5

(a) – As a group, identify a ‘high visibility’ operation that you all are familiar with. This could be a type of quick service restaurant, record stores, public transport systems, libraries, etc.

(b) – Once you have identified the broad class of operation, visit a number of them and use your experience as customers to identify:

(i) the main performance factors that are of importance to you as customers, and

(ii) how each store rates against each other in terms of their performance on these same factors.

(c) Draw an importance–performance diagram for one of the operations that indicates the priority they should be giving to improving their performance.

(d) Discuss the ways in which such an operation might improve its performance and try to discuss your findings with the staff of the operation.