Individual Facility Review of Etihad Stadium - Essay Example

TOPIC: INDIVIDUAL FACILITY REVIEW, ETIHAD STADIUM STUDENT’S NAME: INSTITUTION: INSTRUCTOR’S NAME: DATE: Executive summary Etihad Stadium is located in Docklands and has a capacity of 55,000 seats in total. The stadium is designed in such a way that it can host different sporting events like cricket, soccer, Rugby and Australian football. Apart from these sporting activities, the stadium can also be used to perform concerts. In order to allow for good or perfect conditions all the time, the stadium has a retractable roof which can open and closes itself within a short period of time, without affecting the people sitting behind the drip line of the roof. Since it is a multipurpose facility, it is reconfigured to suit the nature of the activity taking place at the stadium (Etihad Stadium, 2015) The construction of Etihad Stadium can be told today in a totally captivating story. This is because the stadium is located in a region that was initially filled with silk and water. The construction of the stadium, however, did not just took place instantaneously, but it was a process that took a period of 10 years for the stakeholders to discuss the facility. Initially, the stadium was built because of an idea to build a new stadium for rugby and soccer games. Later on, during the discussions, it was decided that the facility to be built in a way that could support other games like crickets to be played. There was also a need to increase the number of the fans who could attend the games played and in turn, raise the amount of revenue being collected at the stadium. The stadium got its name on March 1, 2009 and was named after Etihad Airways in UAE. The stadium is properly situated in a central place where it is accessible to all. It is located in the Docklands which is nearly the CBD. This facility was intended to be football facility during the construction. The stadium was constructed in the Southern Hemisphere and has a fully retractable roof. This facility is around 52,000 seats stadium and was designed to be a flexible venue that would play host to a broad range of sporting events and other entertainment users. It is the best stadium and has movable seats that make the users of the stadium be at a proximity to the sporting activity in the field. Buying or booking of tickets is considered one of the main ways in which the stadium can generate income. This process is done by ticketing companies like the Ticketmaster and Ticketek. One will access their website, make the required payments online, and then he or she will receive a copy of the ticket with a specific ticket or serial number. This number is unique and shall be used by the ticket companies to ascertain if a particular ticket is authentic or not. Problem definition Ticket booking and acquiring for the same at Etihad Stadium are mainly done by ticketing agencies like Ticketek and Ticketmaster and is done through online websites and portals. The process of ticket booking is not that simple and have been marred by some problems. Etihad Stadium offers several categories of booking tickets. This includes booking for patron space inside the stadium when there is an event taking place inside the stadium. There is a car park ticketing category also, where people can book for a space where they can park their vehicles while attending an event at the stadium or just parking the vehicle there for some designated time. The stadium also offers mobility impaired parking. Individuals that need this kind of service have a specific entry point where they have to contact the corporate Suite Executive for the necessary arrangements. All the above activities indicate that the operations at Etihad Stadium have always been conducted in systematic manner in a bid to avail efficiency in service delivery to all the clients and fanatics attending any sporting and social events at the stadium. Ticketing is a very vital tool in service provision and revenue generation for the maintenance of operational activities in the stadium. Lack of a proper and efficient ticketing system, would mean inefficiencies in operation and loss of revenues which will in turn lead to loss and embezzlement of funds and an eventual closure of the stadium due to lack of funds. Below lies the problems that have faced the Etihad Stadium Management. Hiking of ticketing charges by the ticketing mentioned above companies has been an ongoing issues. The problem lies in excessive or unreasonable increase of ticketing charges for apparently no reason. There are standard charges, but sometimes the ticketing companies end up charging more for a given event for no reason as the service provision is never made any better from the previous event. This has raised a lot of public concern, and there have been public outcries of extortion. Another issue are the inability of purchasing tickets for an event due to malfunctioning of the ticketing management software. There have been reports of use of the outdated software by the two ticketing vendors. These obsolete and inefficient ticketing system has barred many people from attending event that they like. In the eventual end this means that the organization is not making any money, this is mainly due to the inability of the ticketing companies to make sells because of failure of their ticketing system. Instances of this failure have been duly noted, Ticketek was been criticized on how they handled the One Direction and Prince concerts (Zoya, 2014) and Ticketmaster, on the other hand, has been criticized following the pre-sale of Radiohead tickets that did not proceed as they had