Case Study - Simulated work environment

About the organisation and your role

ABC Hotel is an Australian luxury boutique hotel based in Sydney, offering accommodation and events management services.

The hotel has been recently bought by XYZ Pty Ltd (XYZ), wanting to re-launch the hotel as an iconic destination for corporate clients. The CEO at XYZ intends to use the hotel as a conference and training facility offering boutique accommodations to guests. Additionally, the CEO plans to make the hotel a preferred destination for corporate events.

The hotel is centrally located and has 20 bedrooms, two medium conference rooms (40pp capacity each), one large conference room (150pp capacity), four breakout rooms for workshops and meetings (20pp capacity each), a caf, one function room (200 seats), a business centre, a gym and an indoor pool.

The catering (food and beverage) services are outsourced to a local company nearby.

Services offered by the hotel include the organisation of the following:

• Conferences
• Workshops and seminars
• Corporate Meetings
• Team building events
• Corporate events
• Accommodation

Change intervention

This is an excerpt from the 3-year strategic plan for the hotel as dictated by XYZ:

• Vision statement: To become the number one hotel destination for corporate events in Sydney
• Mission statement: To make and deliver corporate events that support businesses in achieving their goals.
• Values: Integrity, personal accountability, results and service orientation, quality, sustainability

Key strategic goals overview:

1. Increase revenue by 50% in the next three years

This will be achieved by launching a new corporate membership program, improving the promotional campaign with a significant presence on social media, offering bundled products and increasing the customer base by targeting medium and small businesses in New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland.

Overseas businesses in the Asia-Pacific area will also be targeted.

1. Strengthen strategic partnership

This will be achieved by working closely with the City of Sydney, industry associations and chambers of commerce from other countries

1. Increase customer satisfaction by 60% in the next year of operation

This will be achieved through the training and development of existing staff.

1. Reduce costs by 30% in the next three years

This will be achieved by streamlining processes and reviewing operational costs.

XYZ has decided to employ an external Organisational Development Manager (ODM) with change and project management expertise (you) to:

• Develop a three-year high-level change strategy to achieve the key strategic objectives and the desired future state
• Lead the strategic transformation according to plans
• Develop and implement a change plan to address two or more of identified priority problems in the first six months
• Update the three-year change plan based on the outcomes of the priority change intervention plan

Change intervention - Priority

Employees:

A recent survey highlighted the following problems:

• Lack of communication between departments
• Lack of clarity of roles and responsibility
• The Events team feels overworked and believes that the Marketing team could support them better
• Lack of clear direction from management
• High turnover and poor performance of caf staff that the caterer does not properly manage
• Negative feedback by 80% of customers due mainly to:
  • Poor customer service
  • Conflicting information
  • Cleanliness
  • Outdated decor

Operations:

A recent review of operational activities identified the following issues:

• 35% errors in bookings
• Duplication of tasks between departments (for example, Marketing and Events teams both respond to potential client enquiries)
• Quality of food has decreased in the past year: client surveys rate the quality of food as poor (70% of responses to the survey)
• There has been an increase in Japanese companies booking conferences at the hotel. However, there are currently no staff who can speak Japanese
• Wage cost is too high and should be reduced by 20% in the first year since the takeover
• Minimal recycling practices
• High energy costs
• Employees have shown resistance to change due to the following reasons:
• Fear of the unknown
• Lack of trust in the organisation
• They are already overwhelmed and stressed

Organisation:

The board is committed to the change process and is concerned with the following priorities:

• Lack of sustainability processes
• Operational costs
• Downsizing to control HR costs and improve practices
• Improve the organisational culture to reflect the values of the company
• Negative feedback/reviews from clients
• Refurbishing

Change management budget:

• Year 1 - $ 3,000,000.00 (includes the budget to address priority problems in the first six months); additionally, $800,000 have been budgeted to pay for redundancy packages.
• Redundancy pay & entitlements -https://www.fairwork.gov.au/ending-employment/redundancy/redundancy-pay-and-entitlements
• For the purpose of this assessment, assume that all employees have been in the business for at least three years but less than four years, and review the information about redundancy entitlements for 'accommodation, hotels and gaming'.
• Assumptions on the remuneration of current roles can be made based on award:https://www.fairwork.gov.au/taxonomy/term/230 and market trends (refer, for example, to remunerations as reported on seek.com.au )
• Year 2 - $ 1,500,000.00
• Year 3 - $ 500,000.00

QUESTION TO BE ANSWERED

SCENARIO

The following issue occurred:

An employee was made redundant, and they wrote an article about the hotel in an online Holiday and Travel Guide Magazine disparaging the hotel about the poor level of cleanliness.

The claim is untrue.

Rite a short press release in response to the article.