As a waitress at the Surf City Hotel I have worked with the Aloha database system. This computerized system allows waitresses to input their drink and food orders and they get sent to their respective areas. For instance once I put the drink order into the computer any alcoholic beverages are sent to the bartender to make. All of the appetizers are sent through the system to the chefs who work line two and all of the dinners are sent to the chefs on the main line who make dinner. The aloha system allows for waitresses to add any modifications easily like when anyone has a specific request (no salad dressing, food allergy, sauce on the side, etc.). On the aloha system is what the waitresses, waiters, bussers, hostesses, and other employees use to clock into work. This shows how the information system also plays a role on how many hours each employee works. It also keeps track of another important aspect of the restaurant business: declared tips. Each waitress, waiter, and busser must add the tips they made into the system. In this business the restaurant legally only has to pay waitresses $2.15 an hour because the tip amount they make usually makes them make more than minimum wage. Once the waitress or waiter enters how many tips they made for the night the system determines if the business needs to pay them more to make up for the lower number of tips based on the hours they work. The aloha system also allows the manager to print out reports about the restaurant. These reports include which waiters and waitresses are working, their sales, their head count, their credit card tips, etc. This system provides all of the essential data for making important managerial decisions. It keeps track of how busy the restaurant is on any particular night. With this information the manager makes decisions like how many waitressing or waiters he will on a night. What nights are most busy, what dishes are most popular, which dishes are not popular, etc. This system really has proven to essential to the business. A few times I have been working the power as gone out and as a result the system has shut down. During these times we realize how important the system really is. Aloha really allows for the management to make important decisions about how to run the restaurant.
Questions:
1.) Some of the challenges the Aloha system at the Surf City Hotel faces is there are minor kinks in the system. For instance some of the side buttons do not go through so the servers must manually enter them. Otherwise the system is pretty accurate and reliable.
2.) Aloha offers a competitive advantage because the system is able to store important data that is extremely relevant to the restaurant. The information it provides allows managers to compare the data of the restaurant to other restaurants. Although this information is not always public, the manager can adjust prices when necessary and figure out how many hours employees are putting in which makes helps make important decisions.
3.) After doing more extensive research on the Aloha database system it appears the version the Surf City Hotel restaurant is currently using is an older version. Perhaps updating to a newer version would provide more important information to the managers and be more user friendly to the employees who work there.
No comments:
Post a Comment