Analysis of Customer Retention Problems at Ben's Cookies: A Report

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of customer retention challenges faced by Ben's Cookies, a chain of cookie shops. Utilizing the soft system methodology (SSM), the report explores the complexities of the client's issues, including high product prices, ineffective marketing strategies, poor employee-customer communication, and inadequate employee training. The report includes a rich picture to visually represent the problem, followed by a detailed SSM analysis, including stakeholder identification, PQR, CATWOE, and root definitions. The report culminates in actionable recommendations for Ben's Cookies, such as improving communication skills, utilizing social media marketing, and offering skill-based training for employees to enhance customer retention and achieve a competitive advantage. The 3E's model is also used to evaluate efficiency and effectiveness.

Effective Management
Consultancy

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION ..........................................................................................................................3
PART 1............................................................................................................................................3
Rich picture of the client's problem solution...............................................................................3
PART 2............................................................................................................................................5
Soft system methodology Analysis..............................................................................................5
PART 3..........................................................................................................................................11
SSM analysis .............................................................................................................................11
PART 4..........................................................................................................................................13
Recommendations......................................................................................................................13
CONCLUSION .............................................................................................................................14
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................15

INTRODUCTION
Management consultants are experts who are well-trained to solve the problems , provide
solution, make strategies for the other's ad improve the financial and operational health the
clients organization thorough the proper solution. Most of the companies hie the management
consultancy organization for the help and solve their problems.
This report will cover case study of Ben's Cookies which is an chain of shops in the
England and elsewhere they bake s and sell a Soft and gooey Cookies, Freshly baked. The logo
of the company was related by the British Artist Quein Blaje.
This report will discuss the problem rated to the customer retention faced by the Ben's
Cookies. This project will make use of the soft system methodology as the overall framework to
identify the problems and explore complexity of the clients. Proper strategies will be followed by
the report to overcome from the issues faced by Ben's Cookies.
PART 1
Rich picture of the client's problem solution
Rich picture is the ways to define the situation by using the figures a and symbol and
numbers worlds. It helps to represent the simultaneously and allow the stepping back from the
small details that are creating the problems and improve in the objectivity of the plan .

Ben's Cookies is facing many problems related to the customer retention. Ben's Cookies
is making the quality product t for their customers but the fist problem they are facing and
creating the problems related to the customer relationship is their prices of the product. Other
competitors of the Ben's Cookies are selling their product and services in the lower prices and
taking the competitive advantages. On the other side Ben's Cookies getting force from the
competitors to decrease their prices. It is necessary for the company to bake and sell the Sift
cookies in the affordable price range, so they can also attract the customers and take competitive
advantages.

Another problems face by the Ben's Cookies in the customers' retention is their
promotion activities. They are using the basic method for the advertisement like template
distribution, door to door marketing, but they rarely meet the customers who can buy the
Cookies from them (Daniels and Wosicki, 2020). It is necessary for the Ben's Cookies to sell
their cookies by using social media platform which is trending marketing strategy and also most
effective because company can target the people according to their area, and they can target the
audience according to their interest. Most common reason behind the customer retention is the
choosing of marketing tool, it is necessary for the company to have accurate tool that can helps
them to retain the customers and attract to buy product and services.
Another most important reason behind the customer's retention faced by the Ben's
Cookies is how their employees communicate with the customers and build the trust. Customer
get attract when they find a good people around them. Trust among the customers can be build
the employees of the Ben's Cookies communicate with them and provide fast services to their
customers, so they can gain their loyalty and customers can regularly buy product and services
from them (Jung and et.al., 2017). Management team of the Ben's Cookies and leaders are
responsibly for it. It n is necessary for the companies managers to provide training and
development program to their customers for the fats services and developed skills like
communication, so they can interact with the customers and communicates properly with the
customers. Training will develop new skills and make the employees understand that they should
welcome their customers when they enter in their Cookie shop and how they shrouds
communicate with them. On the other side leaders of the company is responsible to training of
their team about the communication. Thy should practically present to see how their employees
are treating their customers or if they are able to communicate with the client priorly or not, so
they can identify the problems.
PART 2
Soft system methodology Analysis.
Soft system Methodology is the approach and organizational process modelling and it can
be used both in the soling the problem generally and in the management of the changes. This
methodology was developed by the Pete after the 10 years of research.
Selection of Stakeholders

Stakeholder are most important part of the company and list of stakeholder can include
both internal and external stakeholder of the Ben's Cookies. Internal stakeholder life Managers,
employees, leaders, owners are getting affected from the Customer recension because they are
not able to satisfy their customers need and create trust among them. Stakeholder will focus on
the will focus to increase the rates of Customer recension to over come the problem (Tsvetkov
and et.al., 2019). They will develop new strategies that will helps them to overcome from the
issues, and they will able to attract customers who can buy product and services from the Ben's
Cookies and company can increase their productivity and show their presence within the Uk
market. According to the research most activities effective stakeholder that need to look for the
issue are their employees and mangers.
PQR
PQR is one of the most essential formula to cover the definition of the Root. The main
aim and goals is to describe what the ideal system would be in the perspective of the some
stakeholder. It covers P which means Preparative, Q that represent How does the system work
and R that helps to define why does the stakeholder want to the new system to be implement at
their workplace.
What ? (P) How ? (Q) Why ? (R)
Managers Managers top
stakeholder their
responsibility is to
look for the proper
solution of the
problems.
They will provide
training and
development to their
customers, so they can
learn communication
skills and increase the
customers retention
Managers are
responsible to manage
their employees they
have take look for the
weakness of the
organization.
Employees Employees need to
improve their
communicate skills,
and they need to learn
how to gain loyalty of
They should use their
communication skilful,
and they will create
trust to the employees,
so they can build a
Customer services the
services and hand over
the product to the
customers to it their
responsibility to

