Monitoring & Management

The essay for this lesson is required to be 1,000-1,500-words and clearly demonstrate your understanding of the prompt. Essays should be 5 or more paragraphs with a clear introduction, thesis statement and conclusion, written in APA format. Once completed, submit your work to the Essay Dropbox. You may select from one of the following prompts:

The owner of a small independent ski shop has asked you to perform a bench marking study to help her increase profits during the holiday season. In your essay, outline the steps you will take and give examples from the real world

You work for a startup software company that is developing an inexpensive word processing application for the iPad. In the essay, analyze which metrics are key, and which companies to benchmark against.

Choose one of the following industries and write an essay that identifies three to five best practices for that industry and relates these best practices to your experience as a consumer of products or services. Choices: hospitals, theme parks, school district, fast food chain, auto manufacturer, wireless phone provider, fire department.

A chain restaurant wants to improve the profitability of its urban outlets by doing a benchmarking study. Using the checklist below, write an analysis in which you:
Select a product, service or process to benchmark
Identify the key performance metrics
Choose companies or internal areas to benchmark
Collect data on performance and practices
Analyze the data and recommend opportunities for improvement
Create actions steps for adapting and implementing the best practices, setting reasonable goals and ensuring company wide acceptance