Case study

DQE – Project CASE STUDY Integrated Management Systems Terra Askania / Hotel „Fichtenbreite“ Petra Winzer Bergische Universität Wuppertal Miriam Gärtner Bergische Universität Wuppertal Abstract: Terra Askania is a small service network. 8 entrepreneurs have confederated to a cooperative to provide touristic service offers from one source. Furthermore 3 employees are working for the network. 2 hotels, 2 companies for coach tours, 1 railway company, 1 company for sight seeing tours, 1 sauna hotel (It is not in use, but its build-up is in progress) and a collegium (as a consultant) have conferderated to develop jointly new attractive offers for educative or adventure tourism in the region Dessau in Saxony-Anhalt. This shall lead to tourism growth in this region at long term so the entrepreneurs get a good basis for their own existence. Additionally the tourism shall enhance the region so that Dessau and its inhabitants experience an economical revival. The tourists shall be attracted by the quality and variety of offers. Due to its size the network focusses on a familiar atmosphere and intensive, direct support service to win the tourists over. The network wants to sensitise the tourists for the environment – its beauty and fragileness - to enhance the region and prevent damages caused to the environment that would arise through pushy tourism. The hotel „Fichtenbreite“ is one of the two hotels that are members of Terra Askania. This small enterprise with 6 staff members, 3 of them apprentices, offers accommodation in 28 rooms and meal in the restaurant. Furthermore it offers parking space for campmobiles, features a bike rental outlet and offers nordic walking courses. The region – Dessau (Saxony-Anhalt) After the German Unification in 1990 life has changed radically in the federal states of the former German Democratic Republic. Many people lost their jobs as a result of the closing of many factories and enterprises. The region of Dessau was also heavily hit by this trend. The populace which were mostly working in (chemical) industry, lost their jobs and had to reskill so that they could build up a new existence. Tourism lend itself to be a good possibility to add new jobs. Even after 15 years after the unification tourism is still emerging in the new federal states and has to be build up systematically so that tourists will be attracted to a greater extend. The region of Dessau is very suitable for building up an attractive all-round tourism because it is possible to connect cultural, industrial and nature tourism. Dessau The location Dessau is characterised by a long tradition of innovative evolutions. The city was a centre of the German enlightenment in the 18 th century with its social, economic and pedagogic projects. From this time arised the harmonious and romantic world of parcs, castles and gardens of Dessau-Wörlitz in the large landscape of the floodplain. Besides effective world-wide impulse for architecture, art and design came from the Bauhaus style who was actually created in Weimar and Dessau by e.g. Walter Gropius. As modell city in the project „Cities of the future“ created by the Federal Office of civil engineering Dessau is committed to sustainability. Moreover as the third largest city in Saxony-Anhalt and lying close to the cities Berlin, Leipzig, Halle und Magdeburg Dessau garantuees favourable transport connections as well as excellent economic local conditions Naturschutzgebiet (biosphere reserve) Numerous water and avian species, beaver, amphibians, fish and insects are habitants of the reserve. Amongst others wild fruit, field maple, Siberian iris and water fern are growing in the plaines. As a result of this unique nature settings this area has been put under protection in 1979 by the UNESCO as a biosphere reserve to save the living conditions of the endangered animal and plant species in the waters and wetlands. Ferropolis Five surface mining machines of the former open pit Golpa-North as well as the arena compose the heart of Ferropolis. They remind of the lost mining and industry era in the 19th century: brown coal has been delivered in Central Germany for almost 150 years. Along with the surrounding lake these machines compose the distinctive and exceptional scenery of the venue Ferropolis. The network: The network was founded at 03/28/2005 It is still in erection phase. So far the members have realised only one project: It was a christmas market in 2005. The members wanted to test their interworking with this project. The entrepreneurs have not yet developed any more touristic offers. This is scheduled for the year 2006. Until now the first steps have been made to build up the network: Among other things the articels of the association have been made, the trend of the future offers have been worked out, the questions and the sheet for costumer survey have been developed. The hotel „Fichtenbreite“ is a modern hotel whose entrepreneurship is constantly looking for improvement and amelioration of the products (predominantly tourism services but also gift baskets with products of the region).The entrepreneur and the employees develop offers for business travel, group travel, short holiday, family celebration, business dinner and