Managing Communication Knowledge and Information - Case Study Example

Topic: Managing Communication knowledge and Information Task Starbucks Coffee Company Information The rise of Starbucks from a single coffee store in Seattle’s Pike Place market to a Fortune 500 company (number 261 on Fortune’s 2009 listing) is now an American business legend. The owner-managers of Starbucks were Gerald Baldwin and Gordon Bowker, former University of San Francisco students who had been running the company for 10 years. The Company sells whole bean and ground coffees, including the Starbucks and Seattle’s Best Coffee brands, as well as a selection of premium Tzo teas and other related products, to institutional foodservice companies that service business and industry, education, healthcare, office coffee distributors, hotels, restaurants, airlines and other retailers (Grant, 2008, pg. 75). Some of the decision taken by the manager in the coffee company department involves largely corporate social responsibility (Schultz, 2011, pg, 51). CSR maintains the exchange of ideas on the rights and duties in an ethical way between the employees, organisation, and society are important for community relations and social purpose. Schultz’s approach to human resource management is not simply about the role of Starbucks’ employees as key agents in transmitting the Starbucks’ Experience, but also part of a broader vision of a common humanity. Furthermore, problems present have implicated the moral rights and duties among the organisation and the stakeholders, community, regional diversity and the national posing moral challenges in their overseas operations and may be tempted to lower their standards when situations permit (Grant, 2008, pg. 81). The counter staff at Starbucks stores-the baristas played a central role in creating and sustaining the Starbucks Experience. Their role is not only to brew and serve excellent coffee but also to engage customers in the unique ambiance of the Starbucks coffee shop. The department focuses on integrating operations and supply chain strategy with a firm’s operations capabilities. This involves decisions that relate to the design of the processes and infrastructure needed to support these processes. Process design includes selecting the appropriate technology, sizing the process over time, determining the role of inventory in the process, and locating the process (Schultz, 2011, pg, 49). The infrastructure decisions involve the logic associated with the planning and control systems, quality assurance and control approaches, work payment structure, and organisation of system quality assurance and control approaches, work payment structure and organisation of operations and supply chain functions. This department’s operations capabilities can be viewed as portfolio best suited to adapt to the changing product and or service needs of a firm’s customers. Starbucks’ location strategy-its clustering of 20 or more stores in each urban hubwas viewed as enhancing the experience both in creating a local “Starbucks buzz’’ and in facilitating loyalty by Starbucks’ customers. Starbucks’ analysis of sales by individual store found little evidence that closely located Starbucks stores cannibalized one another’s sales. Recognizing that convenience of location was critical to driving sales; Starbucks began adding drive-through windows to some of its stores and locating stores specifically to capitalize on drive-through customers (Miles & Friedman, 2006, pg. 100). For this reason, the manager requires information to do with the corporate social responsibility (Phillip & Freeman, 2010, pg. 33). This implies that the manager requires understanding what the community around as well as the consumer perceives of the products from the company. In addition, the management in this department requires information on employee perception on the decisions being undertaken in the company. This will ensure that operations are efficient and therefore, the supply chain is up to date. As such, the manager is supposed to integrate operations of the company too the supply chain for easy movement and delivery of goods to the customers. It is hence recommended that the department looks into issues that affect the society and ensure that corporate responsibility department is as effective as possible. On the other hand, for efficiency to be achieved in the department, technology should be embraced. This means that contemporary business activities have to utilize advanced technology through the internet. This will assure faster information dissemination and inventory updates on the side of the consumer. Notably, the company’s department of coffee stores lack in good information flow from the senior management to the junior employees. As a result, it would be prudent for the manager to revise the information channels of the company so that movement of data is laterally (Schultz, 2011, pg, 51). As such, misinterpretation of information will be avoided. Misinformed decisions are apparently the main cause of conflicts among employees. It is imperative that decision making processes involve the entire team f workers at the coffee company. Task 2 Stakeholders affected by decision about improving service A stakeholder is a person or group of people who have an interest in an organisation or something. Decisions made by the management can either affect the stakeholders positively and negatively. If the decisions made are collaborative, the stakeholders in general will be happy. This is because the management took time to involve the in making the decisions (Grant, 2008, pg. 93). They will also feel a sense of belonging because they are actively involved in the process. If the management makes the decisions autocratically, definitely a larger group of the stakeholders will be affected. This is because consultations were not made before making the decisions (Schultz, 2011, pg, 51). In the Oxbridge University Computing Services for instance, the main stakeholders are the customers who are mainly students and university lecturers, the suppliers, the workers in the place among others. The management will have to know how to take care of the needs of the stakeholders. If the management does not meet the needs of the stakeholders, they may move to somewhere where they feel more appreciated and well taken care of. The stakeholders should also be involved in decision making to have a good relationship