Management Compensation as a Value-Added Competitive Method for Casual Theme Restaurants

The primary purpose of this study is to propose that the management compensation package at Outback Steakhouse is a value-adding competitive method. Specifically the research focused on a survey of general manager's altitudes in regards to their intentions to seek out new employment and the effect of the compensation plan provided by Outback Steakhouse on the managers' intentions. This research will provide insight into the use of compensation packages and programs as proactive, value-adding competitive methods in retaining good quality managers it casual theme restaurants.

Customer relationship management: A content analysis of issues and best practices

This dissertation is a study of customer relationship management theory and practice. Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is a business strategy whereby companies build strong relationships with existing and prospective customers with the goal of increasing organizational profitability. It is also a learning process involving managing change in processes, people, and technology. CRM implementation and its ramifications are also not completely understood as evidenced by the high number of failures in CRM implementation in organizations and the resulting disappointments. ^ The goal of this dissertation is to study emerging issues and trends in CRM, including the effect of computer software and the accompanying new management processes on organizations, and the dynamics of the alignment of marketing, sales and services, and all other functions responsible for delivering customers a satisfying experience. ^ In order to understand CRM better a content analysis of more than a hundred articles and documents from academic and industry sources was undertaken using a new methodological twist to the traditional method. An Internet domain name (http://crm.fiu.edu) was created for the purpose of this research by uploading an initial one hundred plus abstracts of articles and documents onto it to form a knowledge database. Once the database was formed a search engine was developed to enable the search of abstracts using relevant CRM keywords to reveal emergent dominant CRM topics. The ultimate aim of this website is to serve as an information hub for CRM research, as well as a search engine where interested parties can enter CRM-relevant keywords or phrases to access abstracts, as well as submit abstracts to enrich the knowledge hub. ^ Research questions were investigated and answered by content analyzing the interpretation and discussion of dominant CRM topics and then amalgamating the findings. This was supported by comparisons within and across individual, paired, and sets-of-three occurrences of CRM keywords in the article abstracts. ^ Results show that there is a lack of holistic thinking and discussion of CRM in both academics and industry which is required to understand how the people, process, and technology in CRM impact each other to affect successful implementation. Industry has to get their heads around CRM and holistically understand how these important dimensions affect each other. Only then will organizational learning occur, and overtime result in superior processes leading to strong profitable customer relationships and a hard to imitate competitive advantage. ^

How do partnerships lead to a competitive advantage? Applying the resource based view to nascent social ventures

This dissertation is one of the earliest to systematically apply and empirically test the resource-based view (RBV) in the context of nascent social ventures in a large scale study. Social ventures are entrepreneurial ventures organized as nonprofit, for-profit, or hybrid organizations whose primary purpose is to address unmet social needs and create social value. Nascent social ventures face resource gaps and engage in partnerships or alliances as one means to access external resources. These partnerships with different sectors facilitate social venture innovative and earned income strategies, and assist in the development of adequate heterogeneous resource conditions that impact competitive advantage. Competitive advantage in the context of nascent social ventures is achieved through the creation of value and the achievement of venture development activities and launching. The relationships between partnerships, heterogeneous resource conditions, strategies, and competitive advantage are analyzed in the context of nascent social ventures that participated in business plan competitions. A content analysis of 179 social venture business plans and an exploratory follow-up survey of 72 of these ventures are used to analyze these relationships using regression, ANOVA, correlations, t-tests, and non-parametric statistics. The findings suggest a significant positive relationship between competitive advantage and partnership diversity, heterogeneous resource conditions, social innovation, and earned income. Social capital is the type of resource most significantly related to competitive advantage. Founder previous start-up experience, client location, and business plan completeness are also found to be significant in the relationship between partnership diversity and competitive advantage. Finally the findings suggest that hybrid social ventures create a greater competitive advantage than nonprofit or for-profit social ventures. Consequently, this dissertation not only provides academics further insight into the factors that impact nascent social value creation, venture development, and ability to launch, but also offers practitioners guidance on how best to organize certain processes to create a competitive advantage. As a result more insight is gained into the nascent social venture creation process and how these ventures can have a greater impact on society.

