Search results

The purpose of this paper is to determine the job characteristics or key success factors of current multi‐unit managers (MUMs) in a large casual dining restaurant organization.

The paper is a case study methodology which was used to survey a group of 71 MUMs in one organization regarding characteristics of their job. There were a total of 53 respondents for a 74.65 percent response rate. Factor analysis was used to determine whether any of the 24 characteristics could be condensed into “factors”.

The paper finds that the eight factors that emerged as key success factors were: single unit operations, standard operating procedures, multi‐unit strategic planning, interpersonal and social responsibilities, travel and visiting units, human relations, effective leadership, and unit level finances, which explained 75 percent of the variance among the individual items.

The paper shows that the current study is limited in its generalizeability as the case study methodology is used. The current study does give researchers a start on categorizing key success factors of MUMs in the twenty‐first century.

The paper can help practitioners to develop training programs for MUMs, as well as to help them recruit people for their MUM ranks that exhibit the skills and knowledge needed to perform the key factors that emerged from the study.

The paper takes the topic of multi‐unit management and develops a model for the key success factors needed for successful operation at that level in an organization. This paper is important for researchers in order to help develop research questions for the future. It is valuable for top management in organizations in order to help them to create development programs and to focus recruitment efforts. MUM is underrepresented in the restaurant industry by females and younger people and this study can help to develop people in these groups.

The purpose of this paper is to determine differences in perceived needs of training among multi‐unit managers (MUMs) in a large casual dining restaurant organization.

Case study methodology was used to survey a group of 71 MUMs in one organization regarding characteristics of their job. There were a total of 52 respondents for a 74.65 percent response rate. A pair‐wise comparison was used to measure the difference in perceived training needs, followed by a stepwise regression to indicate the relationship between the perceived need for training and the MUM competency levels on their current jobs.

This study found significant differences between the perceived need for training in the current job or to get promoted in areas such as finance and control, marketing and promotions, and human resources. In addition, the perceived need of training in human resources influences how competent and confident multiunit managers feel with regards to doing their job or in being promoted to the next level of supervision.

This research is developed as a case study focused on all the MUMs from one of the top 400 restaurant chains in the USA.

The knowledge obtained from this study will help multi‐unit restaurant organizations in the development of training and development programs and on human resource practices across organizations.

This paper offers insights into how casual dining restaurant MUMs have evolved from “task master” to “people developer” in their organizational roles.

This study aims to analyze the relationship between the intrinsic characteristics of the teams that perform specialized industrial services in multi-units and dynamic capability.

This study was developed from a survey conducted in 188 multi-unit industrial service providers and data were analyzed using the structural equation modeling technique of partial least squares.

The results indicate the two constructs act differently on dynamic capability. While the infrastructural construct influences the capability of knowledge absorption, generation and adaptation, the construct related to the willingness to share and integrate knowledge has a positive impact on the capability of knowledge generation and storage.

This research is limited by the choice of only one industrial sector – in the case of this study, the service industry. Future studies will include other industries and a more diverse sample of firms.

This research analyzes the process of dynamic capability development in the context of multi-unit service provision. The context of multi-unit industrial service provision is peculiar when compared to other organizations. In the context, knowledge is absorbed, generated and adapted by individuals organized into teams that work in customer’s units. Service providers play a key role in the development of dynamic capabilities regarding knowledge storage, acting as knowledge repositories.

The purpose of this paper is to develop a new systematic method for a multi-unit organization to cope with the cost allocation problem, which is an extension of the reciprocal method. As uncertainty is the inherent characteristic of business environments, assuming changes in engaged parameters is almost necessary. The outputs of the model determine the total value of each unit/business lines or product.

In the proposed method, contrary to existing models, business units are able to transfer their costs to other units, and also, not necessarily transfer the total costs of support units completely. The DEMATEL approach, which finds all relationships between different parts of a system, is also applied for computing effects of the units’ expense paid to each other. Moreover, a fuzzification approach is used to capture linguistic experts’ judgments about related data.

Being closer to the real-world problem in comparison to the previous approach, the proposed systematic approach encompasses the other cost allocation models.

