In 1948, the McDonald brothers re-organized the drive-in and completely restructured food delivery by focusing on quick and efficient “Speedee” self-service system which lowered prices as well as increased speed and volume of sales. Now, the McDonald’s Golden Arches logo can be seen throughout every continent except Antarctica and is one of the most recognizable in the world. McDonald’s Corporation remains to be the world’s largest restaurant chain focused on providing cheap fast food and delivering quick service to their customers.
However, the fast-food giant has been struggling with falling sales due to a vast number of complaints with its service. According to the Wall Street Journal, McDonald’s customer service is “broken,” because too many customers complain about the speed of the drive through, chaotic service, and unprofessional employees.
Slow service and inaccurate orders are known to be caused by management problems. Main reasons include employees being only trained for specific job tasks, lack of communication among fellow employees and poor wages. These problems lead to an increase in employee turnover and according to Wall Street Journal, McDonald’s Corp. contribute to 60 percent turnover rate. Furthermore, customers are outraged by rude or unprofessional employees and leave restaurants disappointed after experiencing chaotic service, which contradicts its traditional practice of “service with a smile”.
It is clear that customer satisfaction has a great impact on sales. What are the solutions to these management problems? First, McDonald’s new leadership has decided to focus on customer satisfaction to expand its brand name. The company will evaluate its performance through restaurant inspections, and conduct customer and employee surveys. The biggest change or improvement will be with the incorporation of the new “Dual-Point” ordering system. This will provide a simple and better service along with improved order accuracy. After the customer orders, he or she will be handed a receipt with a number and that order number will then appear on a screen and the customer will pick up his or her food at the other end of the counter. The “runner” will take on the responsibility of fulfilling requests and making sure the customer is satisfied with the order. Finally, the dedicated employee who delivers the food will thank customers and encourage them to come again.
In addition, new software has been installed to help managers decide the optimal number of employees to have on staff within a time frame. Also, the new management structure will designate managers to each area of the operation in the restaurant for efficiency. At the end of the day, by enacting these new changes to its management, McDonald’s Corporation hopes to win back its customer with improved customer satisfaction and encourage them to keep coming back for more.
There are number of restaurant chains that already carry out the new ordering system, will the new “Dual-Point” ordering system improve overall customer satisfaction for McDonald’s Corporation?
If you were part of the McDonald’s operations management team, what other implementations or suggestions would you incorporate to boost sales?
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324010704578414901710175648.html#printMode
http://www.dailyfinance.com/on/mcdonalds-dual-point-ordering-system/
I think this is a very interesting post because McDonald’s is such a corporate monster. Whenever you think of business success, McDonald’s is definitely among the top of the list and that is because they effectively managed many simple concepts of fast food eating. I recently heard that McDonald’s was beginning to require Bachelor’s or Associate’s degrees for certain chains, which may seem ridiculous but would hopefully improve service. I am definitely curious to see how the McDonald’s corporation handles some of these recent troubles, although I’m sure there’s enough wealth to last for a little while.
I work at McDonalds and we now have the dual point system. We have so many unhappy customers now. We were doing great before. People do not want to stand in one line than have to stand in another line. When I finally get to a cashier that is taking my order, I just want to see them filling that order, I sure don’t want to have to wait again. Before we would take the order, get the coffee and muffin, turn around , serve it to the customer and they would be gone. Not now any more, W have noticed that people do not want to have to wait twice, they are not coming in to our store anymore. some are going through drive thru so they don’t have to come in but now that is getting busy and they don’t want to wait there either. Not everyone wants a guest experience. Most customer want to get in and get out fast. That is what fast food service is.