Please help ASAP its due Friday. BBA 340 MIS: Information System for Mel’s Place
ID: 3579004 • Letter: P
Question
Please help ASAP its due Friday.
BBA 340 MIS: Information System for Mel’s Place
Mel’s Place is a neighborhood restaurant that serves people from both a residential area and a nearby business area. Mel’s serves 50 – 100 patrons each morning for breakfast and about the same number again for dinner or late evening meals. Mel’s has a robust weekday lunch crowd of 150 – 200 patrons between 11:00 am and 1:00 pm. Eight full-time and ten part-time waiting staff work at Mel’s, along with about the same number of people working in the kitchen. The restaurant is something of a local landmark, having been a part of the neighborhood for about 25 years. People appreciate Mel’s for its homey atmosphere as much as for its reasonably priced comfort food. The neighborhood is poised for additional population growth due to the nearby construction of an upscale condominium building and the arrival of a call-center operation just two blocks away. Mel hopes to get a larger lunch crowd and a growing dinner crowd but he knows some things must change if he expects to be able to handle more business. He sometimes struggles to handle the current lunchtime crowds. His kitchen is small and needs new equipment. He has too little freezer space. Some changes must be made.
A restaurant management consultant has suggested that Mel purchase a restaurant MIS system that the consultant says works as follows: “A waiter takes an order at a table, and then enters it into the network via one of several terminals located in the restaurant dining room. The order is routed to a printer in the appropriate kitchen preparation area: the cold item printer if it is a salad or dessert, the hot-item printer if it is a hot sandwich or entrée, or the bar printer if it is a drink. A customer’s bill, including the items ordered and the respective prices, is printed out as well. This ordering system eliminates the current three-carbon-copy guest check system as well as avoiding any problems caused by a waiter’s handwriting. When the kitchen runs out of a food item, the cooks send out an ‘out of stock’ message, that will be displayed on the dining room terminals when waiters try to order that item. This gives the waiters faster feedback, enabling them to give better service to the customers. Other system features aid management in the planning and control of their restaurant business. For example, the system provides up-to-the-minute information on the food items ordered and breaks out percentages showing sales of each item versus total sales. This helps management plan menus according to customers’ tastes. The system also compares the weekly sales totals versus food costs, allowing planning for tighter cost controls. In addition, whenever an order is voided, the reasons for the void are keyed in. This may help later in management decisions, especially if the voids consistently related to food or service.”
Mel knows that there are many standard restaurant MIS packages available including Touch Bistro, SimpleOrder, Squirrel POS, MaitreD POS and others (You may want to do a bit of internet exploration about these packages). Several of the MIS vendors advertise that they can quickly modify their standard restaurant MIS to accommodate any unique needs or preferences a restaurant like Mel’s Place may desire. Until now he has been reluctant to invest in such a system because the existing processes have worked well enough, because he is concerned that the inevitable staff turnover in the restaurant business would mean perpetual training effort, because he believes the systems are expensive to install and maintain, and because he fears these systems would detract from the “neighborhood feel” at Mel’s Place.
Mel is also considering making other improvements. He is considering expanding the size of the dining room to add space for more tables to accommodate what he hopes will be more customers. He is considering an upgraded kitchen to make food preparation faster and to replace some older equipment. He is considering redecoration of the existing dining area. He is considering installing a separate bar area with several TV’s for sports nights, thinking that this might help draw some of the new condo residents. He cannot afford to do all these things so he needs to be convinced that the new MIS will be worth the cost and the deferred opportunity to do some of the other improvements. He has thought about purchasing a very basic off-the-shelf software package then perhaps expanding it as the business grows but the consultant argues that the new MIS will improve efficiency so much that it will pay for itself almost immediately.
You may personally feel that Mel should certainly purchase or lease a restaurant MIS system. After all, many of the restaurants where you and I eat already have such systems, so it seems like the thing to do. But, Mel’s Place is not a franchise restaurant. Mel’s customers are happy frequent visitors who enjoy the personal atmosphere, and quite a few of the current servers and cooks who have worked there for years may be uncomfortable with the technology. Mel very much wants to keep that “family” atmosphere because he is convinced that it is the reason his restaurant is so popular and it is what will help his restaurant attract new customers as the neighborhood grows.