conferences. Furthermore walking, bicycle or nordic walking tours are organised by the hotel team. By using bicycles or their feet the guests are able to discover the near-by biosphere reserve without harming the plants and animals by the exhaust emissions. This shall contribute to protect the biosphere reserve sustainably because the concerns of natures are called to the tourists` attention. The hotel is nearby a highway and not far from a freeway. Thus it has excellent transport connection so that tourists that are leaving the freeway for accomodation are often staying at “Fichtenbreite”. Steps towards an Integrated Management System We were geared to the following sequence of measures to implement and build up an Integrated Management System (IMS). This sequence of measures has proved on many cases but never on a small service network or a small service enterprise. 1. Analysis of compliance with standards and initial environmental review 2. Derivation of the enterprise philosophy, policy and strategy A work shop and review which can be set before the analysis of compliance did not seem expedient in this case. Considering the size of the network and the hotel enterprise it can be expected that the interviewees are familiar with the structures of the enterprises and know their tasks. Therefore it would be time-consuming and not necessary to set a review before the survey. In small enterprises we do not have complex structures or obscure job descriptions. Therefore it is possible to achieve best results without a prior workshop. 1 employee and 2 members of Terra Askania as well as 3 staff members (including the entrepreneur) of hotel “Fichtenbreite” have been interviewed. In this survey the strenghts and weaknesses of the enterprises in terms of the norms` requirements (ISO 9001 and 14000) have been analysed. The ascertained informations have been evaluated with an analysis tool that has been developed in our research group. On the basis of this programme it is possible to compare the interview results with the norm requirements of quality, environment and occupational safety. The potency for the analysis of compliance is that this programme shows detailled graphics on the strenghts and weaknesses of the enterprise. It is possible to rate the degree of requirement performance by typing the percentage of compliance. The norm requirements are split in 6 topics: 1. Management 2. Information and analysis 3. Costumer satisfaction 4. Corporate planning 5. Requirement compliant design of products and/or realisation of services 6. Personnel development This is very useful for the graphical realisation because we get outcomes that are clearly arranged. The programme composes 4 bar charts out of the percentage specification. With these figures we can read off the company´s strenghts and weaknesses. The topics of the 4 bar charts are: Evaluation enterprise Evaluation quality Evaluation environment Evaluation occupational safety Evaluation of Terra Askania The following example is one of the bar charts from Terra Askania (Evaluation enterprise) The residual figures are shown in the appendix. Auswertung Unternehmen 30 1. Führung und Management 2. Information und Analyse 25 25 23 3. Kundenzufriedenheit Prozent Erfüllung 20 15 11 10 6 5 5 11 4. Unternehmensplanung 5.Anforderungsgerechte Erstellung von Produkten und/oder Realisierung von Dienstleistungen 6. Personalentwicklung 0 mtl. Erf.grad in % The two bars „management“ and „requirement complaint design of products“ are the lowest bar in the figure. This can be put down to the fact that the network has not yet developed any products and is an emerging company that has no management system at all. The bars of „information and analysis“ as well as „corporate planning” are in medium height. The corporate planning only concentrates in short-term objectives to stabilise the enterprises on the market and to enhance their utilisation. Analysis on product efficiency cannot be done until more products are developed. The information flow is not good for the network does not forward all informations to its members. The bars of „costumer satisfaction“ and „personnel development” are in high rank because Terra Askania has attached great importance to these topics since its foundation. Firstly costumer preferences have priority. Secondly the employees of the network are comfortable with their jobs and seem to work willingly for the network. This motivation is very important for the future progress of the network. Besides it is planned that the enterprises train apprentices conjointly. I.e. that the apprentices get to know different occupational images and activities by running through all enterprises. Below the detailled evaluation of the analysis of compliance of Terra Askania: 1. Management + Quality important Tourism shall be sustainable of products is very Business objectives are not yet documented explicitly Terra Askania does not publicise ist business philosophy Objectives exist concerning quality No marketing and environment Each member has a vote to decide or introduce new ideas 2. Information and analysis + - Informations are collected if the No methodes or tools to analyse enterprises appear before the public public relations (e.g. in