Hydro-physical characterization of media used in agricultural systems to develop the best management practices for operation of an environmentally sustainable agricultural enterprise

Florida is the second leading horticulture state in the United States with a total annual industry sale of over $12 Billion. Due to its competitive nature, agricultural plant production represents an extremely intensive practice with large amounts of water and fertilizer usage. Agrochemical and water management are vital for efficient functioning of any agricultural enterprise, and the subsequent nutrient loading from such agricultural practices has been a concern for environmentalists. A thorough understanding of the agrochemical and the soil amendments used in these agricultural systems is of special interest as contamination of soils can cause surface and groundwater pollution leading to ecosystem toxicity. The presence of fragile ecosystems such as the Everglades, Biscayne Bay and Big Cypress near enterprises that use such agricultural systems makes the whole issue even more imminent. Although significant research has been conducted with soils and soil mix, there is no acceptable method for determining the hydraulic properties of mixtures that have been subjected to organic and inorganic soil amendments. Hydro-physical characterization of such mixtures can facilitate the understanding of water retention and permeation characteristics of the commonly used mix which can further allow modeling of soil water interactions. The objective of this study was to characterize some of the locally and commercially available plant growth mixtures for their hydro-physical properties and develop mathematical models to correlate these acquired basic properties to the hydraulic conductivity of the mixture. The objective was also to model the response patterns of soil amendments present in those mixtures to different water and fertilizer use scenarios using the characterized hydro-physical properties with the help of Everglades-Agro-Hydrology Model. The presence of organic amendments helps the mixtures retain more water while the inorganic amendments tend to adsorb more nutrients due to their high surface area. The results of these types of characterization can provide a scientific basis for understanding the non-point source water pollution from horticulture production systems and assist in the development of the best management practices for the operation of environmentally sustainable agricultural enterprise

Measuring Hotel Service Quality: Tools for Gaining the Competitive Edge

As the hotel industry grows more competitive, quality guest service becomes an increasingly important part of managers' responsibility measuring the quality of service delivery is facilitated when managers know what types of assessment methods are available to them. The authors present and discuss the following available measurement techniques and describe the situations where they best meet the needs of hotel managers: management observation, employee feedback programs, comment cards, mailed surveys, personal and telephone interviews, focus groups, and mystery shopping.

Service Management Concepts: Implications for Hospitality Management

In - Service Management Concepts: Implications for Hospitality Management – a study by K. Michael Haywood, Associate Professor, School of Hotel and Food Administration, University of Guelph, Ontario, Canada, Associate Professor Haywood initially proffers: “The study and application of hospitality management has progressed on its own for many years; however, managers are not immune to the knowledge gained from study of other service industries. The author synthesizes what is happening in the area of service management, looks at its relevance to hospitality management, and identifies a few important implications of service management for hospitality managers.” The author draws a distinction between non-denominated service management, and service management as it applies to the hospitality industry. This is done to make an apparent comparison, as many people would assume the two are one in the same. They are not, and the contrast works well here. “While much of what we already know about effective management applies to service industries, some of the traditional concepts of management are inadequate in solving the problems faced by service businesses,” Haywood points out. “If a body of knowledge to be known as service management already exists, or is being developed, where does it fit relative to hospitality management,” Haywood asks. According to John Bateson, Testing a Conceptual Framework for Consumer Service Marketing, there are four criteria used to judge service management. Haywood details these for you, the reader, by way of citation. Haywood points to the difficulty in pin-pointing the intangibles that underpin the service industry. Since service is a concept rather than a touchable good, such as inventory, problems arise for both the organization and the client. Haywood points to a classic study of four service industries in France to illustrate the problems, although no realistic suggestions address the issues. “Over the past few years a variety of system models have been developed to explain the service process, that is, how the service is designed, produced, delivered, and consumed,” Haywood offers. These models are depicted in Appendices A-E. In offering perspectives on how the hospitality industry can gain from the experiences of service management, Haywood observes: “Service management places particular emphasis on a strategic outlook. Hospitality firms would be wise to carefully examine how they are perceived in the marketplace vis-a-vis their service concept, position, competitive situation, and management’s leadership abilities.” “Learning from the experiences of other service firms can help keep a company on track, that is, providing needed and valued services,” he closes the thought.

