THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTHAMPTON NORTHAMPTON BUSINESS SCHOOL MODULE: Managing Operations and the Supply Chain Module Code Level Credit Value Module Tutor STRM046 7 20 Andrew Gough Luciano Batista Assignment 2 Brief Assignment title: Circular Economy Weighting: 60% Deadline: 20th January 2017 Feedback and Grades due: 17th February 2017 Resit Date 2nd May 2017Purpose of the Assessment The purpose of this assignment is to develop your ability to present the fundamental principles of the circular economy and critically discuss how the adoption of circular economy principles can help organisations and related supply chains to increase their economic, social and environmental performance. Assessment Task You are required to discuss how companies that adopt circular economy principles increase their economic and social efficiency and minimise their environmental impact. More specifically, you are required to write a report that provides two perspectives of the topic above: A theoretical and a practical perspective. The report as a whole should be no longer than 2,500 words (excluding cover page and references). Assessment Breakdown Theoretical perspective: The first part of the report should address theoretical perspectives of the subject. For this, you are expected to draw from academic publications and articles fundamental circular economy aspects. The topics you should address are:  Concepts and characteristics of the circular economy  The main drivers of the circular economy, i.e. why it is important and benefits for businesses, society and environment  The role of circular supply chains in supporting circular economy processes in organisations. Practical perspective: In the second part, you are expected to apply the theoretical perspectives above to describe a business model case of a specific company implementing circular economy principles. For this, you should choose a particular company and describe its operations in terms of circular economy aspects. Reports explaining how the company's supply chain supports the business operations will achieve higher marks. Your chosen company should represent a real-life illustrative example of how a business attempts to implement circular economy practices and the economic, social and environmental benefits the company can achieve. You are expected to support the description of your chosen company with business articles from high quality reliable sources such as the Financial Times (FT.com), The Economist (economist.com) or other similar sources. A business case presented with basis on the company's website only will be considered unsatisfactory, i.e. exam fail. You can access electronic versions of business articles through the university library online services and reputable newspapers websites (e.g. The Guardian Sustainable Business reports). Report presentation: In order to help you refine your final submission, you are required to present a short summary (no longer than 10 minutes) of your business case in the timetabled lectures on the 13th December 2016 or 10th January 2017. Your presentation day will be set in advance.Assessment Submission Your assignment must be word processed and presented in a report format with simple sub-headings. The word count should be 2500 words±10% (tables, diagrams and appendices are excluded from the count). The Assignment report should have a Front Sheet showing your name, your student number, the module name, the module number, the assignment title, the module tutor's name, the date and the word count. All assignments will be submitted, graded and fed-back electronically via TURNITIN. Several submissions will be permitted before the hand-in date in order to enable you to refine the content in your report. If you click on the "Submit Your Work" button on the Module NILE site you will find an explanation of the Submission and Grading Electronically process there. Feedback on assignments in general will be provided to the whole group when marked assignments are returned. Feedback on assignments for each individual will be provided electronically via TURNITIN. A student may obtain an individual appointment to discuss feedback with the tutor. Assessment Guidance The quality of your presentation and academic referencing is very important. Please, use the Harvard Referencing System. Within your assignment your tutor will be looking for content that addresses the key elements of the assignment brief. Look at the Check list at the end of this brief. It shows the subheadings to use and offers a guide as to how the marks will be distributed. Use the percentages as a guide to how to distribute your word count. Academic Practice This is an individual assignment. The University of Northampton policy will apply in all cases of copying, plagiarism or any other methods by which students have obtained (or attempted to obtain) an unfair advantage. Support and guidance on assessments and academic integrity can be found from the following resources SkillsHub: http://skillshub.northampton.ac.uk CfAP: http://tinyurl.com/UoNCfAP Learning outcomes The learning outcomes being addressed through this assignment are: a, b, c, d, e, f, g, h Knowledge and Understanding: a) Investigate and critically evaluate the range of concepts andtechniques available to operations managers so as to enable effective business decision making. b) Demonstrate conceptual and practical understanding of the opportunities and constraints that organisational characteristics place on operations managers and on operational decision making in the supply chain context. c) Critically discuss and evaluate the theoretical and real life applications of topics in the indicative content, analysing and evaluating the benefits they offer to an organisation and the challenges to be overcome in implementing them. Subject- Specific Skills: d) Critically evaluate the business relevance of the concept/topic studied, with a view to understanding the value of its adoption to an organisation. e) Design evidence-based and contextually relevant solutions to a range of case study scenarios to illustrate the applicability of the Operations Concepts, Tools and Techniques studied. f) Assess the capacity and capability of an organisation to deliver Quality and Value to Customers both internal and external to the organisation. Key Skills: g) Make discriminating use of a range of learning resources in order to solve problems within the domain of International Supply Chain and Operations Management. h) Communicate the solutions arrived at, and the critical evaluation underlying them.STRM046 Managing Operations and the Supply Chain ASSIGNMENT "Content Checklist" STUDENT NAME AND ASSIGNMENT FRONT SHEET DESCRITION OF ORGANISATION (5%) - Identify chosen company, products/services and main customers THEORETICAL ASPECTS (55%) - Concepts and characteristics of the circular economy - The main drivers of the circular economy; why it is important; economic, social and environmental benefits - Circular supply chains supporting circular economy processes APPLICATION OF CONCEPTS (40%) – Describe chosen company's business model (operations and supply chain) in terms of circular economy aspects - Point out economic, social and environmental benefits MAX WORD COUNT 2500 +/- 10%