the customers look relation with their
customers.
communicate with
employees effectively
to increase the
customers insertion
rate.
Leaders Leaders are top
superiors are the
company, and they
should look for the
better performance of
the company, the are
responsible to solve
the customers
retention problem.
They should inspire
and make their
employees understand
that how they should
behave when
customers come to the
stores so employees
can learn and take
knowledge
Leaders are top
superiors are the
company, and they
should look for the
better performance of
the company, the are
responsible to solve
the customers
retention problem.
CATWOE
CATWOE Analysis is one of the essential and useful tool that helps to identify the
problems and provide what business is trying to achieve and also how the stakeholders
perspectives affect the people involved in.
T, W
Owners
Leaders- who
can take decision.
Managers and staff – can give
suggestion and recommend
strategies for the
improvement in customer’s
retention of business
Customers are not satisfied with the prices provide by
the company. They should get product in affordable
prices
Satisfy
customers
Actors-
Managers,
Employees,
Leaders

Environment
 Company will create environment where environment where employees can learn how to
build trust among the customers.
 create environment where customers can feel safe and better in the shops of Ben's
Cookies
Customer
Customers are facing the problems in satisfaction, product and services sell by the Ben's
Cookies are costly and mostly they are not getting the fast services that creating barriers for the
customers.
Actor
The business process and technique use by the company are not that affecting because
they are not able to satisfy their customers, customers once buy their product do not look back to
buy product again due to the slow delivery and process (Ahmad and et.al., 2017).
Transformation
Ben's Cookies create their cookies with their hand that takes times as compare to the
other business who use the technology to provide fast services. Employees also responsible to
produce services outputs that are not been delivered to the client because of lack of
communication skills. Company buy raw materiel prom the local market after that production
team of the Ben's Cookies make cookies with their hand and then they reach to each and every
shop of the Ben's Cookies. It is long process and sometimes their product are not available on
time.
worldview
Customers retention problems that mainly faced by the Ben's Cookies and to have proper
solution of the problems there are some strategies that can be adopted by the Ben's Cookies,
Communication skills of employees can be improved, so they can build trust among the
employees (Lathan, Selwyn and Langhinrichsen‐Rohling, J., 2020). Company can use social
media to adverse their product and target the people who are looking or the Cookies and other

product sell by the Ben's Cookies, Training and development will enable the employees to
provide fast services.
Owner
Owner of the situation is the managers and employees because Ben's Cookies because
they are facing the Customer recension problems at the workplace, and they can help in this
situation by giving their contribution by bringing some improvement in their strategies and skills.
Environment
It is necessary for the Ben's Cookies company to create a environment where employees
can learn how to build trust among the customers, and they should also focus on their services
and create environment where customers can feel safe and better in the shops of Ben's Cookies.
Root definition
From the PQR formula and after considering the CATWOEs for some stakeholders, we
can derive the root definitions, which are statements describing the activity system to be
modelled, viewed from a pure, declared world view.
Managers
As system that will helps employee to learn the communication skills and importance of
the customers retentions. It will help to mange employees activities and provide support to them
to increase the employees retention.
Employees
It is system that will be responsible to provide good experience at the workplace of Ben's
Cookies so company can overcome from the customers retention problems, and they can gain the
loyalty and trust of the customers and take competitive advantages.
Leaders
It is the system who are the top superiors of the company and responsible to
communicate with the employees to overcome the customers' retention problems. They will
make employees understand the importance of customers retention and create strategies to
overcome the issues
Activity Model
Activity model is the tool that helps to illustrate how system works. In an activity
modelling workshop , the grouping works jointly to outline a series of steps and the constituent

pieces caught up in creating a action or result. Groups use activity models to optic stand for the
series of case that trigger a behaviour.
Provide skill based training to the employees (Mangla., and et.al., 2018).
 Leaders will communicate with the employees related to the Customers recension.
 Decrease the product prices to the competitive advantages.
 Use social media marketing to attract and target the interested customers and increase the
retention.
3E's Model

All the root definition were taken into thinking when structure the abstract model,
however, it is also essential to warrant that it follows certain criteria in order to be a good model.
Efficiency.
Efficiency is more of a process than a goal. It is a moving target that changes with
technology, each new client and to some degree, with every new employee. Rather than asking
“Are we being as efficient as possible
Effectiveness
In this phase managers will see the different and how effective s their strategies are
working related top the customers' retention. They will identify the customer's retention rates.
Execution
Execution is the carrying out of a plan (Melton., 2017). It is one thing to create a plan
and the steps it takes to reach a goal but if the plan is not executed properly,
PART 3
SSM analysis
Choice of the new stakeholders
Previous model focus in the improvement of the employees' communication so company
can create better relationship between the employees and the customers and create trust among
them. But in this section Ben's Cookies baring and strategies will be brioche to increase their
customers retention.
What ? (P) How ? (Q) Why ? (R)
Owner Owners are top
stakeholder their
responsibility is to
look for the proper
solution of the
problems.
They will take
decision to implement
new technology so
company will bale to
improve their quality
and increase the
productivity and
decrease the prices of
the product Ben's
Owners are
responsible to provide
better facilities, and
they provide strategies
so company can
improve their product
quality so Ben's
Cookies can improve
their customers

Cookies will able to
take competitive
advantages within the
market where they are
operating their
business.
retention and take
competitive
advantages.
CATWOE
Customer
T, W
Owners
Leaders - Create new
strategies for improvement.
Customers are the first priority of the business so
prices and offers will be provided to customers.
Satisfy
customers
Actors- Owners Managers- Training
and development of
staff