Part 06: You Make The Decision: Controlling

Step in Control Model What should you do? A. Agree with Katherine, and require mandatory training sessions with the housekeeping staff. B. Agree with Brian and lower the standard of performance to have 70% of guests "completely satisfied".

A. Agree with Katherine, and require mandatory training sessions with the housekeeping staff.

How to Address a Problem As manager of Creekview Lodge, what is your next step in addressing the problem? A. Take immediate action and require that all rooms be inspected by the hotel manager (you) or an assistant manager before being made available to customers B. Review the standards of performance and compare to current performance

A. Take immediate action and require that all rooms be inspected by the hotel manager (you) or an assistant manager before being made available to customers B. is correct

Benchmarking What do you tell her? A. Suggest that she choose a few of the best performing hotels in the area and determine what criteria she will be collecting data for. Katherine can review industry reports and online travel sites to gather data. B. Suggest that she look at as many hotels in the area as possible and determine what criteria she will be collecting data for. Encourage her to approach employees of the competitor hotels to interview them on their hotel's processes.

A. Suggest that she choose a few of the best performing hotels in the area and determine what criteria she will be collecting data for. Katherine can review industry reports and online travel sites to gather data.

Feedback Grade 66%

Although your answer to the first question about The Control Model is incorrect, your answers to the next two questions show that you have a good understanding of the balanced scorecard and benchmarking as part of Total Quality Management. Go back and review the material in the text about the control model for a better understanding.

How to Address Problem (2nd attempt) As manager of Creekview Lodge, what is your next step in addressing the problem? A. Take immediate action and require that all rooms be inspected by the hotel manager (you) or an assistant manager before being made available to customers B. Review the standards of performance and compare to current performance

B. Review the standards of performance and compare to current performance

Benchmarking What do you tell her? A. Suggest that she look at as many hotels in the area as possible and determine what criteria she will be collecting data for. Encourage her to approach employees of the competitor hotels to interview them on their hotel's processes. B. Suggest that she choose a few of the best performing hotels in the area and determine what criteria she will be collecting data for. Katherine can review industry reports and online travel sites to gather data.

B. Suggest that she choose a few of the best performing hotels in the area and determine what criteria she will be collecting data for. Katherine can review industry reports and online travel sites to gather data.

Immediate Action What perspective of the balanced scorecard is affected in this situation? Internal business processes perspective Customer perspective

Customer perspective

Feedback 100%

Good job! Your answers suggest that you have a good working knowledge of organizational control and its key role in the management function.

Mandatory Training

Katherine is curious how other hotels in the area are performing in customer satisfaction and how they train their employees. Katherine approaches you about the idea of benchmarking Creekview Lodge against some of the hotel's local competitors. She isn't sure where to start and asks for your opinion.

Customer Perspective

One of the assistant managers, Katherine, is curious how other hotels in the area are performing in customer satisfaction and how they train their employees. Katherine approaches you about the idea of benchmarking Creekview Lodge against some of the hotel's local competitors. She isn't sure where to start and asks for your opinion.

Review Standards

After reviewing the standards of performance, you find that the hotel has determined that the standard of performance for room cleanliness requires that 75% of customers respond "completely satisfied". You decide that corrective action is needed in order to raise the customer satisfaction rating. You meet with your assistant managers, Katherine and Brian, to discuss the situation. They each offer a different suggestion on what you should do next. Brian thinks the housekeeping staff is doing a great job at cleaning the rooms. The problem, he thinks, is that customers have become too picky and expect a five star hotel at three star prices. He suggests that you lower the standards of performance to 70%. Katherine disagrees and thinks you should hold mandatory meetings in order to retrain the housekeeping staff. Even though customers are picky, the hotel should be able to rise up and meet the current standard of performance.

Introduction

You have recently been promoted to General Manager at Creekview Lodge, a 50 room hotel in Gatlinburg, Tennessee. You started working at the lodge in high school in the restaurant and after college, returned to Creekview as one of the assistant managers before being promoted to hotel manager. Recently, a 200-room hotel opened not far from Creekview Lodge, and although Creekview still maintains near 100% capacity there has been quite a bit of turnover. More than ten employees left to work for the larger hotel which boasted higher pay and better health insurance. You were informed this morning by the front desk team that the latest customer survey results show a drop in the satisfaction rating for guest room cleanliness. The current report indicates that 73% of guests responded "completely satisfied", 12% responded "satisfied", 10% responded "neither satisfied nor unsatisfied", and 5% responded "unsatisfied." The housekeeping staff lost four employees to the new hotel, so although disappointed, you aren't surprised by this news. Still, you could not remember a time that the hotel had received such a low satisfaction rating.