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UPDATE: Use charts/tables, etc in the paper that are given to you so that is clear that there are specific numbers/measures. Develop a 7-page process improvement plan for a provided scenario or a business and process of your choice, using data to support your recommendations.IntroductionThis portfolio work project, a process improvement plan, will help you demonstrate competencies in process documentation, process analysis, and process improvement. ScenarioFor this assessment, choose either Option 1 or Option 2. You do not need to do both. You will apply one of these scenarios in the Requirements below. Both options will be graded using the same scoring guide.Option 1Wild Dog Coffee Company, a locally owned company with a single coffee shop location, serves a wide selection of espresso products, small breakfast and lunch menu items, and a limited evening menu. The company is planning to expand the business by adding an additional location. While different menu items may be tested at the new location, the espresso beverage preparation process will remain exactly the same. The company wants to ensure that the espresso beverage preparation process is documented and refined before the move. Your RoleOption 1 You are one of three owners of Wild Dog Coffee Company. Your background is primarily in operations. Your business partners backgrounds are in marketing and sales. While they are working on the external aspects of the business that will bring customers in, you are focused on making the internal customer-facing processes as efficient as possible. You are preparing an analysis and recommendations that will help manage a core process improvement for the successful opening of a second location. RequirementsInclude the following in your process improvement plan:Assess the steps for a selected process.Develop a flowchart showing the process steps. You may include as many steps as are relevant for your selected scenario.If using Wild Dog Coffee Company, show the steps for preparing an espresso beverage (for example, latté, cappuccino); there are two steps that must be included: (1) order is submitted and (2) beverage is handed to the customer. Hint: You may want to visit a local coffee shop to observe the beverage preparation process.Prepare a procedure documenting the selected process. At a minimum, the procedure must document the following for your selected process:Metrics. Identify at least two metrics that will be useful in determining how well the new process is performing. Be sure to identify the target value of the metric and how you will measure it. For Wild Dog Coffee Company, it could be how well the beverage preparation process is performing. A third metric is already identified for you: order delivery time. (This is the time between when the order is submitted and the time the beverage is handed to the customer.)Procedure. This section describes each step of the process.For Wild Dog Coffee Company, your procedure should be titled, “Espresso Beverage Preparation Process.” Be sure to include order submittal and handing the beverage to the customer as part of the procedure.Purpose (of the procedure). This section describes what the procedure is intended to do.Analyze data for process changes for a selected process. Respond to the following questions:Is the process centered? Provide the results of your calculations and the rationale for your decision by thinking about the process capability.Is the process capable at 3-sigma? Provide the results of your calculations and the rationale for your decision by thinking about the process capability index.Is the process in statistical control? Provide the appropriate numbers and the rationale for your decision using a control chart for individuals.For Wild Dog Coffee Company, analyze the Beverage Service Times [XLSX] data. This data is for 50 beverage preparation events and was collected using their order processing system. Each individual order gets a time-stamp when it is placed and again when the beverage is handed to the customer. The senior barista thinks the beverage delivery times should range between 2 and 3 minutes. The known process standard deviation, which has been calculated on an on-going basis, is 0.5903 minutes.Analyze the cause and effect of process variances.Brainstorm possible sources of variation to create a cause-and-effect diagram to help analyze potential sources of variation in the espresso beverage preparation process at Wild Dog Coffee Company or for your selected business process. Your diagram must include at least four of the “6 Ms” (that is, management, manpower, method, measurement, machine, materials).Recommend quality and customer service improvements for a selected process.Detail the results of your analysis for Wild Dog Coffee Company or your selected business process to substantiate your recommendations.Deliverable FormatRequirements:The process improvement plan is to be a minimum of 7 pages, not including the title, reference, and appendix pages.Use a process improvement plan template of your choice.Related company standards:The process improvement plan is a professional document and should therefore follow the corresponding MBA Academic and Professional Document Guidelines (available in the MBA Program Resources), including single-spaced paragraphs.In addition to the title and reference pages, include the following in the appendix:Flowchart.Procedure.Detailed results of order delivery time analysis.Cause-and-effect diagram. Use American Society for Quality (ASQ) data analysis tools and 2–3 additional scholarly or academic sources where applicable.Use APA formatting for citations and references. mba_fpx5016_butlersullivanapril_assessment1_3.docx Unformatted Attachment Preview Running head: PROCESS IMPROVEMENT PLAN