Busn porcini case assignment | Operations Management homework help
. Details on Assignments
1. Case Assignments
General
For each case assignment, your job will be to investigate the firm’s problem(s) as they relate to Service Operations and prepare a written paper for each case. The format of your paper should be as follows and contain a minimum of 5 pages (Either 2 or 1.5 spaces between lines) excluding the Appendices section:
Executive summary – a couple of short paragraphs which summarize the remainder of the report
Background – use this section to lead in to your Problem Statement; identify symptoms, critical and causal factors leading to the current state
Problem Statement – a succinct statement of the problem/dilemma/issue, preferably in a single declarative sentence; be careful to identify the real problem and not the symptoms of the problem or retell the story.
Analysis – apply operational models, course content, and outside research to support your position; logically discuss options, implications and tradeoffs, you can make inferences if data is missing. If the case contains numbers like financial statements, then analyze them! If the case does not supply enough numbers, you may make reasonable inferences and say what these are.
Recommendations and Conclusions – these should be your recommendations regarding how the organization should deal with the problem; they should be fully supported by the Analysis section. Do think about unintended consequences of our recommendation.
Appendices – References and Charts – does not count towards the 5 pages
Citations must be referenced according to APA style.
Appropriate references: This is a library research paper and you must use at least 3 different sources, not including textbooks. These sources should be company websites, industry sources, periodicals, such as the Wall Street Journal, Business Week, and so on, and governmental sources such as the SEC. Wikipedia and other similar sources are not to be used in this course.
With respect to the Porcini case, the following are guidance comments:
The final individual case is called Porcini’s Pronto, dealing with an Italian restaurant’s expansion potential. Depending on your background and interest, there are several ways to approach this case. One could focus on HR and service quality and the measurement of it via questionnaires, or you could question the whole Pronto business concept.
The most obvious problems are the merits of either franchising, syndication or full ownership, as this restaurant grows. To handle that issue please take a closer look at Exhibits 4 and 5 inside your case. What I would like you to do is to calculate the ROI for each option, where
ROI (return on investment) = NPV of pre-tax profit
NPV of invested capital
NPV or NP means net present value and you find that inside Excel, (Formula, Finance, NPV). You should not overlook the fact that each option carries its unique interest rate. The ownership option, for example, requires you to select a 6 percent interest rate. Your text book does not include a net present value calculation assuming it to be basic knowledge. If you need a refresher you can read
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_present_value
