Operations Management & Decision Making – Planning And Control Assignment
The organisation I have chosen to examine from an operations management and decision making standpoint is McDonald’s, a worldwide chain of fast food restaurants, which are run either by a franchise, an affiliate or by the corporation itself. There are over 31,000 branches of McDonald’s worldwide1. It is estimated these restaurants serve a collective 47 million customers daily2. The restaurants mainly sell customers traditional fast food fare such as burgers, cheeseburgers, French fries, fizzy drinks and milkshakes, in addition to breakfast, dessert items and (in response to growing health concerns in the consumer marketplace) healthier items such as salads and
…show more content…
It was at these times that it was ensured that additional staff with necessary skills (drawing on previous work done on job design) were to be on duty during the times of expected busyness.
A central focus of McDonald’s, much like in any retailer, is Inventory Planning and Control. An advantage McDonald’s and other fast food restaurants have in Inventory Planning and Control is that the vast majority of their stock can be either be frozen (pre-prepared burger patties, chicken products, French fries) or can lost an almost indefinite period without deterioration (Boxes for serving menu items such as French fries or Happy Meals).8 However, Inventory Planning and Control is still something branches of McDonald’s must pay keen attention to in order to attain or maintain the desired level of customer service quality (known as quality management). Buffer or safety inventories (extra amounts of stock which are kept in preparation for unexpected fluctuations in supply and demand) are kept at all times to ensure that customers can be served their desired menu items regardless of increased demand.8 In addition to this, in times of extremely high unexpected demand different branches often
Using Constant Table, we find the value of A2 for Subgroup of n=6 as A2 = 0.483
McDonald’s and Wendy’s are both long-standing dominators of the fast food industry, but although they hold many similarities, they have many distinguishing characteristics which make them different. McDonald's has 36,000 establishments across the globe as compared to Wendy’s 6,500 locations globally. Resulting from the difference Mcdonald's annual income is Twenty-eight billion dollars worldwide, and Wendy's has Two billion dollars from annual income. The high amounts of money incoming annually from Mcdonald’s allows them to put a lot more money into their business more so than Wendy's can. Additionally, McDonald’s food is, while still unhealthy, healthier than Wendy’s higher quality (Calorie and Fat wise) than Wendy's. “The Baconator,” Wendy’s
Kudler Fine Foods founded by Kathy Kudler in 1998 to provide ingredients needed for gourmet meals in one location. Kathy began the company with one store, which turned a profit in the first year. The company now consists of three stores in different cities of California. The organization and culture at Kudler focuses on the customer and the employees. Based on it success in the business, Kudler intends to contract with local growers of organic produce, and in doing so bypasses the old method of
About everyone at some age, at some point or another, and in some country has gotten a sample of American's symbol for fast food through the golden arches of McDonald's. This report will attempt to analyze the external and internal sectors that affect the company's success. The external analysis will provide opportunities and threats while the internal analysis will show indicators of strength and weakness. It will then follow up with critical issues, strategic alternatives, recommendations and implementation. The case studied is found in Appendix 2 of Mary Coulter's "Strategic Management in Action" book.
