Findings
There is going to be a number of things that Richard and Patricia need to think about before buying a new property. One of the main concerns for the new property is going to be to the staff. They are going to have to hiring new staff along with keeping the current staff. The current staff will be very useful in the new venture as they already know the general running of the B & B. I would consider promoting all the current staff and splitting them into two groups making one group stay with there current roles at ‘Snooze Cottage’. The second group I would send to the new property and let them run it, but making them in charge of the new workers. This will help as the current workers can train the new employees to cope with the general work at the cottage.
The current workers roles at ‘Snooze Cottage’ at the moment are:
Cook: cooks all the meals for the cottage, keeps a tab on all the stock with help from the cook’s assistant.
Gardener: keeps the garden looking nice, kills the weeds, waters all the plants also grows flowers for the rooms.
Housekeeper: everyone reports to the housekeeper, she keeps the day-to-day tasks running. Keeps check on all the lining, towels, etc
Handyman: repairs all broken items, make sure all general repairs round the house are done and keeping everything working.
Chambermaid: changes all bed sheets, cleans all the rooms etc.
Something else that Richard and Patricia need to take into account is the cost of the new venture. The new property will help bring more income in from extra customers. These customers can help the income also by word of month. It will give the business more entertainment options with the bigger house and there will be more room’s available. But this is all going to cost a lot to get the new business up and running. More staff needs to be hired, money on new furniture, catering and the cost of the property and renovation of the building all need to be taken into account.
Getting the information across to people who need it;
- Once all the staff has been hired it is going to be hard to get information across to them all. So they are going to need to have a meeting once a week at one of the properties. All staff must attend including the new staff, so that they are all aware of the new operation.
- All the people that will be applying for a job need to be able to find out about the vacancies. Advertising for trained and experienced staff, threw local papers, television, etc so the local media will be a great help. It would be best to advertise in man towns and cities as there will be more of an audience.
- Richard and Patricia need to sort out some advertising as they cannot rely on word of month as they are expanding their business and so word of month cannot be relied on as takes time to have an affect. This is because more money needs to be earned to pay for the costing to pay the workers wages, stock, etc.
This is way it would be very helpful for the business to invest in a standard computer for accounting, adverting and communication purposes.
Organisational Structures
The current structure used at the moment is:
Flat structure
Flat organisations are used in small independent businesses.
This small business is at present using a flat structure. This is because there are only a small number of authority levels and this is due to there being a large number of subordinates directly controlled by the manager.
The advantages are that it encourages delegation by management. But the disadvantages are that the wide span of control can result in mismanagement as well as reduced promotion and career opportunities for inferior employees.
At ‘Snooze Cottage’ the Housekeeper keeps all the day-to-day running of the house, telling the rest of the workers what needs doing and when to do it. Then reports to Richard or Patricia to make orders etc. the lowest part of the structure is the Kitchen Assistant as she has to report to the cook and the cook needs to tell her what to do. So apart from the Owners (Richard and Patricia) the Housekeeper (Hazel) is in charge.
Other structures they may use in there business;
Tall Structure
Tall organisations are used in big multi national companies like banks.
In a tall structure there are recognised smaller units of authority, which therefore means many authority levels and very small spans of control.
The advantages are that it can allow a higher level of specialisation within different functions/ roles.
But it does have disadvantages such as less communication between staff in different areas of the workplace and more formality between them because of the lack of integration.
Typical Matrix Structure
Direct Chain of Command
Project Authority
A Matrix structure is designed to join project based structures with that of functional form. It's common in aerospace/ defence industries and for companies working with large one-off contracts as well as being used in many other types of organisations. The project manager coordinates work out one or more functional mangers. Staff may be assigned to transfer from one department to another as this is appropriate for the Project Team.
Hierarchical structure
A hierarchical structure is where the organisation has a definite top down look to its organisational structure. The structure resembles a pyramid. This is the traditional view of a company. The directors at the top, followed by department heads - sales, finance, personnel - then the middle managers - area managers, product managers - followed by the junior employees - the sales representatives, the shop floor workers.
