Piloting Valero With Real Time Management Case Solution

The success of the Refining Dashboards encouraged them to take a further step by launching different dashboards within every plant and unit within the firm so that they can measure the level and performance that each unit is contributing towards the overall revenues of $70 billion per annum which the company had been able to generate. However, the coming years showed that Valero had over signified the role of dashboards and its ability to increase the profit margins for the company.

The analysis of this situation shows that the company had incorrectly based their decisions upon the results which they had seen once the dashboards had started to operate. The real engine for the substantial growth instead was the increase in the demand for refined products that had further caused the price of these products to increase and resultantly, the gap or spread between the prices of refined goods and crude oil, also known as refined product margin, had increased. Once the global recession hit various parts of the world, the reduction in demand led to high deterioration in the returns of Valero and the installation of new dashboards did not prove to be helpful in this regard.

It is a large company which is continuing to expand in terms of technological innovations. The dashboards were found to be least effective in organizations which were performing relatively better. Had the sales, revenues and technological innovations been stable and stagnant, Valero could have seen amazing results, despite the deteriorating economic progress of the world. Even though, this may be considered as a limitation of dashboards for a company such as Valero, but it is also important to note that small and new refinery companies can benefit largely from these dashboards.

2. What management, organization and technology issues had to be addressed when developing Valero’s dashboard?

The management always sets up production targets that are to be achieved by a company. In the development of Valero’s dashboard, one main concern pertaining to the management team was the extent to which they would be able to achieve the set targets. On the other hand, the organization had to ensure that the operations take place in an efficient manner where the development of the dashboard was concerned. It had the responsibility and the authority to demand explanation regarding any issue from the executive and even refinery level along with system operators, as well. The technological issues were mainly regarding the limited extent to which information or data was displayed on this dashboard. Furthermore, even though the data could be refreshed after five minutes, no future technological innovation prospects were expected regarding dashboards.