Service Blueprint - Assignment Example

Service Blueprint Name Class Unit 1. Describe why you choose this particular organization to blueprint; (1 mark) Service blueprint is a very important tool in the creation of competitive advantage through giving a detailed description on people, processes and system that are used in enhancing service delivery (Kerner & Crawford, 2000). In this paper, hotel industry has been chosen due to several factors. One of the factors is the fact that hotel industry can only achieve a good competitive advantage by having efficient service delivery. Having quality management in the hospitality industry has also been associated with their success (Solnet & Kandampully, 2008). At the moment, more than 70% of the world GDP is made up of the service sector (Kerner & Crawford, 2000). This shows the important role that the service delivery sector plays in the global economy. The hotel industry can only be able to deliver quality services if they all able to incorporate all the relevant concepts in their design. The industry has high competition, which requires that the firm works in ensuring that they have a service blueprint. If the hotel industry cannot offer services that suits the customer needs, they are prone to lose their business. The hotel industry can also use the service blueprint to give the customers an overview of their services. 2. Describe three key elements of physical evidence revealed in the blueprint (photos/images of these elements should be included in the visual portion of the blueprint) and discuss how they influence the customer’s experience; (4 marks) The tangibles that the customers are supposed to have contact with are known as physical evidence. These are tangibles that have an influence on the customers’ quality perceptions. The hotel industry has several physical evidence that the customer comes into contact with. The physical evidence in the hotel industry are; exterior hotel parking, cart for bags, desk registration, papers, keys, lobby, elevators, hallways, room, amenities, delivery, tray, food, appearance and bill. These are physical evidence that the consumer interacts with as they board a hotel. Among the listed physical evidence, there are three main physical evidence which are; hotel parking, room and food/restaurant. The three physical evidences have a great impact on the customer perception on the hotel. Hotel should be able to provide safe and ample parking for their customers (Wood & Brotherton, 2008). The hotel can involve valet parking to save the customer from time wastage in looking for parking space. If the hotel cannot provide a good parking lot, the customers may perceive it as a sign of poor service delivery. In some hotels, visitors are held up in jams during the peak hours. The customer is not supposed to worry about the parking space once they enter the hotel. The customer should be able to park their cars in any place where they are comfortable. The parking experience in the hotel should be able to add luxury to it. The hotel room is important physical evidence (Kerner & Crawford, 2000). The hotel should have rooms which are spacious and well decorated. For example, a hotel can categorize their rooms based on the level of comfort and amenities involved. For example, the rooms can be categorized as executive, deluxe, club and terrace. The rooms should be able to provide services such as bar, coffee maker, hairdryer, television, iron, entertainment, internet, newspapers, bathroom and other fittings. If the rooms are not able to provide these services to customers, they can lead to reduced bookings. The customer experience is based on whether they are able to fully enjoy the services provided in their rooms and the level of comfort accorded by the room design and amenities (Wood & Brotherton, 2008). The food offered in the restaurant has a great effect on the customer. The restaurant should be arranged in such a way that the customer is comfortable and have a sense of being wanted. The furniture should be laid according to the customer needs. For example, the dining area should have expensive cutlery. The sitting arrangement should be based on the customer comfort and keeping in mind the economic aspect. The waiters’ attitude plays a vital role in customers’ experience. The waiters should act professionally and have a proper dress code. The waiter to customer ratio should be appropriate to avoid delays in serving the customers. The services that are offered by the hotel in the dining area are thus very vital in determining the customers’ experience (Kerner & Crawford, 2000). Service blueprint for an hotel Physical evidence Exterior parking Carts for bags and uniform Lobby waiting area Elevators hallways Handling room placements Television menu food Reception room keys beds Wait appearance Billing 3. Identify, number, and describe three potential fail points (points in the process where problems may occur) and/or bottlenecks (points in the process where backups or slow delivery may occur); The hotel industry has three main potential fail points or bottleneck. The areas are room reservation, reception and amenities. Room reservation refers to the process of getting booked in a hotel room. This is the process in which the customer undergoes in order to gain access to the room of their choice. At the moment, hotels use different methods in reserving for a room. There are online reservation where the customer can book a room at the comfort of their homes and the manual reservation. If the hotel is not able to offer this service conveniently, they are bound to lose the customers. Room reservation is a very vital aspect in the hotel industry that has an impact on the customer perception. It is a point where the hotel can fail if they are overwhelmed by the customers or uses poor methods in reservation. Another area where fail can occur is reception. The reception is supposed to make the customer feel welcomed and at home. The reception is the first person a whom the visitor meet when entering the hotel. The hotel can fail if the receptionist is rude, lack of appropriate technology, poor services and slow in receiving the visitors. The hotel amenities are another area that the hotel can fail. If the hotel has inadequate amenities, customers may be faced with shortage. The indicators of failure in amenities include congestions, lack of services and long queues on the service centers such as elevators (Wood & Brotherton, 2008). 