The management of McDonald

Before I was doing this assignment, I carefully did the following 4 steps.

Step 1: Go to any McDonald’s restaurant. You will need $2 to complete this assignment.

Step 2: Place the following order from the “Dollar Menu”:

1 small hamburger WITH EXACTLY 4 PICKLES ON IT (you must stress exactly FOUR pickles, this is important to this assignment)
AND
1 small order of French Fries WITH NO SALT.

Important: Request a printed receipt that shows this exact order. You must have an original receipt to get the extra credit.


Step 3: Carefully watch the management process involved in completing your order.
Time how long it takes the staff to complete this special order. Make note of
the challenges presented by your special order.


Step 4: Check to make sure your order is accurate. If it is not, please ask the personnel
to correct your order.

After above 4 steps, there were 2 more questions:

1. Document all the steps it took to complete this special order. What was the exact process the staff went through to complete this order? How many people got involved? How long did it take to complete the order? How were you treated during ordering, and while you were waiting? Was the order completed correctly?

As more and more people getting concerned about healthy lifestyle, McDonald’s is constantly reviewing the levels of salt in its products, and they actually provide French Fries with salt free. When they took an order, people serving the French Fries put the fresh fried fries with no salt into the package before they put salt all over them. So my order of French Fries with no salt almost didn’t take the extra waiting time.

When I ordered the small hamburger with exactly four pickles on it, the cashier put my order into the computer’s special menu which satisfied all kinds of customers’ special request. The manager on duty got the order information back in the operation area and asked people who make the hamburger to make my hamburger specifically according to the extraordinary menu. It took me a little longer time to wait because they need to separately produce rather than make a batch of hamburgers at the same time as usual. From order to serving, there are only three stuffs involved the whole management process, cashier, manager and people make the hamburger. It took me about four minutes to complete the order and it done without fault. During the whole service, they took my order carefully and responded normally. For my particular requirement they didn’t have any doubt and discontentment.

2, Analyze the management process you witnessed. How would you rate the staff’s manufacturing (order preparation), communications, coordination, and customer service processes? If you were brought in as a consultant to McDonald’s to help them improve their efficiency, what recommendations would you make to improve operations during special orders?

During the whole management process of special orders, the communication and coordination of the stuffs in McDonald’s are smooth and efficient. Received the pre-classified orders from a manager can greatly improve the speed of the foods makers. Adopting the approach of product line in the factory, one food maker only need to focus on a singular sort of food, even there are some especial requests on the menu, they can take care it very well and can hardly reduce their producing speed.

However, the special order could generate additional works and waste more time for the cashier. We need our stuffs to be more patient and careful. After the food has been done, it still got the chance of mixed up the order number. To improve efficiency of operations, the food maker should take an extra mark on the box which can show the content clearly to the cashier who is responsible for putting every item together and hand in to the customer face to face. The cashier should not only in charge of money, sometimes during the shortage of employees they can also take care of all the beverages and snacks. For example, when some customer asked for two cups of coffee, one is decaf with a little sugar and a little milk; the other is regular with a lot of sugar and a lot of milk. The cashier could have easily served it because the coffee maker is near them; it’s convenient and fast operation. It is no need to make an exact order to waste other stuffs’ time.