Process Improvement Plan April Butler-Sullivan Capella University Jan. 10, 2020 1 PROCESS IMPROVEMENT PLAN 2 Process Improvement Plan Introduction Watts Humphrey is quoted to have said that unplanned process improvement is wishful thinking. Planning is very core when it comes to business or management. Any organizations, company, corporation, firm be it small or big must engage in planning in order to ensure that success is realized within a certain period of time. Planning is the process of thinking about and organizing the activities required to achieve the desired objectives or goals over a given period of time. It involves deciding in the present what to do in the future by bridging the gap between where we are and where we are to go. It is after planning is when things are made possible to occur which would otherwise not happen. Process improvement plan is a process of identifying and analyzing the existing business processes or activities with a goal of improving all of its operations (Trkman, 2013). It is a selfassessment technique, which helps organizations evaluate itself, and how they can come up with better ways of operations and how they can generally improve on their services or goods they provide. Process improvement helps to eradicate or combat the weak points that a business encounters on a daily basis. By identifying the bottlenecks that business operations face, it will help them among other things to reduce completion time, eradicate wasted efforts, reducing conflicts or frictions that are encountered in business processes and it will improve process efficiency and quality. Lastly, such a step will help organization, company, corporation or any business entity meet regulatory compliance. Business improvement process plan is a comprehensive blueprint, which outlines an organization’s overall business efforts and activities (Parmenter, 2015). It involves coming up PROCESS IMPROVEMENT PLAN 3 with specific objectives for marketing activities, determining and scheduling the steps necessary to achieve such objectives and identification of resources available in order to realize such goals. Such a roadmap of an organization for selecting a target market and satisfying the consumers is very essential in the business world since it aids the organization or the company to accomplish specific marketing objectives within a set time frame. A right business improvement process plan identifies the target consumers, how to reach and retain them, to ensure that they continue buying products from company In our current dynamic world, any organization that has an ambition of achieving set objectives and goals must ensure that its process improvement plans are initiated. It is a wellknown fact that developing process improvement plan is not an easy task for it takes a lot of time and in most cases requires putting a lot of efforts to ensure that the plans identified can work effectively to achieve the stated goals. Process improvement plans are usually confronted with a number of challenges that if not solved in their initial stages their purpose to which it was formed fails. The Wild Dog Coffee Company scenario A scenario is given of the Wild Dog Coffee Company of which I am one of the owners. Having the intellectual wherewithal on internal matters focusing on making the internal customer-facing processes as efficient as possible then a process improvement is a prerequisite. Having a business process improvement will help the Wild Dog Coffee Company to establish another company with ease and continue making profits. The success of opening a similar company in a different location is dependent on the analysis and recommendations given that will help manage a core process improvement of the establishment of the same company. PROCESS IMPROVEMENT PLAN 4 In the new site or company, the business will be required to maintain the same process of customer handling and coffee making, but with improved efficiency in two main areas. First, the time difference between order time and delivery time must be reduced to the minimum. This means that the company should consider installing the most efficient espresso machines and employees who will not only deliver high quality beverages, but also timely deliveries. For instance, the company could consider following the outlined steps below: order is submitted assessemnt of the reqirements acquisition of the fundamentals beverage preperation quality assessemnet beverage is handed to the customer The process of making a latte, or milk and coffee drink 1. The first step is to switch on the espresso machine, assuming that the customer has placed the order and the required material-milk, coffee beans and grinder, are available. Also, for latte, it is important that the steamer is switched on. 2. Step two involves grinding the coffee beans using the grinder. The grinder has settings based on how fine the ground bans are required, which varies with the consumers. However, the recommended size is that that resembles salt particles. For a normal latte, up to 18g of coffee beans are ground. 3. The third step, and the most important one is to tamp the ground coffee. For quality assurance, the portafilter should be placed on the scale to confirm if it still weighs 18g. Once that is ascertained, the ground coffee in the portafilter is PROCESS IMPROVEMENT PLAN 5 pressed for a few seconds with a coffee tamper with about 30lbs of force. Uniformity of extraction is ensured through this process, which ensures equal, consistent water contact when it is forced through the portafilter. 4. Step four involves pulling the shot of espresso. In this step, the espresso machine is set and locked in place, and then water is pushed through the portafilter for about 20 to 30 seconds. Once the short is completed, it is then poured in any cup of coffee container. 