planned to. Another arising issue is that companies like Ticketed gets into malpractices issues like infringing the sales rights of Lasttix, a discount ticketing retailer. This ended up in the Federal courts, and the company was imposed a penalty of $2.5 million. Such inappropriate malpractices are the things that contribute to the losses. Etihad stadium is directly or indirectly affected by such issues, and it tarnishes the image of the management as corrupt and care more about their interests other than that of the majority. All the above-mentioned problems have been handled in ways that can help manage the spills, ticketing companies like Ticketmaster and Ticketek have put in effort to update their servers and adoption of modern and efficient ticketing systems which have impacted on 98% uptime during the sale of tickets to upcoming events. After the probe by the ACCC ticket master has open the market in order to allow other vendors like Lasttix to be able to make ticket sales on behalf of the stadium, this practically helps to reduce traffic on the two companies and I the long run efficiency has been achieved. Customer Expectations Etihad Stadium is a world-class facility that has been praised for time for its exemplary services offered to its customers. However, in order for the stadium to maintain this level of services offered, all the areas of service provision must be checked and the management of the stadium should ensure that they keep on providing the best services to its customers. The following is an account of customers’ expectations while at the facility: Efficient ticket purchase mechanisms. Customers want to purchase their tickets easily from where they are, basically efficiency in the purchase of tickets is what is needed. Proper air conditioning and temperature management at the stadium. There should be proper AC in the stadiums to help avoid discomfort due to high temperatures or lack of fresh air. Good security at the stadium. The attendants of an even would want an assurance, or their safety, cases of arson should be unheard of in this social settings. Food safety and hygiene. All the food vendors within the stadium should uphold the Food Hygiene and Safety Act, and this should be enforced by the stadiums management. Clean and well-maintained washrooms. These small offices should be well maintained in full operation, and they should be hygienic for use by the attendants of an event. All the above customer expectations have to be met by the management to provide an inviting arena for people to come and entertain themselves. For there to be traffic and customer loyalty the affair of the customers should be of priority to the management. Management plan to resolve the problems The management of Etihad Stadium has plans to achieve the laid down goals, but all this is done in line with solving the suggestions of the customer’s expectations. Implementation of the top quality management systems in line with the goals of the management in a bid to solve issues and complaints brought forward by customers and surveys of customer expectation. Here say the quality is defined by customer requirements, it is the responsibility of top management to implement goals that would lead to the quality improvement of services offered at the stadium. It is through the implementation of a systematic work process and an overall reshuffle of how activities were being conducted initially, this systemic changes would allow for an overall reevaluation of the partnerships and companies offering different services at the stadium. Is it only through the reinvention of the wheel that the quality of service offering can change? Practically it seems Yes is the plausible answer. Quality improvement is a continuous effort by the organization. The management of Etihad stadium plans to implement the following actions in line with quality improvement and meeting customer expectations: The best way that Etihad stadium can do is to instruct the ticketing companies to install the latest software solutions for ticketing. Another approach to this matter can be through the adoption of cloud computing technology which can help in generation of scalable computing power which will help in load balancing of the server instances during the sales of tickets in the advent of big events. Implementation of a ticketing recovery system that will help in recovering of ticket ID in case one loses their ticket. The best way to implement this is by sending clients online ticket with a ticket ID on their email, so in case of any loss one can report back to Ticketek of their loss and another copy can be sent to them. This will help absolve issues of loss of tickets by customers. Etihad Stadium has been communicating with all its user to purchase tickets through Ticketmaster and Ticketek because they are the first had approved vendors of the ticket. In the case of any cancelation of an event, through the policy of the management all who made ticket purchase will be refunded. In 2014, The Rolling Stones; canceled their shows that were to be held at Etihad Stadium. The customers who had purchased the tickets were expected to show a clear proof that they legitimately purchased the tickets so that they could be refunded. Those who purchased their tickets from other sources like the e-bay and ticket scalpers could not get their money refunded (John, 2015). In a bid to control the abuse of alcohol in the stadiums, all alcohol vendors in the stadiums should uphold the Responsible Service of Alcohol and should have undergone an RSA training before they start selling liquor in the stadiums. The management is also committed to