the reduction of transport. If

the education and vocational training are both processed in-house rather than being

outsourced, then the time and funds spent to transport the children that were previously

‘wasted’ would be eliminated. The waiting time for each child to be found and assigned a

proper outsourced training would also be eliminated as they can each begin training almost

immediately after education has been completed. Similarly, the in-house vocational training

could be taken advantage of by beginning to train the child even before he or she has

successfully completed schooling. These in turn will eliminate the waste of the extra

processes that take place to get a child enrolled in public schools and so on.

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 5.1 The Chosen Lean Approach

After having considered the options discussed above, it seems clear that they are all

interlinked, and one cannot exist or progress without the other. It seems that all of the

concepts can be covered when taking the “Eliminating Waste” approach.

In order to eliminate waste, the operations of the education department at the orphanage

will have to involve everyone as well as continuously improve its processes. Thus, for the

sake of this paper, they shall all be examined under one lean approach option for simplicity

reasons.

6 The Lean Approach’s Potentials in Performance Measures Alignment

The lean approach chosen, “Waste Elimination”, has been chosen as it is the most

flexible approach of all in that the other approaches can be combined within it to reach the

aim of waste reduction or elimination.

The waste elimination approach will help the orphanage’s education system align to its

quality standards by training in-house staff to give both vocational training as well as

education (which will also require the improvement of the process through certification).

The waste elimination approach will help the orphanage’s education system align to its

dependability standards by being able to ensure that the service is being provided in a

timely manner as well as without a waste in transport time and costs.

The waste elimination approach will help the orphanage’s education system align to its

flexibility standards by continuously improving and streamlining its processes to be able to

provide as much as possible in-house, without outsourcing. This will lead to multi-skilled

staff that are capable of responding to even more complex and unique cases or situations

that may arise than they were able to before.

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 REFERENCES

Kaydos, W. 1999, Operational Performance Measurement: Increasing Total

Productivity, CRC Press, Florida

Lean Enterprise Institute. 2019, What Is Lean?, accessed on 11 October 2019,

<https://www.lean.org/WhatsLean/>

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