Operational and Strategic Decisions in Hospitality. Lessons from an Action Research Process

Amaya Erro-Garcés () and Laura Ramírez-Ávila
Additional contact information
Amaya Erro-Garcés: Universidad Pública de Navarra
Laura Ramírez-Ávila: Universidad Pública de Navarra

Systemic Practice and Action Research, 2020, vol. 33, issue 5, No 4, 577 pages

Abstract: Abstract The aim of this article is to find measures that reduce personnel costs in a catering company through the optimization of routes and tasks for staff to increase the efficiency of the company, and to transfer these measures to the sector as a whole. This paper is based on action research methodology which facilitates both taking action and creating knowledge or theory about the action analysed. Findings demonstrate that the solution focused on minimization of the workers’ operations and optimization of routes does not solve the problems identified in the company. The flexibility of action research allows adaptation of the focus on the needs of the company, and both the problem and solution are redefined. Thus, a discovered relationship between operational and organizational management is the main outcome obtained in the research. As a result, six proposals are described: clarifying task assignments, improving organizational management and the estimation of provisions, optimizing routes, reducing personal services, and improving human resources policy. It is concluded that the performance of both manager and employees is influenced by the organizational strategy.

Keywords: Action research; Productivity; Optimization; Catering company; Operations (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11213-019-09500-0 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:syspar:v:33:y:2020:i:5:d:10.1007_s11213-019-09500-0

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/journal/11213

DOI: 10.1007/s11213-019-09500-0

Access Statistics for this article

Systemic Practice and Action Research is currently edited by Robert Flood

More articles in Systemic Practice and Action Research from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().