I, Tayneata M. Starr, decided to discuss McDonald’s for this strategy report. McDonald’s began in the 1940’s as a “mom & pop” bar-b-que diner in San Bernardino, California by Dick and Mac McDonald (“McDonald’s History,” n.d.). In December of 1948, McDonald’s was rebranded as a self-serve drive-in restaurant (“McDonald’s History,” n.d.). The original menu was comprised of nine items, with the staple product being the “15-cent hamburger” (“McDonald’s History,” n.d.). Today, McDonald’s is a publicly traded organization that operates in the United States, Europe, Asia, Africa, Canada, and Latin America (“MCD Profile,” n.d.). As of December 2015, McDonald’s has 36, 525 restaurants in operation, offering products such as soft drinks, hamburgers,
The “Made to Stock” strategy at McDonald’s depends on an inventory of products, with great emphasis on the standard sized patties, which are made prior to processing a customer order. This means that when a sale is made and food delivered to the customer, the products in
Even though Weber’s bureaucracy theory was published in 1922, it is still relevant in modern days. With seventy-one years apart, Ritzer applied Weber’s theory to McDonaldization. In modern days, people can clearly see the success of franchising fast-food restaurants. For example, McDonald. This name has extended its tentacles all over world.In 1993, there are almost 14,000 McDonald worldwide. It earns over one billion dollar a year which what most businesses desire. Ritzer took McDonald’s working system apart and compared it to Weber’s theory. Thus, Ritzer claims there are four factors, similar to bureaucratic characteristics, that contributes McDonald and other fast-food restaurants, such as Burger King, Wendy 's, and Domino 's, undeniably successful. These restaurants do not only sell food but also sell efficiency. It get food ready in a nick of time. In a busy city, like Manhattan, fast-food restaurants are very appealing to workers that have little to no time to eat or cook. Also, it is very appealing and irresistible to most consumers who want to satisfy their needs in the shortest amount of time as possible. The second factor is calculability. It is the quantity and
The McDonaldization theory defines the process of which the principles of the fast-food restaurant are coming to dominate more and more sectors of American society as well as the rest of the world (Ritzer 1). Within McDonaldization there are five different concepts embedded into this theory, which are efficiency, calculability, predictability, control and lastly irrationality of rationality. These concepts are not just used in fast-food restaurants, but are becoming more
In the Fast Food Industry research task, I did an extensive comparative study on McDonalds and Burger King. Paying special attention to Marketing and Social Responsibility areas, I then came to a conclusion of which Fast Food franchise is more successful and made recommendations for the “unsuccessful” company on how they can improve on their current business model.
REFERENCES•www.mcdonalds.com, accessed on 18 July, 2008•www.mcdonldsindia.net, accessed on 18 July, 2008•en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McDonald's, accessed on 19 July, 2008•http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/263943/mcdonalds_strategic_marketing_mix.html?cat=4, accessed on 19 July, 2008•www.kfc.com, accessed on 25 August, 2008
Firms such as McDonald’s and Wallmatt, which operate in the service industry, have branches internationally and nationally. They open stores in various regions of the globe with the primary objective of providing their target client’s with seamless experiences while utilizing this opportunity to expand their business in emerging markets. Compared to manufacturing industries, intangible sales characterise service industries as they greatly rely on people’s ethics, experiences, education. Moreover, the utilization of management in this industry is not yet mature (Lambert, 2008).
Due to globalization and increased competition in the fast food industry, a very complex environment is created for McDonald’s. There are various internal and external environmental factors affecting the functions of McDonald’s corporation and demands for new innovations. The factors are as follows:
The process in the back office can be seen as using ‘just-in-time’ system (JIT), which means all the foods are produced at exactly when they are needed with perfect quality and no waste (Slack at el., 2011). When orders are displayed on an electronic board, staffs begin to reprocess the processed foods like bread and beef to finished foods using specialized equipment and standard procedures immediately. This means maintaining quality while controlling the time in production and delivery (Davy et al., 1992). In the meantime, it is useful in eliminating the wastage, as a regulation set by McDonald’s that finished foods must be thrown away if they fail to be provided to customers within a specific period of time (because the taste of foods will have slight change). The application of JIT is efficient in minimizing work-in-progress inventory, reducing costs and saving space (Bowen and Youngdahl, 1998). The design of the process mentioned previously such as a good layout supports the possibility of JIT, then the use of JIT help McDonald’s has a better performance in cost, speed and quality, which add value to the organization and support strategies.
In the past, Ray Kroc established and stood on the principle of delivering superior “Quality, Service, Cleanliness and Value” to each individual McDonalds customer. It is this principle that has helped us grow into the successful global company that we are today, as we are now the number one fast food restaurant in the world. However, today, several public concerns are threatening our positive image and status. Today, there is an ever-increasing concern for health consciousness, changing demographics, and a list of other issues that are influencing how we run our restaurants. These topics must be assessed and analyzed, to find the best strategies and solutions possible to ensure that McDonalds remains the global
Likewise, McDonalds has also adopted Taylor’s theory to their workforce by identifying the ‘one best way’ of completing the required tasks in each food station, detailed instruction for each carried out tasks and meticulously select and training of the suitable staff with incentives. Since McDonald is a big global franchising business with more than 34,000 stores in 118 countries that sells hamburgers on every continent, well apart from Antarctica, its focus are mostly on efficiency and nothing is left to chance. For example, the hamburger patties are prepacked and pre- measured and delivered to the store in a frozen form that will then need to cook for a certain amount of time and ready for constructing a burger. Considering amount of millions hamburgers they sells everyday, this approach of management have save McDonalds tons of time.