This organisational chart is for the ‘Federation International Football Association’. It is a tall organisation, which this large company works on many authority levels. Football worldwide is organised along simple and yet efficient structures. This not always ideal for this company as there is long lines communication as levels between staff increase more formality. But this can allow a high level of specialisations of function or roles. This structure is designed to fulfil purposes. Its purpose is to keep this great sport running with no problems between teams, fans and players. It also supplies money for lower teams to help them keep out of dept etc. This is why there use a tall structure as each department has there input to football like the media department, which is there to get the relevant information across to people like advertising big games and world tours. It works down the structure until you get to the referees who have a big input into the football match but hardly anything into the association they just make sure the games clean of fights and keeping the game under control. If any fights brake out, the referee tries to stops them and reports the players to FIFA for fines match bans etc. this is what keeps the football association running very well with each department giving there input to the association.
Flow Chart
This information flow chart shows how ‘Snooze Cottage’ orders its stock for the catering. If the cook realises that she is getting low on certain thing for example eggs, then she will make a list of all the things that she is low on and reports to the Manager that checks the accounts to make sure that the stock isn’t going missing and that it is actually being sold. Once he checked the accounts he will feel in an order form and sends it to the supplier, he will send this by E-Mail (if they had a computer) possibly by Fax or by post. Problem is with post though is that it may take a while to arrive so if they had a computer they can have it a lot sooner. The supplier sends the order to the warehouse which gets the relevant stock that is wanted and then sends it back to the cottage. Once the stock arrives it is checked and finalised that it is correct and gets put into the store room until needed.
The same process happens if a large party is going to stay or going to have a party etc. they need to make a very large order before the customers get there so that the food is here on time. When large parties stay a number of different people within the cottage need to know;
The Cook needs to know as they need to cook a lot of food a make sure that they have enough.
The Gardener needs to know to make sure that the garden is looking very nice for the new guests or if there is wedding etc then the garden needs to be arranged for it.
The Housekeeper as she needs to make sure everything will go smoothly, checks there is enough lining, towels etc.
The Handyman needs to make sure there are no problems with the rooms i.e. lights are working and there isn’t any health hazards etc.
The Chambermaid has to make sure all the rooms are clean and that all the beds are made.
Computers
Expanding their business I recommend buying a computer. I have found a computer that will suit the company. It is a standard small business PC.
They will get a licensed copy of an Operating System such as Microsoft Windows XP.
Software
MICROSOFT
MS WINDOWS XP PROFESSIONAL EDITION
MICROSOFT
Windows comes standard when you first buy a PC but if you buy it separately is will cost around the price of £259.99 Inc VAT.
They would be a great help in doing there accounts making memos, agendas, etc. They would have the use of spreadsheets, databases, word processing web page designing, and presentations for promotional reasons and quick retrieval of emails. You can pick up this entire package in Microsoft Office. They will need to buy a licensed copy of this software for example:
MICROSOFT
OFFICE XP PROFESSIONAL EDITION
MICROSOFT PC-CD
This piece of software can be bought in most computing shops and online companies for around the price of £397.99 Inc VAT.
Very good software to have for accounting is Sage. This is software that is designed to help with cash management in small businesses.
SAGE
INSTANT ACCOUNTS V10
SAGE PC-CD
This software can be bought from most computing shops and online companies for around the price of £129.99 Inc VAT.
Conclusion
To conclude my report I have shown what Richard and Patricia need to take into account for expanding their business and buying the new cottage. I have told them advice in what to do in expanding their staff and new organisational structures for there venture. I have giving and example or an organisation structure used at a big company. I have shown a typical flow chart used at the cottage, which is used in the kitchen and ordering stock from their supplier. I have also informed them about Desktop PC’s which would be very useful for the running of the company. I have also given prices of what it will cost to buy a PC and the software which will be very useful to them for all there accounting and very useful for word processing etc. I have also given information on how I think the company will be run best with the current staff and what will be best once the new staffs has arrived and what will be best training wise. I hope my information has been useful to Richard and Patricia in deciding expanding their business.
