Managing Business Operations

Managing Business Operations

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
McDonald's take on capacity management.................................................................................4
Four Ds implementation by McDonald.......................................................................................5
Performance objectives of McDonald.........................................................................................6
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................8
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................9

INTRODUCTION
This file is on how a restaurant chain deals with operational problems, the approaches followed
to solve them. Also it highlights the 4 Ds used in restaurant chain to improve business and
achieve performance objectives. Company being taken here is McDonald which is a big fast food
restaurant chain from America and having expanded to a number of countries.
McDonald's take on capacity management
In recent years, growth of McDonald has been unprecedented with retail chains. In mid 1990s it
has expanded its chain to nearly the double with restaurants opening up in many cities. The low
priced food items offered such as burgers became an instant hit because of an innovation and
quality infused together. The marketing campaigns further increased its popularity among
various nations. This however led to some problems of capacity management as customers kept
flocking to the restaurants with popularity of the brand. It became difficult to manage many
orders coming in at one time. Therefore, it came to people queueing up to get their orders. A
large crowd brings problems such as less seating capacity, less room for fresh air and comfort
and long waiting for orders (Jacquillat and Odoni, 2018).
Any step to be taken for improvement in a business requires planning and decision-making. The
step which has been first taken is of capacity planning. McDonald managers first established the
level of productive resources. They analysed on the factors influencing lead time, cost and
competitiveness. It is then determined how much and when to increase capacity. It is very
important that company makes available the right amount of inventory to cover the demand as
well not exceed it. The company also has to rightly judge the cost of expansion and operation as
a misjudgement can lead to heavy losses. McDonald has also implemented Just-In-Time
approach in which small amount of inventories are supplied to cater for instant demands. It also
requires support of employees who are ready for such routine to be followed. McDonald have
followed a pull strategy for this approach in which the resources are bought as and when there is
an order placed by the customer. This helps in bringing fresh material for consumption
enhancing customer experience as well as reducing production costs. It also helps in reducing the