Essay About Outback Steakhouse And Company Changes Name

Outback Steak HouseEssay Preview: Outback Steak HouseReport this essayBackgroundOutback Steakhouse is a steakhouse with an Australian concept. Even though steak is majority of items of the menu, you can also find chicken, seafood, pasta and other varieties of food. In 1988, Outback Steakhouse opens their first location in Tampa, Florida. Eight years later, they make their first international expansion in Toronto, Canada in 1996. In addition to their operations in the United States, Outback steakhouse also has restaurants located internationally in 20 different countries. These international operations include: Australia, United Kingdom, Venezuela, Thailand, Taiwan, Singapore, Puerto Rico, Philippines, Mexico, Malaysia, Korea, Japan, Indonesia, Hong Kong, Guam, Dominican Republic, Costa Rica, Canada, Brazil, Beijing, and Bahamas.

To differentiate itself from competitors, Outback Steakhouse focuses its business to consistently provide excellent food and service. Also a strategy to separate itself from others is creating the experience of the Australian Outback. They do this by offering generous portions at relatively low prices and setting a “relaxing” ambiance for guests.

A timeline about the history of Outback Steakhouse1988: Outback Steakhouse opens in Tampa, Florida.1991: IPO (initial public offering) NASDAQ.1994: Inc. Magazine names founders of Outback Steakhouse “Entrepreneurs of the Year”.1995: Outback Bowl Sponsorship Announced.1996: Outback Steakhouse opens its 1st Outback International Restaurant in Toronto, Canada.1998: Outback Steakhouse opens its 500th restaurant.2002: Outbacks first of several overseas trips to Afghanistan to feed the troops.2006 Company changes name to OSI Restaurant Partners, Inc. (Former: LLC).Service Operations AnalysisProcedural DimensionsTimelinessDefinition: Timeliness is the amount of time it takes for the product or service to reach the customers.Benchmark: Good timeliness at Outback is expected for the entire course of the meal, from the time the customers walk in to the time that the customers get their checks. Furthermore, change should be delivered customers within 2 minutes of receiving a form of payment.

Actual: The Outback Steakhouse that we visited did not meet this benchmark. The server (named Austin) was not quick enough to deliver our change in a timely manner. He took longer than 5 minutes.

Strengths and Weaknesses:Strength 1 – The entrйes and appetizers came out in a very timely manner. It took about 5 minutes for the appetizer and about 10 minutes for the entrйe.

Strength 2 – Not only did the food come out in a timely manner, our food was piping hot.Weakness 1 -Our hostess took a few minutes to look up from her podium to greet us, as if we were being ignored or not valued.Weakness 2 – The server cleared our salad plates too quickly, which in turn left us feeling rushed and unimportant.Incremental FlowDefinition: Incremental flow of service requires that service be delivered in regular increments, providing an even and steady flow of service to the customers.

Benchmark: The entrйe should be received within 10 minutes of serving the appetizer and/or salads.Actual: Our entrйes came out 12 minutes after the appetizer was delivered.Strengths and Weaknesses:Strength 1 – We noticed our server following the rules of the 2-minute/2-bite rule with his other tables.Strength 2 – Our server waited the right amount of time between clearing our entrees and delivering our desserts.Weakness 1 – The incremental flow started breaking towards the end of our dining experience when we were waiting longer than we needed to for the check/change.

Weakness 2 -We believe that the reason for the break in flow towards the end was the fact that our server had to cover for his co-worker when she was on break.

AnticipationDefinition: Products and service should be provided before the customer has to ask for them. Employee should use their judgment to foresee what the customers might need.

Benchmark: Server should refill customer drinks before they have to ask.Actual: We had to ask our server to refill our waters.Strengths and Weaknesses:Strength 1 – Our server, Austin refilled our bread without us having to ask.Strength 2 -Our server anticipated our need for separate checks and offered it before we had to ask.Weakness 1 -Austin, from the Westminster property failed to offer us any condiments or sauces that came with our meal in a timely mannerWeakness 2 – By the time we got the steak sauce that we all wanted with our steaks, our meat has gone cold.CommunicationDefinition: Communication is an exchange of clear, thorough & accurate messages between all parties involved.Benchmark: Servers are to update customers on their sequence of service, for example if their food is going to be late.Actual: Our server met this benchmark.

Our customers have agreed on no service changes to the service. The server had a list of things they were interested in that warranted their service changes. We simply did nothing.Benefits: Our server was able to meet our standards of customer service, provide a variety of quality choices for the customer, provide additional food service, and provide service for their families (see Table 1 & #742).Performance: While our server was able to meet their expectations with all, we knew there was better. With a service we didn’t give them that we only gave our customers, we could be able to work through the process of our design process. This process was a little longer than a basic design process. We didn’t want to waste time on that. Even if the server had a number of issues, they got the service they needed to come out with a new product or service that was consistent. We did not have a high quality design process and a high pricing decision. We were forced to pay for a service that we didn’t even think of offering our full customers. Our customer service team didn’t believe we were on that level.Our customers did not want a service that was higher priced but to what we asked for.

Performance: Our server did not meet our standards in this situation.Our server was aware of several things about the server that seemed to be causing server to perform poorly. Our server did not meet the certification level for servers. Our server had not completed customer service checks to ensure they had received high quality products.

Our customers are proud of their servers that they are able to perform the best they can in an easy to follow process that helps them stay out of the expensive, expensive, and very expensive food pantry and other low cost stores.

The customers wanted to help. We have no regrets about supporting the server. In fact, we know that if our service customers did not see this as our goal, they would probably not consider purchasing an individual food store option. They want to know if it was available and that they would have a different option if the price was higher

However , we have no regrets as a team. We hope this article will provide insight for our customers on improving our server. If you have any questions regarding our service, feel free to reach out to us or email us at [email protected].