news papers) No central computer to canter and Members have no access to the data save all data 3. Costumer satisfaction + The informations from market No findings are not fixed in writing research bureaus are checked for up to date costumer requirements The main features of the future No products are fixed orally The ascertained comparison is made to competitors costumer The network must develop an requirements flow into the business enterprise philosophy philosophy Questionnaire to acquire costumer No satisfaction statistics for costumer complaints are arised Enterprise shall react directly on There are no standards for the costumer complaints 4. Corporate planning contact with costumers + - Short-term objectives are written up Middle- and long-term objectives predominantly Business priorities are fixed are disregarded Priorities must be filled with content so everyone is relating the same meaning to the words (important for working as a team) Priorities are set on quality and No fixation in writing environment 5. Requirement compliant design of products and/or realisation of services + Offers have high quality: variety and high claims to satisfy the costumer The corporation planning should In the course of product planning no are used for fast and effective development requirements The idea of DQE and sustainability into the are missed out new of - give more importance to quality and methods environment aspects Acquired shall be costumer integrated development products/services The purchase shall always aim for The network is not looking after the best price performance ratio 6. Personnel development + Every member is of the same The members are little involved in the business processes. They have to be involved so and informated can work better they other criteria importance systematically to help the members Each week a team discussion takes place including logging Schooling members is and very important: No tranings for environment employees must protection or quality management are envisioned attend to continuing training The employees are motivated and The members are not yet acting as are content with their jobs a team. For now everyone is acting on his/her own Now step 1 is finished. In contrast to step 1 we have added a workshop to derivate the enterprise philosophy, policy and strategy. First the results of the analysis of compliance have to be presented in front of the members and employees of the network. On the basis of these results the participants of the workshop can acquire the (short-term) business objectives, the “hot-spots” on which they have to work most to implement IMS. Following measures have been ascertained: What is important for us (objectives)? In which point do we differ from other service networks? Which criteria do we have for the sustainability of our products? In which steps do we develop our touristic services? o Which processes are required for a systematic development? The participants have worked out the short-, medium- and long-term objectives as well as the enterprise philosophy by the means of this questionnaire. It is necessary that a moderator is denominated (possibly a secretary who is fixing the discussion results). The moderator shall join in to control the discussion to forward productiv workings. We have put the results from the workshop into business objectives and a enterprise philosophy. The objectives must come along with measures that should be taken. Otherwise the objective can fail because the members and employees do not know how to take action. It is a great problem that the members and employees of Terra Askania do not seem to understand the idea of DQE. Therefore they disregarded it in the course of the enterprise´s formation. We hope that it will be possible to implement DQE in based long-term considerations because the entrepreneurs only think of their financial survival and do not care about other aspects at present. Enterprise philosophy We – the members and employees of the cooperative Terra Askania, stand for: - Adventure tourism as well as educative and industrial tourism from one source Constantly improving our services as a team Integration of the costumers to learn from their ideas how we can improve our services and products Corporate training for new highly qualified employees Business objectives Short-term objectives 1. Joint development of products as well as a joint marketing Measures: - Formation of task forces to develop product innovations Construction of an internet platform to present Terra Askania, their products and to bring them to market (booking) 2. Building up an IMS to structure the cooperative Terra Askania as a marketable enterprise Measures: - Fixing of responsibilities Development of a process map Definition and implementation of an enterprise philosophy and business objectives Medium- and long-term objectives 1. Stabilisation of product innovation and marketing Measures: - Service evaluation and integration of the costumer to develop and improve (new) products Marketing: e.g. by using the newspaper, posters, souns broadcasting or TV 2. If necessary gain new partners Measures: - Evaluation: Which possibilities do we have to enhance our range of products by gaining new partners or members? Creation of a list which enterprises could fit to the needs of our network? Evaluation of hotel „Fichtenbreite“ The analysis of compliance of hotel “Fichtenbreite” gave informations about the strenghts and weaknesses of the hotel. These findings were diferent to the findings of Terra Askania. Auswertung Unternehmen 50 45 40 35 45 2. Information und Analyse 1. Führung und Management Prozent Erfüllung 30 25 20 15 10 6 5 0 mtl. Erf.grad in % 13 15 12 20 3. Kundenzufriedenheit Unternehmensplanung 4. 