Engineering Management Case - Essay Example

?FACULTY COVER PAGE ENGINEERING MANAGEMENT PRACTICE CASE STUDY Executive Summary This report is based on the analysis of an engineering management case in which a professional engineer Fred Merton employed in CoolIT; proceeded with a concerned contract with FixFrig countrywide refrigeration repairing firm, the contract was made focusing on the renovation of frozen food cabinets owned by Buycheap super market. The actual problem was faced by Buycheap super market because its food stuff was not preserved properly, since food storages malfunctioning because of the reason that the frozen food cabinets could not maintain the desired temperature to preserve food stuff. The actual manufacturer Cool Right Refrigeration of frozen food cabinets was bankrupted in the year 2003 and thus could not repair their manufactured cabinets. Therefore Buycheap supermarket looked for a project managing firm that could solve their problem of restoring cabinets to their proper functionality. In this way Fred Merton became the project manager of this project representing CoolIT, the selection of CoolIT by Buycheap super market was made because of the credibility of CoolIT in initial investigations of the problem, the investigations of CoolIT explained the failure which was due to the piping problem in certain areas of the cabinets. However when CoolIT came in contract with FixFrig to repair the cabinets of Buycheap super market, a series of non-professional actions were taken by Fred Merton and his firm. These actions were taken on account of personal relationship as Fred was also a brother in law of Sam (National Repair Manager) of FixFrig. Moreover when identification of controversy arose, it was handled with negligence coupled with unethical friendship and unprincipled recognition of restaurant’s reception. TABLE OF CONTENTS Number Topic Pages 1 Introduction 1 2 Analysis and review of the Case 2-3 3 Liable Firms and Personalities 4 4 Recommendation 5 Bibliography 6 Introduction Human Societies are governed through laws, the application of law starts from an individual to a family, from a family to a group or tribe, from tribes to nation and so on. The fact is that every sector of the human society is liable to act within the junctions of laws. Similarly manufacturing companies whether food producing, medicine making or some other are liable to consumers with in the jurisdictions of law. The liability of a manufacturing firm before the consumers is known as product liability. The main types of product liability are manufacturing defects, design defects and failure to warn defect. The area of product liability is both influenced by social and economic conditions of a society. However engineers managing issues in consultant or manufacturing firms can avoid severe failures leading to product liability by maintaining effective control on recommended procedures. The control must be maintained on both financial and operational processes in an economic venture. The effective use of controls in engineering management is demanded due to various reasons, first is to ensure the safety of consumers, the second is to ensure that the product is working well as it was desired, third is due to the engineering ethics that must be followed by engineers being a part of engineering societies. The case study in this report is also a similar example of product liability for all the entities involved in the chain of maintaining the food stuff frozen including the Buycheap super market, CoolIT and FixFrig. However the actual negligence occurred at the part of CoolIT’s engineer Mr. Fred Merton who ignored the engineering ethics in this case of repairing frozen cabinets. 1. Analysis and Review of the Case Buycheap supermarket had ninety five stores overall in the country with two hundred and forty three freezing cabinets. The food preservation cabinets were malfunctioning and could not retain the desired temperature for preservation of food, resulting in food decomposition before time. The manufacturer of these cabinets Cool Right Refrigeration was bankrupt in the year 2003 and was not in a condition to investigate and repair the food freezing cabinets; Buycheap supermarket calls other firms for investigation in this matter, the initial investigations under Fred engineer of CoolIT along with an expert private consultant Dr Klaus Freezer were appeared satisfactory for Buycheap supermarket. The problem was identified as piping problem in certain areas of cabinet and hence CoolIT was selected to manage the whole project to repair these food preserving cabinets. Fred was supposed to hold all responsibilities of a project manager. Following this reason Fred of CoolIT prepared contractual documents and tender to grant the repairing work to some refrigerator repairing and manufacturing firm. However the problem varies from refrigerant cabinet to cabinet, since Cool Right Refrigerant used different methods for piping installation, therefore every cabinet had to be repaired separately. Therefore the contracting price was set as basic for each cabinet and sum of all costs of specific type of repairs. FixFrig won the tender and signed the contract. Sam Sneeze (National Repair Manager) of FixFrig is also the brother in law of Fred (Project Manager). Fred suggested payment delivery on completion of 102 cabinets repaired without analyzing