Critical Thinking in Action DP

5

Business Situation

Devan Pouncy

Capella University

MBA-FPX5002

Professor: Kristine Ziola-Pardell

October 19, 2021

Business Situation

The specific organization and business situation chosen for this paper is Panera Bread Company and customer dissatisfaction. The situation, referred to as ‘mosh pit of people,’ entailed customers who would wait for minutes before placing an order. The longer waiting hours before placing an order made those in line tired, hungry, and consumed much of their lunch break before returning to their workplace. However, the organizational situation was analyzed on the basis of the VUCA environment, and a critical thinking framework was applied to resolve the issue.

You have shown that Panera used critical thinking and VUCA to resolve its problem.

Please note that as per the instructions:

Then, find another company with a problem they need to fix. You may use NASA, BP, or United Airlines, all of whom have had numerous high-profile problems to solve in recent years, if you wish. Or, you may choose a company that you know has an issue. If you are unsure who to use, try searching "Companies with customer service problems" online and you will get a lot of ideas, though your problem does not have to be about customer service.

The Panera information as meant to be used as a knowledge gained situation to help you apply the information to another problem.

Please note that you need to have a separate problem section that clearly states the problem you want to resolve for another company.

Critical Thinking Framework

               In curbing the situation, the organization’s Chief Executive should apply a critical thinking approach to achieve the intended solution. Most importantly, they should utilize thoughts and ideas beyond ordinary and standard knowledge and skills known by many; they should think out of the box when dealing with the situation. They will have to use critical thinking in formulating different possible service models to the business situation regarding the fast-food industry. The company should listen carefully to feedback from various parties, including the organization management, store managers, shareholders, and Wall Street analysts, to come up with multiple options (Jargon, 2017). This should give the chief executive a clear overview of the issues causing customer dissatisfaction. Also, the chief executive should formulate assumptions or conclusions based on how best he understands the origin of the problem and the actions intended to be taken on the causing factors. Separate the conclusion from the decision during the decision-making process as they both have different thinking processes. Generally, this should help to understand and apply practical recommendations based on the situation causing factors.

Once you find a problem that you want to resolve for another organization, please be sure to apply the specific problem to the elements. For example, if you use an organization that is receiving poor customer satisfaction, the problem is low performance score. So, Company A would achieve clarity by seeing the reports and looking at several situations that led to the low score. Then conclusions would be thought about such as: what is causing this low performance score? Then your conclusions help you to arrive at the decision.

Evidence-Based Situation

               The organization management needs to gain clarity of the issue facing the ordering process to determine the causing factors and formulate the necessary changes. This can be done by looking at the industry to relocate the available opportunities. One of the opportunities in the fast-food industry is the advancement of technology. The organization should find a way to create a business website where customers will be ordering and paying rather than queuing in line for a longer time. Besides, it can also develop an application for ordering making payments in the comfort of the customers. To make the experience more interesting, it should introduce delivering services to the nearby customers. By doing this, the company will significantly reduce the number of people overcrowding its store since many people will be placing their orders via the website and the app. The recommendation more likely to offer solution to the company since it will reduce the frustration experienced by the customers while waiting to place their orders.

When providing the solution, you need to include evidence (research) to prove that the solution/recommendation will work.

VUCA Influence on the Situation

               Based on volatility, organization or industrialization changes are inevitable. As technology rapidly advances, many organizations are changing their operation techniques to offer the best services to their customers in a rush for competitive advantage (Adani, 2021). If, for instance, the entity delays to advance their ordering process, customers will continue to be dissatisfied, thereby looking for other alternatives stores with improved services. Also, the future is typically unpredictable therefore full of uncertainties that might impact the situation. For instance, if the entity is not flexible enough, it may fail to meet the expectation of its customers, whose demand changes with time (Adani, 2021). Moreover, ensuring customers’ needs in terms of services are achieved to their satisfaction will always pose complexities. In particular, offering a similar quality of services in all of its stores may be a complex issue due to different management who may use different approaches in their ordering process service. On the other hand, ambiguity may influence the situation, especially if the leader or the organization management fails to understand the core factors that cause the problem to occur in the first place.

You have shown a good understanding of how to use your VUCA tool.

Once you identify a problem and solution/recommendation for another organization, you will want to re-write the above to reflect the new information.

References

Adani G. (2021). Managing in a VUCA World. Thriving in Turbulent Times. Retrieved from; https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/managing-vuca-world.htm

Jargon J. (2017). How Panera Solved Its ‘Mosh Pit’ Problem. Retrieved from; https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-panera-solved-its-mosh-pit-problem-1496395801

                 

Devan,

It appears that there was a mis-understanding of what was required. As indicated above the Panera information is meant to be used as a learning tool in order to apply the knowledge gained to another organization’s problem and how best to resolve that problem.

Please review the instructions, along with my comments, select a different organization’s problem and then re-write as indicated above.