5.Anforderungsgerechte Erstellung von Produkten und/oder Realisierung von Dienstleistungen 6. Personalentwicklung On the bar chart we can see general problem that arises if we want to implement IMS in a small enterprise. A small enterprise is out of the bureaucracy´s depths that come along with the requiremtns of the norms. The employees cannot cope with fixing all operational sequences and activities in writing. This would constrain the daily work unnecessary. Therfore everything – operational sequences, costumer contact and enterprise philosophy – is firmly “anchored” in the heads of the employees. On the other hand very few things have put down in writing. Thus the poor result can be explained. The norms call for written planning and fixation of all operational sequences in writing. However it can be read off that the information flow is very good. The employees communicate the enterprise philosophy each day. Therefore it is always present in the actions of the employees and the costumer contact. The enterprise philosophy is also shown in public: 1. The entrepreneur is bent on promoting the hotel in newspapers 2. It is also shown as soon as you got to the homepage Enterprise philosophy “Dear guests, we promise you, that a nice and friendly team,which will do everything to make your stay in our house a pleasure, will take care of you.” Following business objectives have been fixed. Short-term objectives - Build up of a process map by the employees Broadening of marketing Newspaper articles and engagement on local events Measures: o Medium- and long-term objectives - Raising the average utilisation With more marketing and the cooperation with Terra Askania Measures: o - Extension of the hotel´s offers Cooperation with Terra Askania Team discussions to develop new ideas Observation of the market for new stimulus Measures: o o o Results: In this case it is shown how we can adopt the first steps of the sequence of measures on a small service enterprise and a small service network. We have seen the problems that can arise by attempting to implement IMS and DQE: - the daily struggle of small enterprises for financial survival a basic lack of understandig concerning DQE the dimensions of bureaucracy that are demanded by the norms But if we implement IMS and DQE to a certain extend we won´t make future business difficult. We have seen that clear objective targets can help structuring the enterprise. It is important that we look at each enterprise for its own. We have to be flexible in implementing an Integrated Management System and have to constantly look after the implementation of DQE even if it is difficult to implement this idea in the erection phase of the enterprise/network. Appendix Bar charts of Terra Askania Evaluation quality Auswertung Qualität 30 28 25 25 2. Information und Analyse 1. Führung und Management 25 3. Kundenzufriedenheit Prozent Erfüllung 20 15 15 13 12 10 5. Anforderungsgerechte Erstellung von Produkten und/oder Realisierung von Dienstleistungen 6. Personalentwicklung 4. Unternehmensplanung 5 0 1 Evaluation environment Auswertung Umwelt 30 2. Information und Analyse 25 25 21 1. Führung und Management 3. Kundenzufriedenheit Prozent Erfüllung 20 15 12 10 6 5 3 3 4. Unternehmensplanung 5. Anforderungsgerechte Erstellung von Produkten und/oder Realisierung von Dienstleistungen 6. Personalentwicklung 0 1 Evaluation occupational safety Auswertung Arbeitsschutz 30 2. Information und Analyse 25 25 21 1. Führung und Management 3. Kundenzufriedenheit Prozent Erfüllung 20 15 12 10 4. Unternehmensplanung 5 5. Anforderungsgerechte Erstellung von Produkten und/oder Realisierung von Dienstleistungen 6. Personalentwicklung 0 0 mtl. Erf.grad in % 0 0 Bar charts of hotel “Fichtenbreite” Evaluation quality Auswertung Qualität 50 45 40 35 45 2. Information und Analyse 36 1. Führung und Management Prozent Erfüllung 30 25 20 15 15 10 5 0 1 19 29 3. Kundenzufriedenheit 22 4. Unternehmensplanung 5.Anforderungsgerechte Erstellung von Produkten und/oder Realisierung von Dienstleistungen 6. Personalentwicklung Evaluation environment Auswertung Umwelt 50 45 40 35 45 2. Information und Analyse 1. Führung und Management Prozent Erfüllung 30 25 20 15 15 10 5 0 1 1 19 3. Kundenzufriedenheit 4. Unternehmensplanung 1 0 5.Anforderungsgerechte Erstellung von Produkten und/oder Realisierung von Dienstleistungen 6. Personalentwicklung Evaluation occupational safety Auswertung Arbeitsschutz 50 45 40 35 45 2. Information und Analyse 1. Führung und Management Prozent Erfüllung 30 25 20 15 15 10 5 0 mtl. Erf.grad in % 4 2 0 19 3. Kundenzufriedenheit 4. Unternehmensplanung 5.Anforderungsgerechte Erstellung von Produkten und/oder Realisierung von Dienstleistungen 6. Personalentwicklung