Improving Business Performance Report

IMPROVING BUSINESS PERFORMANCE

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Executive summary................................................................................ ......................1
Improving business performance report
1.0. Brief introduction of organisation, its products or services................................................2
2.0. Business performance analysis...................................................................................2
2.1. Problem identification at Bellevue cleaners.................................................................4
3.0. Projects evaluation..............................................................................................6
3.1. Literature review on appraisal techniques...............................................................6
3.2. Application of project appraisal techniques for Bellevue cleaners.
3.3. Result analysis...............................................................................
4.0. Continuous improvement vs radical change.
4.1. Literature review: definition of radical change and continuous improvement.
4.2. Project implication method for Bellevue
5.0 project plan draft for Bellevue cleaners.
6.0. Project risk evaluation.
6.1. Risk management literature review
6.2. Project risk evaluation at Bellevue cleaners.
6.3. Risk appraisal summary
6.4. Risk register
7. Final project plan .........................................................................................................................
8. Conclusion.......................................
9. References......................................................................................................................................
10. Appendix......................................................................................................................................

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Improving business performance is described as ongoing process in the whole live
of organization that helps to improve its operations in order to achieve business goals and
objectives. In many situations where the business is struggling, management makes strategic
decisions which are believed to improve the organisational processes and its performance.
This paper will undertake deep qualitative and quantitative analysis of operational
strategy of fast growing dry cleaning and laundry specialist in London: Bellevue Cleaners ltd, with
the aim to recommend most appropriate forms of actions, in line with business needs. Further,
organization capability to implement the change will be measured with the use of varied appraisal
tools such as Payback Period, Net Present Value, SAFe, Performance-Importance matrix, FEMA
etc. This analysis will help to select improve business performance and achieve further benefits in
the form of competitive advantage over the other market or industry competitors.
Most importantly, report highlights the importance of operational function into the
development and implementation of the business strategy. Furthermore, it shows the complexity of
improvement process where managers of the business must apply various techniques which will
help them to get the full understanding of factors impacting the success of the business performance
(Zeithaml, Bitner and Gremler, 2010). To sum it up, business operations require consistent internal
processes review and external environment monitoring in order to achieve sustained success in the
long term.
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IMPROVING BUSINESS PERFORMANCE REPORT
1.0. Brief introduction of organisation, its products or services.
The organization undertaken for the purpose of this study is Bellevue Cleaners ltd. It’s the
fastest growing dry cleaning and laundry specialist in London. Since established in 1974, has
always been and still is a family run business. The business name comes from the French word
which means beautiful view. The mentioned organization is located in the centre of the busy
shopping street, just 5 minutes from Clapham Junction Station. The Bellevue Cleaners ltd is a
private limited company, ran by two brothers, with only one main shop, having no other dry
cleaning branches. It employs 4 fulltime contract employees and a part time tailor. The major
services provided by the Bellevue Cleaners ltd are divided into 3 main categories:
 General dry cleaning along with rugs, curtains, furniture covers and wedding dresses
cleaning
 Repairs and alterations services
 Laundry and shirt services
Furthermore, being located at the centre of the crowded shopping area, it attracts large
number of new customers. However, business has long line of the loyal customer base. The prices
of dry cleaning services are also reasonable as per give offered quality, fabric care and discreet
service.
2.0. Business performance analysis.
Base on the data available, it can be stated that Bellevue Cleaners is going throughout
hard time (Illustration 1). The declining tendency in cash (down by 37.32% compare to previous
year) and net worth (13.2% lower than in year before) indicate that business is struggling in some
areas. By taking in consideration that company`s owns only one shop in south London area, which
is already surrounded by many other competitive dry cleaning their market share is low.
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Illustration 1: Bellevue Cleaners annual results
Unfortunately, Bellevue Cleaners is lucking innovations thus the customers` complain level has
increased dramatically. One of the well known methods of evaluating business performance is
Hayes & Wheelwright capability and maturity model (1984). It shows how operations which at the
beginning are a barrier for business become a strategic opportunity for future success (Illustration
2). Hayes & Wheelwright model reveals that operational capability can increase and make positive
impact on the business performance (Meedith and Mantel, 2012). As seen on illustration, it has four
main stages such as: Correcting worse problem, Adopting best practice, linking strategy with
operations, and giving operational advantage. According to Hayes & Wheelwright capability and
maturity model (1984), overall Bellevue Cleaners performance can be located at the first stage:
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Correcting worst problem. It`s because firm is facing many issues within the business what holds
organisation back from further development therefore it needs to be dealt with immediately. It
indicates the poorest contribution of Bellevue operational processes into their business strategy.
Bringing innovative machines, similar to competitors and will help business to move further thus
organization will be able to increase their productivity, customers satisfaction and quality of
services. Therefore, surely Bellevue will be able to link their strategy with the organization
operations and with that firm will be able to get a competitive edge over the rival firms who are
working within the same industry (Douglas and Craig, 2011).
2.1. Problem identification at Bellevue Cleaners.
As mentioned above firm is facing some problems which are affecting their revenue and
putting them one step behind the competition. Decreasing performance is not acceptable for small
business like Bellevue Cleaners as in result their financial performance will be impacted (Douglas
and Craig, 2011). Performance of Bellevue is impacted by operational issues such as:
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Illustration 2: Hayes and Wheelwright model (1984)

Above table clearly shows that the Bellevue cleaner is facing three major operational issues.
In order to overcome these issues, cited firm has to adopt changes discussed below: Long queues
As identified, organization having broad customers base, thus they get a large number of clothes
daily. The busiest operational time falls in morning drop off hours and afternoon pick up times.
Therefore, due to the lack of the front shop assistance they are experiencing long queues. Extensive
waiting time, causes customers dissatisfaction and deceases loyalty of old time customers
(Leonidou, Palihawadana and Theodosiou, 2011). In result, long waiting time makes customers to
choose another place for cleaning their clothes. This issue can be solved by introducing fully
automatic self drop off machine where people can drop out their clothes and get a ticket as prove of
the provided service. This technological innovation will definitely improve customers’ satisfaction.
Furthermore, it will help business to increase their revenue as by installing new machines more
order will be booked.
 Poor quality of shirt and laundry services
The standard of the shirt and laundry services is also a major problem at Bellevue. High level of
customer complains results in need of reclining what causes financial lose. Indentified problem is
mainly associated with the lack of space to install newest pressing machines. The shirts as well as
laundry are done by human, with no use of innovative technology. Opening new processing shop in
close by location can solve the problem. The manager has to take necessary action in order to
improve organization performance. Having, other shop where the staff will focus only on high
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