Reference no: EM132255331

Read and Complete Case Study: The central components of your analysis should include at least a 600-word response that shows the issue identification, issue analysis, solutions, and potential limitations to your resolutions. The answer needs to demonstrate effectiveness in identifying and analyzing issues in the case, the adequacy of and support for the recommendations made, and the identification of potential downsides to your solutions.

Mike's Carwash, based in Indianapolis, Indiana, is a privately owned chain of car washes that has 37 locations in Indiana and Ohio with 650 employees. Opened in 1948, the first Mike's was called "Mike's Minit Man Carwash", named after the type of equipment initially used. Mike's has a reputation for excellent and speedy service and continues to expand to new locations. Mike's carwashes are automated and feature equipment systems and technology developed by Mike's employees. Mike's credits some of its success of the family's business smarts but believes that most of its success comes from its employees and its hiring and training practices. Mike's founders, Joe, and Ed Dahm were known to tell employees that the company was indeed in the people business but it just happened to wash cars.

Customer satisfaction is essential to Mike's with the emphasis placed on repeat business by serving customers so they will come back again. The biggest challenge that Mike's faces are providing a consistently enjoyable customer experience through innovation and new ideas. If a new design works it is implemented in all locations. Mike's believes that the only way to provide a consistent customer experience is through finding great employees, retaining them, and helping them develop. The company website explains that it is "notoriously picky" when it comes to hiring, For every 50 people Mike's considered hiring, just one is hired. Mike's feels that it is easy to teach the mechanics of how to perform a job, but it is much more challenging to show someone to care about customers. Also, because about half of promotions to managerial positions come from current employees, Mike's is looking for employees who intend to stay with the company. As a result, the hiring process focuses on identifying employees who have a positive attitude, a desire to work with people, a willingness to go out of their way to please customers, and leadership qualities. To identify new employees with these characteristics, job applicants participate in multiple interviews, pre-employees testing, thorough, reference checks, criminal background checks, and drug testing.

Mike's retains and engages its employees through some HR practices. Each employee has a development plan and receives performance appraisals twice each year. New employee training involves familiarizing them with best practices and how to help customers in different situations that they will encounter at the car wash. Before employees wait on their first customer, they receive two days of orientation and participate in workshops that all focus on customer service, how to treat customers, how to recover from service errors and mistakes, and how to deal with demanding customers. Mike's also provides training to help employees advance in the company. The career path from hourly associate, to the supervisor, to shift manager, to assistant manager, to the manager is well-defined. Movement on the career path is possible through excellent performance and completing internal certificates that include up to 12 weeks of training and three exams requiring passing grades of at least 80%. Employee engagement and satisfaction is measured by semiannual surveys as well as information gathered from employees who are leaving Mike's. Employees play an essential role in the choice and design of training and development activities. A 15 to 20 person team consisting of members who have been nominated by their store manager serve a one year term as subject matter experts in helping to develop new and modify existing training programs. Team members also are the first trainees in new programs, providing feedback about needed changes and feedback on program effectiveness.

In addition to its regular training programs for new employees and certification programs for advancement, Mike's has developed programs to meet emerging business needs. The economic recession resulted in a decrease in the volume of customers Mike's served as well as revenue. As a result, Mike's recognized the need to increase the spending of its customers by making sure that employees made them aware of value-added services such as underbody washes, tire treatments, and clearcoat. To do this, Mike's developed an online training module and trained managers to encourage employees to complete the training and practice using the selling skills at monthly employee meetings. Mike's recognizes the vital role that managers play in helping employees learn. At Mike's managers need to support and help deliver training actively. They are held accountable for training and developing employees to advance and succeed. In this program, managers were taught how to identify weaknesses in employees' service recommendation techniques and use weekly coaching sessions to enhance them. Managers were also encouraged to observe and document employees making service recommendations to customers and to provide them with feedback. The results of this program were positive: overall revenue, revenue per customer, customer satisfaction, and mystery shopper scores all increased.

Another business issue that Mike's uses training to resolve is how to maintain a consistent corporate culture across its 37 locations. To address this challenge, Mike's created "Int the Loop," a weekly video communication that is shown on a computer terminal in each area. Each 10-minute segment is used to deliver training content, recognize employee and store performance, communicate to employees, and share best practices. Regularly on the video, the CEO shares a letter from a satisfied customer and discusses that exemplifies Mike's customer service values. Since the development of the video, Mike's has seen an increase of more than 100% in the number of positive customer letters, comment cards, and website contacts.

Questions:

1. Is Mike's training strategic? Provide a rationale for your answer. What information did you consider in determining your answer?

2. How does Mike's support training? What else could they do to support their training activities to maximize their effectiveness?

3. Does Mike's support continuous learning? How?

4. Provide recommendations about how Mike's could facilitate informal learning within and across its car wash. How would you evaluate your recommendations' effectiveness?

Provide at least 4 references with in-cite references and APA formatted cited references,