Applying the proposed model for a system like a multi-unit organization, the total price of each unit/business line can be obtained. Moreover, this cost allocation process guides the related decision-makers to better manage the expenses that each unit pays the others.

In the existing studies, business units cannot pay expense support units. However, in the proposed method, the business units are able to pay expenses for other units, and also, not necessarily pay total expenses for support unit completely. Moreover, considering engaged parameters as fuzzy numbers makes the proposed model closer to real-world problems.

We study organizational vocabularies as complex social structures emerging from the association between organizational participants and words they use to describe and make sense of their experiences at work. Using data that we have collected on the association between managers in a multi-unit international company and words they use to describe their organizational units and the overall company, we examine the relational micro-mechanisms underlying the observed network structure of organizational vocabularies. We find that members of the same subsidiary tend to become more similar in terms of the words they use to describe their units. Members of the same subsidiary, however, do not use the same words to describe the corporate group. Consequently, the structure of organizational vocabularies tends to support consistent local interpretations, but reveals the presence of divergent meanings that organizational participants associate with the superordinate corporate group.

The purpose of this study is to investigate and document current US hotel management company practices in budgeting and forecasting, and to recommend a process to improve accuracy and efficiency.

Key corporate financial executives of hotel management companies operating in the USA were surveyed. Different from prior studies that surveyed the US property‐level managers, or European hotel operators, the study surveyed the authors of budget guidelines of US hotel management companies with at least ten units or 1,000 rooms, to discover and document the budgeting and forecasting practices of multi‐unit hotel management companies. Chi‐square and t‐tests for equality of means were used to identify the differences between large and small hotel management companies.

Many concepts were identified that are not found in hospitality management textbooks. Current budgeting and forecasting methods used in the industry present opportunities for improving accuracy. There are also opportunities for time efficiencies, which may lead to improved participant satisfaction. Some significant differences were identified in budgeting and forecasting processes between large and small management companies.

The findings may not apply to independently owned and operated hotels, or small hotel management companies. Future research may focus on identifying economic factors that most influence hotel revenues at the local or regional level. Also, future research may focus on corporate computer software that facilitates intranet consolidation of property level budgets and forecasts and also allows spreadsheet flexibility for exploring various scenarios.

The practical application of the study is the recommendation for a centralized budget process that enhances accuracy, improves efficiency, and reduces “gamesmanship”.

There are four main contributions of the study: the obtaining of inputs from corporate officers of hotel management companies with operations in the USA; the documenting of forecasting and budgeting practices of hotel management companies operating in the USA; the recommending of a forecasting and budgeting process that may improve accuracy and participant satisfaction; and the identifying of differences between large and small companies in relation to forecasting and budgeting practices.

The paper proposes a model aiming at the explanation of the formation of coordinative knowledge practices in distributed work. Findings from a pilot study aiming at the preliminary testing of the model are presented and discussed.

The explanatory model was developed by combining concepts and findings developed in studies of social capital, knowledge sharing and computer supported cooperative work. The empirical data were gathered in 2007‐2008 in a multi‐unit Finnish chemical company production site. The methods used were structured observation of work processes, semi‐structured interviews and a web‐based questionnaire.

The model suggested that coordinative knowledge practices are shaped by four major factors: work coupling, social capital, spatio‐temporality and affordances of collaboration technologies. The empirical study showed that these concepts can be successfully applied in empirical research to better understand and support the development of coordinative knowledge practices.

The findings can be utilized in the analysis and assessment of coordinative knowledge practices between distributed work groups in multi‐unit organizations. The findings can also be used in the development of solutions for knowledge sharing and communication in distributed work organizations and communities.

The model developed provides a novel perspective for the study of knowledge practices in the context of distributed group work. The model proposes that varying degrees in work coupling intensity, social capital, spatio‐temporality and affordances of collaborative technologies explain the emergence of coordinative knowledge practices. The study shows how coordinative knowledge practices can be studied empirically. The empirical study resulted in a typology of coordinative knowledge practices.

