"The role of the operations function means something beyond its obvious responsibilities and tasks – it means the underlying rationale of the function, the very reason that the function exists."The implementer of business strategy.The supporter of business strategy.The driver of business strategy.Two things are important in understanding these roles. First, they are stated in order of difficulty and in order of importance. Implementing business strategy is a very basic responsibility for operations, supporting business strategy is what most operations should aspire to, but driving business strategy is only possible if the operation really does have unique capabilities. Second, they are cumulative in the sense that an operation cannot be a supporter of business strategy unless it has skills as an implementer, and cannot drive business strategy unless it has the skills to support the business strategy.
Listed skills include Six Sigma, Team Building, Business Development, Business Analysis, and 19 others.