Mel knows very little about restaurant software. He does not like, or dislike, technology. Instead, he wants to make a decision that will be in the best interest of his 3 growing business.
Mel knows that you, one of his best customers, are about to earn your business degree from NAU and that you have recently been studying about business MIS. He knows this because Mel’s is truly a “family” restaurant --- he and his staff have taken the time to get to know many of their regular customers, including you. Mel has asked you for advice about how to decide whether to purchase a restaurant MIS so he wrote down several questions and asked you to help him answer them: Mel’s Questions:
1 What are the potential benefits and risks of such a system?
2 How will this decision impact my business strategy, managerial control and operational control?
3 What information do I need to make this decision?
4 What impact would making the system more formal have on the staff and the customers? How would it affect the “neighborhood feel” of Mel’s Place? How could I minimize the impact?
5 Who should I involve in making the decision whether to purchase an MIS? Why? If I elect to buy an MIS package then whom should I involve in selecting the MIS solution to buy? Why?
6 What would make the system a more complete MIS rather than just doing transaction (also known as point-of-sale or POS) processing?
7 What are the risks and rewards of purchasing an off-the-shelf MIS versus purchasing a tailored MIS?
8 What are the three most important things I should consider before making this decision? (Note: This is your opportunity to demonstrate what you have learned that relates to Mel’s situation. Explain why the three things are important and how they may influence this decision.)
9 What factors should I consider when choosing between buying an MIS, expansion of the restaurant, redecorating, adding a sports bar area, etc.?
10 What would you do if you were me? Explain why.
DO NOT MERELY ANSWER THE 10 QUESTIONS ABOVE. Remember that the point of this case is to give you an opportunity to demonstrate what you have learned from this course and how effectively you can apply that learning to a real-life situation. Therefore a brief but correct answer may not earn you a good score. You should read the questions carefully to confirm that you understand what is being asked. Then you should think about what course material may be relevant to the question and how it may be relevant. You may even elect to do some independent research on-line or with restaurant businesses (be sure to appropriately reference any outside sources) to become better equipped to help Mel make his decisions. Then, you should provide a 4 response that makes it clear that you understand and can apply that relevant material. Finally, think beyond just the questions posed below. Are there factors that Mel should consider but that are not addressed in his questions or in your responses to those questions? Perhaps you have insights or knowledge from this course that you want to share with Mel in order to help him make the best decision. If so, be sure to add them in your response to the final question, or separately.
Explanation / Answer
Restaurant is a business which prepares and serves food and drinks to customers in exchange for money, either paid before the meal, after the meal, or with an open account. Meals are generally served and eaten on premises, but many restaurants also offer take-out and food delivery services. When the management is in control and a specific process and standard has been set by the management for the sub level to follow ; the process and control in the operational level becomes easy as to from the time of procurement to delivery to the restaurant , preparation , service and received by the customer hot and fresh ( generally ). This makes the operational staff to have better control , coordination and result oriented at the ground level
Depending on the previous day or previous reports of the sales in the restaurant the management will have a clear picture on the decisions to take it procurement of raw materials ( different items to prepare food ) cost cutting , timely availability of materials , less labor costs , time saving , minimum wastage • Managerial control : Since the management has reports and knowledge of the demand in the restaurant it can access and control the flow of goods , money , time , wastage , quantity and quality and other factors. Which will benefit the chef to prepare the dishes ( food ) on preference of the customer and their choice. This will keep the customer happy and wanting to come back for the same restaurant again and again.
If the system had to be oriented only with transactions then only an accounting officer would be sufficient for the works , but the MIS gives more potential and benefit to the organization , in particular to the restaurant organization as it will help in knowing the taste and preference of the customer , the efficiency of the waiter , the inventory , the chefs advice , availability of raw materials and more such essential information will be available to the management to make accurate and useful timely decisions ; not just an accounting or transaction processing system
To make the right choice, you have to decide what factors are most important to you in a new job, and then you have to choose the option that best addresses these factors. However this operates on two levels – on a rational level and on an emotional, "gut" level. You'll only truly be happy with your decision if these are aligned. Also required
What are the key objectives?
What competencies are required?
What behaviors and outcomes are rewarded?