5. Step five is where the coffee is turned into latte. The milk is not just poured in the coffee, but it requires to be steamed first. The temperature of the milk should be approximately 140° F. 6. This is the last step, which involves pouring the milk in the coffee, and then serving it to the customer. The whole process should take the least waiting time for improved customer service and satisfaction. Metrics to be used to determine the effectiveness of the process Based on the outcomes of the latte preparation, the consumer’s feedback is key determinant in knowing the efficiency of the preparation process. The first metric will b based on the quality of the latte. This is to mean, if the right temperatures was used in the making of the latte. For one, if the milk was overheated and burned, the quality of the latte will be great, hence positive customer feedback. Secondly, the use of the right ground size of the coffee beans. Too large sizes may be of inconvenience to the customers. In most cases, the customers prefer stating their preferences based on the size of the ground beans. If not stated, it is best that the preparation uses the size equal to salt sizes. The third metric, which is of equally great importance, is the order delivery time, which is the time between when the order is submitted PROCESS IMPROVEMENT PLAN and the time the beverage is handed to the customer. In most cases, the shorter the time the better. Espresso Beverage Preparation Process 1. Order is submitted The customer specifies the type of espresso beverage they want by choosing from the menu or direct specification 2. Assessment of the requirements The specified requirements are then evaluated, if they are available or not, which the consumer is then notified on the results of the assessment. 3. Acquisition of the fundamentals If the specified materials for preparing the beverage are available, the barista goes ahead to begin the preparation process 4. Beverage preparation This step follows the preparation procedure for the ordered beverage 5. Quality assessment The prepared espresso beverage is then passed through a short evaluation process that performs a background check on the outcomes and the required specifications 6. Handing the beverage to the consumer Upon certifying that the beverage meets all the specifications and requirements, it is served to the customer in the most appropriate form. 6 PROCESS IMPROVEMENT PLAN Purpose of the procedure When thinking of process improvement plan one must not exclude the issue of customer satisfaction. Without customer satisfaction no business can claim to thrive. Wild Dog Coffee Company must assess and interrogate its current services and products offered so as to know what measures are to be put in place to ensure total satisfaction of customers is achieved within the company. Customers are a diverse people and dynamic and therefore the company or a business need not to stick to its old way of offering services and products to the customers (Tukker, 2015). A company must device new mechanisms, improve its existing standards and implement new and better systems with a goal of satisfying the customers. It is very necessary and crucial for a company to make appropriate changes in services and products offered by the company. Improving customer satisfaction entails promoting sufficient delivery of services, improving the quality of products, employing the best-qualified employees with all the needed skills and improving the level of all operations within the company (Bortolotti, Danese & Romano, 2013). These changes are not easy since in most cases it is hard to have effective changes because changes are always faced internal resistance. An analysis of data for process change implementation Process improvement plan is very crucial for Wild Dog Coffee Company. It is from process improvement that business operations and success in the establishment of a similar company in the second location can be a reality. If the process improvement is not adhered to then establishment of the second will be just a dream. Without internal process improvement then all other plans will be almost impossible. 7 PROCESS IMPROVEMENT PLAN 8 The main discrepancies that require process implementation is the relatively high order delivery time. Most clients prefer timely delivery of their order, however, based on the data collected on the 50 preparations process of the beverages, there is a certainty that the company need to evaluate the causes of the high deviation, 0.5903 minutes. This can be due to several factors, including inefficient espresso machines, poor management, and employee demotivation, among other possibilities. Nonetheless, there is need for an improvement in the internal customer facing process, which calls for the implementation of a process improvement methodology that focuses on customer quality. There are several process improvement methodologies, which can be used by Wild Dog Coffee Company to improve its business sales, operations and productivity with a goal of making profits that will help in establishment of a similar company in a second location offering the same services and goods. For instance, the Six Sigma. Six-Sigma methodology is an effective methodology in process improvement. It is a data-driven approach that aims at reducing defects to improvement performance and operations of an organization. Such an approach can be of very good use in the Wild Dog Coffee Company scenario since a lot of decision will rely on data available by the company. The six-sigma process improvement methodology approach helps measure defects and inconsistencies within a company and it will also influence decision that will improve the quality of services and products of the Wild Dog Coffee Company. The sixsigma process improvement