Database As A Tool For Hospitality Management

In his discussion - Database As A Tool For Hospitality Management - William O'Brien, Assistant Professor, School of Hospitality Management at Florida International University, O’Brien offers at the outset, “Database systems offer sweeping possibilities for better management of information in the hospitality industry. The author discusses what such systems are capable of accomplishing.” The author opens with a bit of background on database system development, which also lends an impression as to the complexion of the rest of the article; uh, it’s a shade technical. “In early 1981, Ashton-Tate introduced dBase 11. It was the first microcomputer database management processor to offer relational capabilities and a user-friendly query system combined with a fast, convenient report writer,” O’Brien informs. “When 16-bit microcomputers such as the IBM PC series were introduced late the following year, more powerful database products followed: dBase 111, Friday!, and Framework. The effect on the entire business community, and the hospitality industry in particular, has been remarkable”, he further offers with his informed outlook. Professor O’Brien offers a few anecdotal situations to illustrate how much a comprehensive data-base system means to a hospitality operation, especially when billing is involved. Although attitudes about computer systems, as well as the systems themselves have changed since this article was written, there is pertinent, fundamental information to be gleaned. In regards to the digression of the personal touch when a customer is engaged with a computer system, O’Brien says, “A modern data processing system should not force an employee to treat valued customers as numbers…” He also cautions, “Any computer system that decreases the availability of the personal touch is simply unacceptable.” In a system’s ability to process information, O’Brien suggests that in the past businesses were so enamored with just having an automated system that they failed to take full advantage of its capabilities. O’Brien says that a lot of savings, in time and money, went un-noticed and/or under-appreciated. Today, everyone has an integrated system, and the wise business manager is the business manager who takes full advantage of all his resources. O’Brien invokes the 80/20 rule, and offers, “…the last 20 percent of results costs 80 percent of the effort. But times have changed. Everyone is automating data management, so that last 20 percent that could be ignored a short time ago represents a significant competitive differential.” The evolution of data systems takes center stage for much of the article; pitfalls also emerge.

Hydro-Physical Characterization of Media Used in Agricultural Systems to Develop the Best Management Practices for operation of an Environmentally Sustainable Agricultural Enterprise

Florida is the second leading horticulture state in the United States with a total annual industry sale of over $12 Billion. Due to its competitive nature, agricultural plant production represents an extremely intensive practice with large amounts of water and fertilizer usage. Agrochemical and water management are vital for efficient functioning of any agricultural enterprise, and the subsequent nutrient loading from such agricultural practices has been a concern for environmentalists. A thorough understanding of the agrochemical and the soil amendments used in these agricultural systems is of special interest as contamination of soils can cause surface and groundwater pollution leading to ecosystem toxicity. The presence of fragile ecosystems such as the Everglades, Biscayne Bay and Big Cypress near enterprises that use such agricultural systems makes the whole issue even more imminent. Although significant research has been conducted with soils and soil mix, there is no acceptable method for determining the hydraulic properties of mixtures that have been subjected to organic and inorganic soil amendments. Hydro-physical characterization of such mixtures can facilitate the understanding of water retention and permeation characteristics of the commonly used mix which can further allow modeling of soil water interactions. The objective of this study was to characterize some of the locally and commercially available plant growth mixtures for their hydro-physical properties and develop mathematical models to correlate these acquired basic properties to the hydraulic conductivity of the mixture. The objective was also to model the response patterns of soil amendments present in those mixtures to different water and fertilizer use scenarios using the characterized hydro-physical properties with the help of Everglades-Agro-Hydrology Model. The presence of organic amendments helps the mixtures retain more water while the inorganic amendments tend to adsorb more nutrients due to their high surface area. The results of these types of characterization can provide a scientific basis for understanding the non-point source water pollution from horticulture production systems and assist in the development of the best management practices for the operation of environmentally sustainable agricultural enterprise