In large organizations, space planning relies on workgroup leaders to indicate spatial adjacency preferences. However, many factors affect workgroups’ adjacency preferences, and it is not clear how the choices are made. This paper aims to explore whether the adjacency preferences are influenced by the collaboration relationship or constrained by the organizational structure.

The authors studied a large company’s spatial adjacency planning with an in-depth analysis of its formal organizational structure and collaboration network. A sample of 183 managers was surveyed regarding groups with whom they want to be spatially adjacent and groups with whom they mostly interact. The data enabled us to test three structural factors related to adjacency preference: department affiliation, workgroup’s prestige and collaboration relation. The authors used the quadratic assignment procedure analysis to examine the correlations between network matrices.

The results suggest that department affiliation and collaboration relations are significantly correlated to adjacency preferences. The authors did not find evidence supporting the notion that a workgroup’s prestige affects the preference. Among the three factors, collaboration relation best predicts the preference, which echoes Pena et al.’s (1977) argument that space planners should look into how groups function, rather than merely following the organizational chart.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this research was the first to explore the choice of spatially adjacent workgroup through a detailed network analysis of the formal structure, work collaboration relations and other group-level characteristics. The findings have noteworthy cross-disciplinary implications, given that spatial proximity can be taken as a human resource management strategy to facilitate the overall interactions between workgroups.

This study aims to examine the utilization of Front of House (FOH) and Back of House (BOH) technology applications in different types of US restaurants along with their level of IT management and explore the importance of these technology applications to restaurant operations.

Survey data were collected from 500 randomly selected restaurant technology managers who subscribe to Hospitality Technology Magazine. The sample group represented 67,299 restaurant units. Data analysis was organized into three parts (descriptive, exploratory factor analysis, and independent samples t-test).

For FOH, the top-five point of sale (POS) technologies used are POS hardware, touchscreen, POS software, gift card integration and integrated credit card swipe into POS. At the BOH, the top-five POS technologies used are accounting/financial software, enterprise reporting, inventory management software, kitchen printers and company intranet.

This is one of the first studies to include a variety of technologies used in restaurants. Most existing studies focus on a single technology or a small number of them. However, this study provides an overall perspective on a variety of restaurant technologies from FOH to BOH. It also includes mobile POS technologies.

本论文旨在研究美国各种类型饭店的前厅（FOH）和后厨（BOH）的各种科技应用系统以及其信息科技管理水平, 此外, 本论文还分析了这些科技应用对于饭店运营的重要性。

本论文采用问卷采样形式, 从订阅了酒店科技杂志（Hospitality Technology Magazine）的饭店科技经理中随机抽取500名经理为问卷样本, 此样本代表了67,299家饭店。数据分析方法共分为三个部分（描述型、因子分析、和独立样本t检定）。

对于FOH而言, 排名前五的POS科技包括POS硬件、触摸屏、POS软件、礼品卡管理、和信用卡与POS系统链接。对于BOH而言, 排名前五的POS科技包括会计/财务软件、企业报表、库存管理软件、厨房打印机、和公司内网。

本论文是仅存的几篇研究多样饭店科技的文章之一。大多数文章只是关注一种或者少数几种科技。然而, 本论文提供从FOH到BOH多种饭店科技的分析研究, 包括移动POS科技等。

关键词 饭店科技、前厅科技、后厨科技、移动POS

The process whereby new recruits are brought into the firm is an important element of human resource management practice. If done well, it can help to retain the new employee and reduce staff turnover. Shows that a cross‐section of firms in the sector now have some form of staff induction programme in place. In most cases, the induction programme is short‐lived and focused on job role and administrative procedures. The survey of these firms suggests that there is a need to embrace best practice from other sectors of the retailing industry, in particular, the recognition that well‐planned and structured induction can play an important role in bringing down staff turnover. However, induction is best seen as a process that commences before the employee starts work and extends through the first two or three months of employment. In the very best instances the new recruit is deliberately eased into the new job. Unit managers play a vital role in delivering the immediate induction programme and management programmes need to ensure that unit managers are themselves trained to train and their performance is monitored.