methodology aims at improving the already existing processes and creating new effective new processes that will be help for the Wild Dog Coffee Company. Total Quality Management (TQM) However, the process improvement methodology to be used by Wild Dogs Coffee will be the Total Quality Management (TQM. Total Quality Management process improvement PROCESS IMPROVEMENT PLAN 9 methodology is also an effective methodology used during process improvement. Total Quality Management (TQM) focuses on customers. This approach believes that a success of a company or an organization depends on the customers. Customer satisfaction is a prerequisite in any business approach according to Total Quality Management (TQM) process improvement methodology. Total Quality Management (TQM) believes that for any business to thrive or for any company to remain relevant, make profits and not to succumb to competition from its rival companies the company therefore has no option but to come up with sophisticated ways so as to ensure that customer satisfaction is met. Many companies have in many times failed to satisfy its customers and this plays a negative role in their existence in the market (Bortolotti, Danese & Romano, 2013). Customer satisfaction is not a one day event but a process that entails coming up with good customer services that will make them satisfied and want to seek more services and products form the company (Bortolotti, Danese & Romano, 2013). For the case of Wild Dog Coffee Company, we must ensure that customer satisfaction is met in order to ensure that establishment of a similar company in a second location is achievable. The cause-and-effect of process variances There are several factors that we can consider when evaluating the espresso beverage preparation process. The variation in beverage service time can be attributed to factors associated with manpower, implying that there are not enough works to meet the demand. Also, manpower can be associated with issues related to re-stocking of supplies and the ability to maintain a drive-thru which effects the service time. Apart from manpower, ineffective equipment make it difficult for baristas to deliver their responsibilities. Equipment that is consistently breaking down can negatively impact the beverage preparation process. PROCESS IMPROVEMENT PLAN 10 Furthermore, the order delivery time can vary as a result of inadequate materials, and the need to constantly resupply during the work time. Management plays a significant role in the operations of a business, and this is why it can be a source of variation in the beverage preparation process (Bortolotti, Danese & Romano, 2013). For instance, the management is responsible for ensuring that there are adequate materials for the whole beverage preparation process in order to ensure continuity of work-flow. Poor management skill negatively impacts service time, which comprise of poor communication, the inability to assign responsibilities and tasks, and not promoting teamwork (Bortolotti, Danese & Romano, 2013). At Wild Dog Coffee Company is it crucial that we understand the different sources of variation. By being at the limelight of the broad sources of variations, reducing their impacts on the beverage service times for the new process will be a possibility. PROCESS IMPROVEMENT PLAN 11 Recommendations After mapping the process, it is wise and necessary to analyze the process. It is at this stage is when you will be able to know where the Wild Dog Coffee Company is taking a lot of time, where a lot of resources are directed and also where a lot of money is pumped into. At Wild Dog Coffee Company, our aim is to serve the best espresso beverages to our clients within the shortest time possible. Currently, our service times in the upper direction of up to 3.5 minutes with an average of 2.47 minutes. Based on these, there is a high possibility that customers who are time-specific are most likely to be dissatisfied with our services. Therefore, it is vital that the new model reduces the service time significantly to accommodate the time specification of the most time-conscious clients, and it is my belief that we can achieve that. Reducing wait times becomes an easier task if there is a full stock of all the required materials, effective management skill and employee motivation, as well as appropriate placement of the required materials within arms length of every barista (Croxton, 2003). Additionally, improving the efficiency of the equipment will have a positive impact in reducing the waiting time. Through regular maintenance, the espresso machines that are required for high-speed preparation process will help the company improve the quality of service as well as reducing the order delivery time. Through these changes, the company will able to ensure continuity of operations as well as sustainable consumer market. PROCESS IMPROVEMENT PLAN 12 References Bortolotti, T., Danese, P., & Romano, P. (2013). Assessing the impact of just-in-time on operational performance at varying degrees of repetitiveness. International Journal of Production Research, 51(4), 1117-1130. Croxton, K. L. (2003). The Order Fulfillment Process. The International Journal of Logistics Management, 14(1), 19– 32. Retrieved from https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/182f/b7c9a6cecd0ac2cd6bd9d45c49f71326dcc1.pdf Parmenter, D. (2015). Key performance indicators: developing, implementing, and using winning KPIs. John Wiley & Sons. Trkman, P. (2013). Increasing process orientation with business process management: Critical practices’. International journal of information management, 33(1), 48-60. Tukker, A. (2015). Product services for a resource-efficient and circular economy–a review. Journal of cleaner production, 97, 76-91. ... Purchase answer to see full attachment