4. Suggest possible solutions/alternatives to address these (potential) problem areas; Technology use in room reservation is very vital. The problems that are experienced in reserving a room are due to use of outdated technology or incompetent staff. The hotel industry should ensure that they are able to provide the staff with appropriate skills to handle room reservations and also ensure that they have adequate technology such as online bookings. The reception should be only be run by qualified staff and equip them with the best technology. This can make sure that the visitors are served in a short time and efficiently. Staff training and development is also vital to make sure that the staff is at par with the changing aspects in the service sector. Amenities such as gym and sauna should be able to accommodate all customers without straining them. The hotel is supposed to conduct appropriate budgeting on the amenities. The entertainment should be provided to every customer who has booked the hotel (Wood & Brotherton, 2008). 5. Discuss how a service blueprint might be used in each of the following areas in your chosen organization: marketing, human resource management, and operations; (5 marks) Service blueprint in marketing Through use of service blueprint, the marketing team is able to note the shortfalls and address them in order to reach the customers. The marketers are thus able to know what to do in order to reach the target customers more effectively. Marketing aims at gaining a competitive advantage which can only be achieved by improving the fail points. The customers’ perception can be obtained more easily through use of service blueprint. The marketing team is able to identify what the customer needs making it easy to meet these needs and come up with a comprehensive marketing strategy (Schneider & White, 2004). Human resource management The human resource management is involved with several functions which among them is employees’ development, planning and talent acquisition (Sharma, 2008). The department is able to observe where the organisation needs to improve on human resource. For example, the poor service delivery can be associated with lack of adequate staff. The department can engage in recruitment in order to increase the number of employees. The department can also retrain the staff to make sure they are able to deliver high quality services to the customers. Employees can offer poor quality services due to lack of motivation. The human resource department can come up with means of motivating the employees to enhance performance (Schneider & White, 2004). Operations Through the service blueprint, an organisation can be able to redesign their operations to suit the customers’ needs (Rahman, 2004). The operations in the hotel industry include registrations, baggage check, billing and making reservations. After making a service blueprint, the industry can identify failures and work towards eliminating them. For example, the service blueprint may note that the customers are not satisfied in making room reservations. This can lead to the hotel improving the online reservations booking and enhance the services offered by the receptionists. Thus the design of the operations can be tailored through use of service blueprint. 6. Discuss what was learned in doing this assignment and how it could be applied in the real business world. Service blueprint is a vital tool in the real business world. The tool gives a better understanding of the service industry and the processes involved. The tool has a strong customer focus which is vital in service delivery. For example, McDonalds have been able to succeed in their service delivery due to their customer oriented services. The tool helps the company to know the areas in which they can improve in order to have a competitive advantage. The industry is able to know what the customer needs and how to provide it. While utilizing a service blueprint, an organisation is able to enhance their creativity in achieving the customer needs. Service blueprint is able. Service blueprint helps the marketing, operations and delivery processes in an organization to communicate more clearly (Johnson, Scheuing & Gaida, 1986). Thus an organisation requires service blueprint in order to improve the services they provide. References Johnson, E. M., Scheuing, E. E., & Gaida, K. A. (1986). Profitable service marketing. Homewood, Ill: Dow Jones-Irwin. Kerner, C., & Crawford, E. D. (2000). Blueprint. Minneapolis: Lerner Publications Company. Rahman, Z. (2004). Developing customer oriented service: A case study. Managing Service Quality, 14 (5), 426-435. Schneider, B., & White, S. S. (2004). Service Quality: Research Perspectives. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. Sharma, S. P. (2008). Service marketing. Jaipur: Paradise Publishers. Solnet, D., & Kandampully, J. (2008). How some service firms have become part of “service excellence” folklore. Managing Service Quality, 18 (2), 179-193. Wood, R. C., & Brotherton, B. (2008). The SAGE Handbook of Hospitality Management. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. Read More