Unit 10 - Achieving perfection

Achieving perfection

Task 7 – Speaking.-  With a partner, act out the roles below, based on the dialogue from Task 6. Then switch roles.

Use language such as:

• How’s that benchmark study coming along?
• How can you be sure?
• The quality management standards on our …

B: Hi Pete. What were the results from the benchmarking study?
A: We got great results. In fact, we're better than our competition.
B: That's great news. But how can you be sure?
A: I compared production numbers. We're a smaller company so naturally produce smaller
amounts overall.
B: I see. But why is that better?
A: Because we're way more efficient. We spend about a quarter of our budget on production.
But the bigger competitors spend almost twice that.
B: I see. They produce more overall, but our methods save more money than theirs.
A: Exactly. In fact, the quality management standards on our production line could be applied
elsewhere.
B: How so?
A: I noticed it while checking the internal benchmarks. As efficient as our production line is,
our marketing department needs work.
B: So what are you suggesting?
A: We take the production best practices and apply them to the marketing department.

Task 8 – Writing.- You are a manager and you have completed a benchmark study. Write a memo explaining the study to the business owner (100 – 120 words). Make up names for the owner and the manager. Talk about:

• What the results of the study are
• How can prove the results
• What you found when examing internal benchmarks
• How the Company can improve

Anthea, We have recently completed our benchmarking study and the results are very
encouraging. We are way more efficient than our larger competitors. We can see this because we only spend about 25% of our budget on production compared to almost 50% by our competitors. So even though they produce more overall, our methods save more money than theirs. The report also considered some internal benchmarks. Although our production line is very efficient the marketing department is not so good. The report suggests that we can improve the company further by taking the production best practices and applying them to the marketing department. 
Martin