between the management and them. How a manager can establish contact and develop relationship with people One of the ways a manager can establish contact and develop relationship is through communication. Communication should be way of helping people get the mission and vision of the organisation. Effective communication is a very important component in the communication and establishing contact with people. By effective communication, one means good listening skills, being able to respond to conflicts, good negotiation skills, good and effective presentation and assertive skills (Phillip & Freeman, 2010, pg. 37). Listening skills- A good manager should be in a position to listen to everyone. This refers to giving people a chance to air their grievances if any and maybe give recommendations on improvement of certain services. Responding to conflict- Conflict is normal to our daily life, but handling the conflict is the big issue. A good manager should learn or be in a position to handle conflicts effectively. Good conflict resolution means that one deals with both parties without taking any sides. With good conflict resolution skills, the people will respect you and know that you can handle any situation effectively (Guffey & Loewy, 2010, 105). They will also be in a position to count on you in any situation. This will help in developing a good relationship with them. Good negation skills- Negotiation is part of business and part of life too. For one to get anything good they have to negotiate. A good manager should be able to negotiate with the suppliers and get the best prices so that the community does not strain in paying for services because of high prices (Miles & Friedman, 2006, pg. 102). The manager can also use these skills to negotiate with customers on the best prices too. This will create an environment where everyone is happy and satisfied with the services. Good presentation- Appearance is very important in any setting. If one appears and they are well dressed, the customers and consumers find it easy to relate to them. A good appearance will create a good relationship with the people around. Assertive skills- An assertive manager is one who behaves in a very confident way. They are also quick to express their opinions and feelings. An assertive manager can create a good relationship with the people because they are confident and do not delay in making decisions. Involving decisions about service Decisions about service should be made by every stakeholder and management included. The following are some of the ways in which stakeholders can be involved in making of the decisions; 1. Delegation of duties- A manager should be an overseer of activities in the working area. They should therefore delegate duties to other members of staff so that they make decisions concerning those areas and just bring results. This will help them feel appreciated. They will also feel that their needs are taken care of. 2. Democracy- This involves allowing every party involved to make the decision. The stakeholders should also take part in discussions for what they would like to happen or changes they would like to take place. This will help everyone present to feel like they are part of the organisation and feel appreciated by the management. Task 3 Information dissemination in Starbucks Company is done based on the trust built in the foundations of the company (Phillip & Freeman, 2010, pg. 41). This is because the coffee company is committed to maintain its reputation to consumers. The company as a result has put in place a privacy policy that governs how data is collected, formatted, stored and made available to customers and employees. Collection of data is done through the corporation’s stores as well as services available at the company’s website. The website is Starbucks.com.au which adheres to the states privacy principles in the management of data. Through the use of the corporation’s services and accessing the site, an individual agrees to the data collection as well as the practices of use prescribed in the site. For any visitor on this website, it is imperative that a person checks for updates or any changes to the policy governing products being offered at the Starbucks Coffee Company (Guffey & Loewy, 2010, 117). In the collection of data, personal information is important in the updating of inventories for the profitability of the firm. This information can then be used to identify individual clients and their orders for products and services at the company. The information is them formatted and store in the company’s database for future reference. This move is imperative in keeping track of the corporation’s activities. The information is then made available to shareholders and stakeholders in a number of ways (Phillip & Freeman, 2010, pg. 44). On the one hand, the company department uses the flyers to offer data to clients on product change. In addition, the department has incorporated contemporary technological innovations to avail data to clients. As such, the website offers a better space and place to acquire information about the company. On the contrary, it was noted that information dissemination within the company department is a key issue. For this reason, it is important that the corporation considers streamlining of information movement from senior managers to the junior employees (Guffey & Loewy, 2010, 127). As such, information should move in lateral manner. This implies that junior employees should be accountable to the seniors to avoid any forms of misinterpretation of information within the department. This will in turn help in involving all stakeholders in decision making as well as attendance to employee issues for the smooth running of the corporation. Bibliography: Grant, R.M. 2008. Cases to accompany contemporary strategy analysis, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd, Publication: West Sussex. Guffey, M.E. & Loewy, D. 2010. Business Communication: Process and Product (with Meguffey.com Printed Access Card). New York: Cengage Learning Schultz, H.2011. Onward: How Starbucks Fought For Its Life Without Losing Its Soul. New York: John Wiley and Sons. Phillip, R. A. & Freeman, E. 2010. Stakeholders: Elgar Reference Collection, Elgar Mini Series. Chicago: Edward Elgar Publishing Incorporated. Miles, S. & Friedman, A. 2006. Stakeholders: Theory and practice. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Read More