Case Study 1

At the Country Club

Background of the Study

Effective communication between the employees and their customers is important in a

business. According to Jilie O' Neil public relations society of America "employee communication
has several purposes, and motivating employees to action in support of organization objective is
one important one." Communication skills is one of the many important things to be mindful of
for the employees and also for the manager. Employees and also managers should focus on how
they will interact with a customer and not just focus on technology. The manager should teach
his/her employee to interact with customer with a little bit of understanding while motivating
them.

This study will give some strategies that might help the company. Employees’
relations/interaction is important in a business. You have to make the customer feel welcome
and special. Communication skills is important not just in the field of business but also in
different factors. How can an employee, manager and customer understand each other’s
perspectives if they don't know how communication skills work? Employees need to improve
their communication skills and the manager will teach them how.

Facts of the Case

 Lillian Hollowell is the president of Conglomerate Restaurants who purchased point-of-sale

handheld units.

 Conglomerate Restaurants have advance technologies which is a very big help for the president
to access everything.

 Sarah Dinsmore, the president of International Restaurants, managed chains that had 1400 units
which focused on much more intimate attention.

 International Restaurants is not a part of the POS units since the restaurant is specialized as
friendly and more on customer to employee type of interaction.

 The International Restaurants make use of their manpower than depending on the availability
that the POS units provides.

 Lillian Hollowell and Sarah Dinsmore argued about handheld computers while waiting to play golf
at the country club.
  Both Lillian Hollowell and Sarah Dinsmore were too proud of their prganizations up to the extent
that they had become unconsciously boastful.

 Sarah thinks that the staff lack personal time—punching of orders with the customers because
they spend too much time and attention on technology, and not to them.

 Lillian was very impressed with how technology had improved the servers’ and the kitchen’s
communication.

 According to Sarah Dinsmore, if you want to do something that is limited to your simple
operations, then you would need to be very familiar with the system considering that it’s going to
help you identify where you lack and where you overrun.

Main Problem of the Case

When Hollowel shared her success in using some handheld device. Sarah found that she
has a problem with her system. She is not into using POS and it is not usually operate in Europe.
She even used 3 different system but it was not all effective so in the end she needs to be
familiarize with the system but she have no enough time to review the system. Even she hired
someone to handle it, the servers are very busy in handling the system and she is worried
because her servers have no time to demonstrate the system to her.

Conceptual Framework

Process
 High-touch organization
 High-tech organization
 Point-of-sale handheld Effective customer
units interaction/relationship
 POS units with useful  Performance of
information the
staffs/employees
Independent Dependent
Variable Variable
 This framework shows how variables affect one another with regards to the case given.
The independent variable contains the POS units providing useful information and other things
that Lillian Hollowell is using in the Conglomerate Restaurants, also, Sarah Dinsmore’s high-touch
organization of the International Restaurant. Next is the process, whereas staffs/employees of
both said restaurants with the use of POS units and being high touch organization. Lastly is the
dependent variable. In this variable, the effectiveness of customer interaction or relationship of
International and Conglomerate Restaurants depends on the performance of the staffs or
employees of the said restaurants using their preferred system of organization which are high-
tech and high-touch.

Results and Discussion

In country club, Lilian Hallowell and Sarah Dinsmore were talking about the handheld
computers. Lilian was thinking about how she got along with the restaurant while Sarah
Dinsmore thought her organization was high touch, she says she didn’t need to learn how to use
data because she got an assistant who can manage and study the things well.
This outcome will be the possible things that will happen. Since Sarah and Lilian was
talking/arguing about the handheld computer and there was a problem in Sarah's attitude, Lilian
will give some talks and advice that Sarah needs to get in familiarity with the system in data since
she was the President of the International Restaurants, she needs to get along with how
operations goes in the restaurant so as to assure that their business goals are achieved.

Conclusion and Recommendation

The two presidents of different restaurants both have their own way of dealing with
their company. Hollowell approves of the technology because it really helps to do work easier
while enjoying some free time. If she can see what the problem with the restaurant is, then they
can take immediate actions to resolve it. Dinsmore, on the other hand, have a special connection
to its customers and prefers the employees to really communicate and be friendly. If Dinsmore
consider having handheld technology in their work systems, the employees would be focused
more on the POS systems than the actual customer itself. We recommend that they should
balance their different strategies in handling their restaurant, Hollowell should mix his strategy
with employees actually doing their job especially with the fact that they are in the hospitality
industry. While Dinsmore should still try and work with the handheld computer system for their
work to be done fast and easily. Balancing things is a good way of improving things in the work
place. In this way, both employees and the customers will be satisfied with what service they are
getting.