Management of Chipotle - Essay Example

Introduction Chipotle has been highly successful in creating a space for itself in the highly competitive restaurant business by offering a wide variety of fresh and nutritious food at affordable prices. The business in Coral Gables offers Mexican delights which can be customized. It is renowned for its excellent customer service. The 33-strong force of employees meets a constant rush of customers with ever-smiling faces. At the same time, a casual survey revealed that most of the time, employees were rushed off their feet, serving the never-ending queue of customers.

The hectic activity has led to an increased number of burnout cases.Recommendations1. The restaurant needs to introduce new initiatives for employees’ health and well-being programs to reduce their health problems. Exhaustion is found to be the main cause for their lack of enthusiasm which is reflected in their level of service at the end of the day. A separate small place should be allotted to them to take short breaks to relax and reinforce their energy. Constant communication and constructive engagement with employees significantly enhance morale and commitment to work (MacLeod & Clarke, 2010).

Management should involve employees in discussions on how to improve the work environment so that they are happy. 2. The management needs to recruit more people to not only maintain its reputation for excellent customer service but it would also relieve pressure from the existing staff. The employees were unanimous in the view that more people are required to meet the rush of the clients. The HR people therefore should create a pool of human resources who can be given part-time work during the rush time.

This would help the permanent staff to recover from the highly stressful work of serving many people in a short time and with efficiency.3. Workers need to be motivated through incentives and fringe benefits like complimentary weekly family meals at Chipotle or company-sponsored family vacations on weekends. It could be a once-a-month affair based on work performance. This would motivate workers for higher performance (Fisher, 2005). At the same time, it would give them an opportunity to spend quality time with family.

The long hours and workplace stress have an adverse impact on the work-life balance, creating dissatisfaction amongst the staff. This initiative would boost their morale.4. The company must provide the workforce with new opportunities to enhance their skills and knowledge. In-house training on skill development and options for partial or full funding of cost for pursuing higher academic qualifications would considerably motivate them and they would not feel trapped as many of the survey participants had revealed.

Moreover, Chipotle is expanding fast, and exploiting in-house talents for new outlets would be a good initiative as it would be a good incentive for personal and professional growth for the employees, especially those who have been consistently performing well.