How Value Optimisation will Play a Major Role in Supply Chain Procurement

No matter how obscure a guest’s order may be, getting it right is paramount. Sure, sometimes guests are just extraordinarily picky eaters. Often though, guests make special requests because of an allergy or sensitivity to a particular food. Order accuracy isn’t just about providing great service, it’s also about protecting guest safety. And, all that is done with the help of great staff and team.

“A strong brick never lets a building fall”. Staff is the biggest asset for a brand without which nothing is possible. The key to happy and productive employees is to make sure they feel important in their role. Empowering the staff means handing them responsibilities, sharing authority, deciding together and thus leading to more sales, improved morale, boosted enthusiasm, loyal staff, smooth functioning and happy customers. For the asset that they are to a brand, rewarding them definitely makes them more efficient and productive. By regular staff meetings, personal one to one talks, training workshops, staff parties and their feedback helps in their empowerment.

Globally, it is believed that 90 per cent of the most successful restaurants have the best team to work with. Empowering staff means a lot as it makes the overall business smooth and happening. “Employee empowerment means turning over decision-making responsibilities and authority to front-line employees. In the hospitality industry, enabling your sales, service and kitchen staff to make decisions can improve morale and increase customer service in responding to problems,’ says Siddhartha Sarmah, Executive Sous Chef , Novotel Pune by adding that it is very important to reward effective decisions.

By clearly defining service standards, role play training and discussing alternatives, restaurants can surely look up to their staff to grow and build their businesses.  There is no denying that building your brand starts with your team. Their overall training and behaviour can determine whether you’ll get repeat business or a poor review. That experience goes beyond just the food, too.  “If you as a brand always look for more and better, the secret lies in empowering the staff. Unlike many businesses, the staff at restaurants are the face of the brand seconding the food they are served. Thus making sure they are as good as the food and drinks, is always a good decision. An empowered staff represents a fine brand and also helps in maintaining its image and vision,” points Umang Tiwari, Owner, LIV Bar.

From demonstrating your trust in them to defining a clear brand vision, all is important. Encouraging them, defining clear channels of communication, supporting their feedbacks and views, delegating more than just work, allowing flexibility and inspiring creative thinking are some of the important legs of any successful and empowered staff which leaves more room from the brand to grow successfully and consistently. “ Growth and excellence in the staff is a strong sign of development. For a sector that the hospitality industry is, staff i.e. the chief personnel plays an important role. Staff empowerment not only make the brand big but also fastens its growth as well,” adds Dinesh Arora of Unplugged Courtyard.

Supply Chain is the management of network interconnected business involved in the ultimate provision of goods and service required by the end customer. It spans all movement and storage of raw materials, work in-progress inventory & finished goods from Origin to point of consumption (QSR perspective it’s FARM TO FORK).

Critical aspect of SCM is that everyone is involved, system approach to reducing cost and lastly integration being the key to drive it. In nutshell - Effective integration of Right product at Righty Quantity, Right Quality, Right place, Right time and Right value. Supply Chain comprises of Planning, Buying & Sourcing, Inventory Management, Distribution, Merchandizing, Logistics & Fleet operation.

Here are 5 ways to build up road map to World-class Supply Chain:

• Managing Demand: Managing demand is an important part of running a smooth supply chain. Many a times we see that there is less demand but we see lots of wastages being done all because of the supply chain miss management.
• Achieving Manufacturing Excellence: It is all about providing high quality, competitively priced products and services in a global marketplace. This is a major hurdle confronting manufacturers. Generally what happens is that suppliers always try to improve product quality, drastically shorten product development cycles, increase productivity growth, stimulate product and process innovation, and respond quickly to changing customer demands.
• World class Logistics: Maintaining a world-class logistic is a major challenge in India market. Half of the products get wasted mid-way while getting them supplied to the hotel or the restaurant. An efficient supply chain isn’t just a way to get reduce operating costs, improve your margins and get products delivered faster. The most complicated issue for any restaurants is logistics handling and that needs to be managed well. Most of the restaurants do not have sufficient space for the storage and hence the JIT delivery method is used to ensure proper supplies. It’s of utmost importance that the restaurants have loyal suppliers who supply products as and when required so there are no excess or short stocks. It also allows the restaurant to provide fresh products all the time.
• Minimizing Risk: Risk is part of any business you do. Especially, there is lots of risk involved in managing supply chain for restaurants. Ideally, if risk is properly managed, nothing occurs that has a negative impact on operations or profitability. Hence, it has to be taken care.
• Product Innovation and use of Technology: Innovate if you want to succeed tells expert in the business. With more technological advancements restaurant owners can minimise any supply chain related faults.
• Human Resource: It is all about team and people. Right people doing the right things in the right way are very important for a successful brand. World-class companies expect supply chain management to focus on the following value adding outputs:

• Quality – purchased materials and services should be virtually defect free. Many defects can be traced back to bought in items.
• Cost – minimisation of total cost of acquiring, transporting, holding, converting items as well as quality costs.
• Time – need to minimise time to market for new products as well as minimising lead-times to increase flexibility.