and assessing the quality of repair. Progress payment is issued 3 days prior to the suggestion of payment for repair of 102 cabinets. In the mean time Fred received a letter from anonymous person who was fired from FixFrig and had worked as refrigeration mechanic. The person in letter told that he was fired on disagreeing on renovation procedure for frozen cabinets. The renovation procedure of FixFrig was only short term; in the long run it could poison the food that could result in illness and even fatality. Fred met Sam along with GM of CoolIT George Greener (Accountancy Background) to discuss the issue without mentioning the letter. On little flattery of Sam the GM of CoolIT was convinced, and Fred was told not to trust fired employees. Sam invited George and Fred in a restaurant which was openly accepted. Sometime after repair, Fred received a letter from Buycheap supermarket manager; that focuses on highlighting improper repairs with contamination of food with mercury and other toxic materials. The same day a child died in Sydney of eating contaminated food bought from Buycheap supermarket. Due to the negligence of Fred such a catastrophe happened for the consumers of Buycheap supermarket. Fred entirely overlooked the ethical bindings placed by the Institution of Engineers, Australia Code of Ethics on him. Fred ignored integrity, practiced incompetently, and endangered the sustainability of his services. He condoned the health, safety and well being of consumers due to his personal relationship with Sam. If he had acted properly as defined by engineering ethics; product liability on his client Buycheap supermarket could be avoided. However if in this situation Fred continued his negligence and negative attitude, he too would be charged in litigation due to claims of consumers about product liability, as he was the important segment of that chain of repairing food preserving cabinets. 2. Liable Firms and Personalities The end product is the frozen food that would be consumed by common men, women and children in the state. Therefore the cycle of product liability would start encompassing Buycheap supermarket, Buycheap supermarket could rightfully involve CoolIT and all responsible figures in CoolIT including General Manager George Greener and Project Manager Fred. Fred would be more responsible in this case because he could face multiple charges; as being engineer it was his duty to ensure that the repair was up to the mark, in advance he was already indicated about the problem but he did not take a serious notice on that, furthermore the actual culprit firm FixFrig’s representative was his relative. This makes the whole case very strong against Fred just due to his insincerity and non-professional attitude during a serious industrial project. However the liability starts from end consumers accounting Buycheap supermarket, Buycheap supermarket alleging CoolIT and CoolIT bringing FixFrig in the process of claims under litigation. A serious analysis of this engineering management case reveals that the true responsible firms are CoolIT and FixFrig that would be claimed, CoolIT due to close association with FixFrig and negligence regarding repair quality while FixFrig involvement is obvious, because of FixFrig’s envisioning urgent and huge earning with improper and sub standard procedures of repair that endangered the consumer lives, additionally an employee of FixFrig was already fired who differed on such dangerous procedures. Hence both the firms would be liable of course in this perspective of unethical engineering and management practices. 3. Recommendation Fred, who is employee of CoolIT and Project Manager in this case; being the centre of study, is highly responsible. Fred should immediately react here since his negligence and reliance on FixFrig had already appeared in a night mare for him. He must immediately respond to the letter of Buycheap supermarket’s manager, explaining all about the misconduct and should instantly ask the manager of Buycheap supermarket to issue a recall of their food products from the market as well as directly from the consumers. Fred must embed the recall with compensation for people who were victimized due to the poisonous stuff. The compensation must be majorly shared by FixFrig and then CoolIT. In view of the recall package and compensation for victims Fred must also ensure that the recall should be enough attractive so to avoid any lawsuit against them and engage the consumers and victims in attractive compensation packages. Fred must develop a strategic plan countering lawsuits against responsible firms; Fred must seek the confidence of Buycheap supermarket so that all three economic entities can jointly face the litigation process. On the other hand Fred must strictly account the FixFrig’s representative Sam Sneeze and should consider no personal relationship in this regard. He must convey the severity of the repair failure and the negative implications of this case for FixFrig and Mr. Sam. Moreover FixFrig must be similarly asked for standardization of their processes and major share of consumer’s compensation should also be accommodated by FixFrig. Bibliography I. Charles E. Harris, M. S. (2009). Engineering ethics: concepts and cases. II. Engineers Australia. (2010). Our Code Of Ethics. Engineers Australia. III. Lewis, J. P. Fundamentals of project management. 2007. Read More