L-4/T-I/NAME Date: 12/09/2021

BANGLADESH UNIVERSITY OF ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY, DHAKA

L-4/T-I B. Sc. Engineering Examinations (January 2021 Term)

Sub: IPE 479 (Engineering Management)

Full Marks: 210 Section Marks: 105 Time: 2.30 Hours (Sections A + B)

USE SEPARATE SCRIPTS FOR EACH SECTION

The figures in the margin indicate full marks.

SECTION – A
There are FOUR questions in this section. Answer any THREE.

1. a) How are operational and strategic decisions differ to industrial managers for 7
tangible products compared to intangible products?
b) Why do managers need to study the types of demand pattern? Mention 8
specific reasons to support your answer.
c) Healthy Hamburgers has a chain of 12 stores in northern Illinois. Sales figures 20
and profits for the stores are given in the following table. Obtain a regression
line for the data, and predict profit for a store assuming sales of $10 million.

Sales, X Profits, Y
($ millions) ($ millions)
$7 $ 0.15
$2 $ 0.10
$6 $ 0.13
$4 $ 0.15
$ 14 $ 0.25
$ 15 $ 0.27
$ 16 $ 0.24
$ 12 $ 0.20
$ 14 $ 0.27
$ 20 $ 0.44
$ 15 $ 0.34
$7 $ 0.17

2. a) When does the EOQ model fail in practice? How? Explain why it is not 15
necessary to include product cost in the EOQ model.

b) A reputed corporation is both a producer and a user of brass couplings. The 20

firm operates 220 days a year and uses the couplings at a steady rate of 50 per
day. Couplings can be produced at a rate of 200 per day. Annual storage cost is
$2 per coupling, and machine setup cost is $70 per production run.
i) Determine the economic production quantity.
ii) Approximately how many production runs per year will there be?
iii) Compute the maximum inventory level.
iv) Determine the length of the pure consumption portion of the cycle.
L-4/T-I/NAME Date: 12/09/2021

3. a) Using a hypothetical example, explain forward scheduling and backward 13

scheduling. What are the four criteria for determining the effectiveness of a
scheduling decisions?
b) Processing times and due dates for six jobs waiting to be processed at a work 22
center are given in the following table. Assume that jobs arrive in the order
shown. Determine the processing sequence according to FCFS, SPT and
evaluate. Which decision is best and why?

Job Processing Time Due Date

(days) (days)
A 2 7
B 8 16
C 4 4
D 10 17
E 5 15
F 12 18

4. a) Consider three hypothetical examples and relate those to decision making 12

under certainty, under risk, and under uncertainty, respectively, with specific
arguments.
b) Explain why financial controls are important to managers. 8
c) Explain why managers at different levels of the organization have different 15
information needs.
L-4/T-I/NAME Date: 12/09/2021

SECTION – B
There are FOUR questions in this section. Answer any THREE.

5. (a) What are the fundamental differences between organic structures and
mechanistic structure of an organization? Describe six key elements required for
organizational design. (15)
(b) Define work specialization. Despite showing its efficacy in enhancing
productivity in most of the cases, why work specialization is used minimally in
some of the famous companies (e.g., Avery-Dennison, Ford Australia, Hallmark,
American Express, etc.)? Discuss potential reasons. (20)

6. (a) Describe equity theory of motivation. How is Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs

theory similar to and dissimilar from ERG theory of motivation? (15)
(b) Explain two hypothetical examples of Theory X and Theory Y managers where
they cannot successfully motivate their employees. (20)

7. (a) Outline the basic theory of managerial grid. Which leadership style in the grid
do you believe most effective? Why? (15)
(b) MIRROR-HOUSE, an auto mirror manufacturing factory supplies mirror to
nearby Honda plant. Honda expects 600 mirrors delivered daily, and the work cell
producing the mirrors is scheduled for 8 hours. If standard time required for
different operations are listed in the following table, calculate the takt time and the
number of operators required.
Operations Standard time (s)
Assembling 50
Painting 45
Testing 10
Labeling 20
Packing 15 (20)

8. (a) Define quality. What are the consequences of poor quality? Explain. (10)
(b) Describe fixed-position layout with appropriate examples. Mention the
assumptions of establishing layout for high-volume low-variety products? (10)
(c) How do managers differ from non-managerial employees? “The manager’s
most basic responsibility is to focus people toward performance of work activities
to achieve desired outcomes.” Do you agree with it? Why or why not? (15)