principles of serving alcohol responsibly and also checking on the consumption levels of alcohol by the customers to make sure that they do not misbehave in any way. All team members who are working in the line of selling alcohol must have a license of operation and should be subject to the performance management by the management of the stadium. The management has also looked into the matter of clean lavatories, stadium cleaners and washroom attendant shall be cleaning the washrooms in spans of every thirty minutes in the case of big event. This will help in the management of cleanliness and hygiene. The management also approved of improving security within the stadium. All attendants will be checked for possession of harmful objects such as knives and guns will not be permitted within the stadium. All security personnel will be available on call 24/7. Emergency and hotline numbers have been set up for a report of any emergencies such as unplanned sickness and cases of fire outbreaks and other emergencies. Medical experts, firemen, security personnel and other emergency response teams are always in place in case of any emergencies. Application of best practice and quality management principles Customer focus Etihad Stadium has always put the interest of the customers at the forefront and responding to any issues that directly affect the customers in one way or another. Food prices is an issue that directly affects the customers. In the recent past, there has been complaining about the prices of food being offered at the stadium. The stadium management has responded to this food prices war that was started by the MCG by lowering the prices of its foodstuffs to a reasonable amount that is affordable to all the customers. This includes selling pies at $3 on Sundays. The price of the pie will be the cheapest ever and in all the stadiums. This will translate to a bid to attract more fans to attend games on Sundays and also free entry for the children under the age of 15 years old (Tom, 2015). Teamwork and Teambuilding Etihad stadium employs many employees of which they come from different backgrounds. However, to ensure a good working environment is created, the employees work as a team when they are at the work place. Working groups are organized into a team then they are given a particular task that will be solved by the team. Each team has a team leader or a supervisor who oversee and controls the activities that take place at their respective teams. Working as a team, will ensure that each and everyone’s ideas are integrated with those of the other members. Leadership Leadership at Etihad Stadium is clearly outlined from the top. The managers oversee the general operations at the stadium. Leadership at various levels of the stadium is the reason behind the successful operations. All the sections of the stadium have a leader that directs them and then reports directly to the overall managers of the stadium. All the team at the stadium have team leaders, and it is these team leaders who evaluate each of the team members and file reports to the managers. This will determine their allowances stipend. Conclusion Etihad Stadium is a world class social gathering and hosting ground, the facility is well developed, and it is big enough to handle over 50,000 seats which are immensely big. The stadium struggles with management issues which, in the long run, end up in causing customer dissatisfaction of the level or service provision by the stadium patronage. Customer have launched complaints ranging from hiking of ticket prices, failure of ticket booking systems, lack of proper channels of customer refunding in the case of cancelation of an event, lack of proper air conditioning systems and poor temperature control in the stadium. All these issues indicate a syndicate problem in the management. This call for a reshuffle of the management system and adoption of new systems that will help in ensuring customer satisfaction and meeting up with the customer expectations. The adoption of quality management principle will help in achieving the best practices to adopt in a bid to ensure customer satisfaction is given priority. Focus on the customer will pass a message to its consumers that Etihad management cares for their clientele. Teamwork on the part of the management helps in achieving goals of the organization that is perfect service delivery and this can only be done through co-operation of all service providers in the stadium to abiding by policy of customer satisfaction. A strong leadership obviously helps in strong-arming people to follow the outlined policies. A strong leadership and a proper management team will help execute and strong arm the implementation of the new policies. Etihad Stadium can offer world class services and patronage to its clientele through improving its services and putting the customer first. References Etihad Stadium, (2015) Accessed on 24th May, 2015 from http://www.etihadstadium.com.au/ Jackie, N. (2014) Corporate Suites, Etihad Stadiums Limited; John, B. (2015) Match Day. Accessed on 24th May, 2015 from http://www.businessinfocus.com.au/index.php/2013/12/etihad-stadium/ Business in Focus Magazine; Tom, C. (2015) Real Footy: Etihad Stadium joins food price war with discounts on Sundays. Retrieved on 24th May, 2015 from http://www.theage.com.au/afl/afl-news/etihad-stadium-joins-food-price-war-with-discounts-on-sundays-20150326-1m85r5.html The Age Media; Zoya, S. (2014) The problems with ticketing. Retrieved on 24th May, 2015 from https://www.choice.com.au/shopping/everyday-shopping/tickets/articles/the-problems-with-ticketing Choice Publication. Read More