Purchase Solution

Strategic Plan for Aramark

Not what you're looking for?

Ask Custom Question

NLT Saturday: Learning Team - Strategic Plan Critique

Each Learning Team member will post a draft of his or her Strategic Plan presentation to the other members of the team in the team forum. Each Learning Team member will read, evaluate, critique, and reply to the posting with recommendations on the presentations drafted by individual team members, submitting an evaluation to each member of the team.

Purchase this Solution

Solution Summary

This is a strategic plan for Aramark including an environmental scan, Mission, Vision and Values statesments, Financial Projections and Analysis, Plan Goals and Implementation, Critical Success Factors and Controls and Evaluation.

Solution Preview

Please Note: Please remember that this is a study guide and to use it as such. You still need to put the paper in your own words. This means you can summarize, and paraphrase the information to fit your needs but I would advise that you do not turn it in word for word as your own work or you risk plagiarism.

Regards,
Fariba
OTA # 105428

Strategic Plan for Aramark

Executive Summary

In today's highly competitive global climate it is imperative for business leaders to have a sound strategic planning process in place to help create and achieve the future vision for their companies. To be effective the strategic planning process must begin with top management and be adopted by the entire organization as a general approach or plan for the near and longer term future. The successful strategic plan should take into account market conditions, the economy, the available internal resources, the changes which would be necessary to implement the plan, and the limitations. Strategic planning helps organizations set clear goals and define clear paths toward achieving those goals, increases the probability of achieving strategic objectives if it is implemented properly, and provides a road map for the organization allowing proper budgeting and allocation of resources. Ignoring the importance of long-term planning reduces the firm to only reacting and adapting to new pressures from the environment. Absence of strong resources and psychological commitment to a proactive strategy effectively bars a firm from assuming a leadership role in its market (Pearce & Robinson, 2005).

There are several steps involved in the strategic planning process. This paper will discuss Aramark Food Services Corporation (Aramark), scan the company's environmental and economic factors, describe Aramark's current situation and ultimately propose a comprehensive strategic plan. The plan will utilize the organization's strengths to compensate for and overcome its weaknesses, and capitalize on opportunities and counter threats in an attempt to help Aramark reach its stated goal of providing positive experiences for its customers that enable the company to stay highly competitive in today's market. The plan will include measures for Aramark to take into account and deal with constantly changing variables such as changing customer expectations, technological breakthroughs, and the changing business environment.

Company Background

Aramark Food Service (Aramark) is an international leader in providing food, hospitality, and facility management services. The company is a well respected organization which has been listed in Fortune magazine's list of America's Most Admired Companies. Aramark has consistently ranked in the top three companies in its industry. The company's global headquarters is located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, from which Aramark provides its services in facilities management, uniforms and work apparel, food service and refreshments, lodging and guest accommodations, clinical technology, and clean room services. Aramark's clients include schools, universities, businesses, hospitals, hotels, resorts, convention centers, conference facilities, and scientific research facilities (Aramark.com, 2008).

Mission, Vision and Values

Identifying the company's mission, vision and values is the first step toward the shaping and development of a company's strategic planning process, because this in fact identifies the company's business in its current state and also where the business aims to go in the future and how it intends to get there. It is important to know where a company is, where it needs to go (mission, vision) and how it intends to get there (values) if it is to deal effectively and efficiently with the challenges that might affect its growth, profitability and overall competitiveness in the marketplace. If a new strategy's goal is to help a company grow, be profitable and remain constantly competitive in the marketplace, as indeed it should be, then having well defined mission, vision and values is crucial to the strategy's success because it is in fact both a blue print with building instructions and a road map with driving directions for getting to the building site and building the structure of success.

One of the components of the strategic management process is the company's mission meaning its purpose. This unique purpose is the quality that above all sets a company apart from other companies in the same category and pinpoints the scope of its operations (Pearce & Robinson, 2005). Aramark's overall mission is to provide the following: professional services and excellence, lead by supporting its people and their creativity and competence, provide exceptional experiences for the customers with relationships based on service, partnership and understanding, enable the customers to reach their mission, and anticipate the needs and expectations of customers with services in hospitality, food, facilities and uniforms, create value and for all stakeholders; employees, customers, communities and shareholders; with a growth in profit sales in a global company built on pride, integrity and respect. I would not change the mission statement. It provides all the necessary information to define what the organization is all about and fully supports the company's stated goal of providing positive experiences for its customers that enable the company to stay highly competitive in today's market.

Aramark's vision is to employ the best employees and have customers that recommend them to other companies. They would like their customers to be satisfied with the services that they receive from Aramark. The company measures its success through how its profits grow and the people within the company. Aramark boasts that it is the leader in managed services. I would change this vision statement to include how they measure their success by their customer satisfaction instead of profit margin and make it one sentence and more motivational to the reader. To help the company achieve its stated goal of providing positive experiences for its customers that enable the company to stay highly competitive in today's market, I would change the vision statement to read as follows: Aramark would like the customers and employees to be satisfied with the services provided by the leader in managed services.

Aramark's values are that the company believes in positive experiences that assist the organizations it serves. The company is responsible and identifies and addresses social and environmental issues to customers, employees, and communities. Aramark's focus is on health and wellness, environmental stewardship, community involvement, and employee advocacy (Aramak.com, 2008). The health and wellness focus assists consumers to make healthy dining choices by providing nutrition education and healthier dining programs to healthcare, college campuses and grade schools, stadiums, arenas and businesses around the world. Aramark is committed to preserving our environment. The company has developed environmental programs and policies that conserve energy and manage waste. Aramark wants to enrich the community through grants, employee volunteerism, and strategic partnerships, diverse expertise, resources and provide assistance to those families in need. Aramark Food Service employees are from diverse backgrounds and work in diverse businesses and public institutions. Aramark employs a culture that allows the diversity to better serve the customer and treats its employees with respect and dignity (Aramak.com, 2008). This value system also fully supports the company's stated goal of providing positive experiences for its customers that enable the company to stay highly competitive in today's market and will not be altered.

The new strategy will definitely have a significant effect on the leadership and culture of the company as well as on its internal ...

Purchase this Solution


Free BrainMass Quizzes
Understanding the Accounting Equation

These 10 questions help a new student of accounting to understand the basic premise of accounting and how it is applied to the business world.

Introduction to Finance

This quiz test introductory finance topics.

Change and Resistance within Organizations

This quiz intended to help students understand change and resistance in organizations

Cost Concepts: Analyzing Costs in Managerial Accounting

This quiz gives students the opportunity to assess their knowledge of cost concepts used in managerial accounting such as opportunity costs, marginal costs, relevant costs and the benefits and relationships that derive from them.

MS Word 2010-Tricky Features

These questions are based on features of the previous word versions that were easy to figure out, but now seem more hidden to me.