Glacier Inn Essay Example for Free

Glacier Inn Essay Our strategy map for the Glacier Inn focuses on the four main dimensions of a business: a financial perspective, a customer perspective, an internal process perspective, and a learning and growth perspective. Each dimension plays a critical part in establishing a strong unified culture, and documents the primary objectives within the organization. For 2004, Glacier Inn has two main goals: to increase profitability and cash flow. The map outlined in Appendix A demonstrates how we will use these four dimensions to facilitate and implement different measures to achieve the desired strategies. With regards to the financial perspective, Glacier Inn can focus on a growth of revenue strategy and productivity strategy. In order to increase revenue, your main focus is to increase the capacity and quality of the hotel. We also believe there are other possible sources of revenue that could be implemented in order to further your capacity to generate income. Because Glacier Inn has such a short season and window of opportunity to make a profit, it is crucial that you make the most out of those winter months by enhancing your productivity and efficiency. The Glacier Inn is part of the service industry, and customer satisfaction plays an integral role in the success of your organization. Your vision statement is centered on delivering more than just place to spend the night; you are providing an experience, an experience of unmatched value and satisfaction. To achieve this, we believe that centering your organization around the culture of the First Nations people will be creating memories and providing adventures. Providing your customers with an unrivaled experience will include outdoor activities, traditional meals, quality service, native art work, individualized rooms, etc. Not only will these add value to the business and differentiate Glacier Inn from other Ice Hotels, but they can also serve as another source of revenue to aid in our revenue growth strategy. The internal process perspective is another important role in our strategy mapping. One of your main goals is to increase occupancy at the Glacier Inn, and we feel that it is important to focus the marketing efforts on the adventure campaign. Glacier Inn needs to showcase their unique business offerings inspired by nature, art, and culture. Due to the nature of the business, it is difficult for Glacier Inn to attract skilled and competent employees. With the development of an effective hiring and training process that also supports the culture that Glacier Inn is trying to create, they will be able to better serve their target market by attracting and retaining customers. Innovation is a key part of your internal process controls, and Glacier Inn wants to be working with ice experts for the development of different and unique ice themes. The final dimension of the Glacier Inn Strategy Map deals with a learning and growth perspective. In order to expand and advance within the entertainment industry, we want to mentor employee proficiency by working with and training the first nation’s people; by incorporating and encouraging culture both internally and externally; and by advancing with new technology through partnering with local colleges and universities in order to generate new innovations in ice making and preservation. All of these dimensions feedback and tie in with what Glacier Inn is trying to accomplish and what their vision is for the company. Issues Another issue that you have acknowledged is the restraint of hiring skilled and competent staff. The Glacier Inn is only open during the winter months, which makes it difficult to attract qualified and experienced employees. Glacier Inn is providing an experience of culture and excitement for their customers. Why not provide the same atmosphere for its employees. In the end, it’s not just about the money. Employees will be able to enjoy the same lifestyle and adventure that this environment has to offer. Glacier Inn can also invest in effective industry training programs to help and support the success of their hired personnel. We also want to address your concerns over changing the staff bonus plan. Currently, bonuses are being determined by profits alone. We agree that the implementation of the 2004 scorecard will provide a great method of measuring employee achievement. The balanced scorecard will provide feedback on whether the strategy is working to impact organizational performance. By measuring employees based subjectively on their scorecard execution, staff will be motivated and empowered to work in the best interests for themselves as well as the company. With employees being measured based on the strategy and implementation of Glacier Inn’s critical success factors, you can ensure that those goals become fundamental to their success as well. Employees are able to focus their attention on what matters most to the success of the organization. The Glacier Inn Hotel has another concern without the seasonal revenues. There is only a short window of opportunity to make profits, from January 4th to April 15th, and is primarily determined by the warming of the weather which can shorten this window. To off set the decrease in revenues in the summer, the hotel can offer customers a chance to stay in touch with nature. Two innovations will be needed to accomplish this, hiring of experienced outdoor staff and the building of year round facilities on the property. By offering summer outdoor actives such as fishing, hiking, and canoeing on guided tours the Glacier Inn can attract year round revenues. Also having facilities built on the property will allow customers places to stay in the summer as well as a warm place or customers to stay in the winter if they are not interested in sleeping in the cold rooms. Lastly, Glacier Inn hHotel lacks a specific measures, targets, and personal initiatives that are clear to the employes of the company. These need to be clearly defined to enhance the strategy and culture that needs to be wolves into the company. We have recommended a possible strategy map that can facilitate these initiatives. We have also chosen a proposition on how the Glacier Inn can continually add value and increase customer satisfaction. We included below a detailed plan of additional initiatives of adding customers value. Customer Value proposition Glacier Inn has competitors in more than just the hotel industry; it is competing with other forms of entertainment as well. The direct industry competitors of Glacier Inn Hotel are the hotel chains in the area, such as Super 8 Motel that offer a place to sleep and eat at a low price. However they do not offer an individualized customer experience. Glacier Inn also competes with other forms of entertainment in Northern Ontario. Places such as Moose Cree Outdoor Discoveries Adventures, which offers outdoor activities incorporated with the culture of the area. However, this experience is easily replicated. We believe that if Glacier Inn could combine the value of both of these industries into one unique location. The hotel must be unique. We have chosen product leadership as our way of adding value to customer offerings. Our recommendations for implementing this customer value from the hotel would be: Three Main Concepts For Product Leadership 1. Cree culture could be used to attract many customers foreign and domestic that are looking for a Canadian experience or wish to discover more about the first nations of Canada. Through cultural story telling, traditional foods, also traditional artwork and ices museum in the hotel lobby a broad audience can be drawn to the hotel. This will also allow the area to maintain its cultural identity and uniqueness while informing others. 2. The Glacier Inn could also offer outdoor winter activities such as snowshoeing, cross-country skiing, and wilderness sight seeing. Acquiring equipment traditional foods (maple syrup). When guests arrive at the hotel, staff could ask two questions: What do you want to experience? What are you not looking for? So that customers do feel pushed or pressured into experiences that’s are out of their fitness level. 3. Lastly, we believe that the individualized rooms will be an excellent way to attract customers to stay in each room. By pre-planning and designing each rooms theme the hotel can attract more customer to stay in the rooms overnight rather than just visiting the hotel for the day. Also ice sculptures will add a unique finishing touch to each room and can be a way of individualizing each room.