Essay on Starbucks: Changes to financial objectives

It is possible to see that the objectives set in the learning and growth perspective influence the objectives in other dimensions, and in particular, Objective 1 of learning and growth perspective is linked to Objective 3 of financial dimension (Employment of local professionals to save costs in the course of the international market expansion). In fact, the interaction with employees and focus on local employment relates to the learning and growth perspective, while the saving costs part belongs to the financial dimension. Therefore, Objective 3 can be redefined as “reduction of foreign employment costs”. Further changes to this objective are listed in Table 2.

Objective Measure Target Action
Objective 3: reduction of foreign employment costs The percentage of foreign employment in countries other than US Reduce costs of foreign employment by 10% in the three-years perspective, and reduce costs of foreign employment by 20% in the five-years period The company attracts and retains employees locally, through the recruitment of local professionals, who are living in the area, where the company’s coffee houses are located.  The company provides them with training to help them to learn to code of conduct and standards of the company, and also provides training needed for them to acquire better work skills.  The company minimizes the transfer of employees from the US abroad and internationally. Instead, the company encourages knowledge sharing within outlets that involves employees, who have already developed extensive experience of work in the company and can share their experience and knowledge with local employees.

Table 2. Changes to the financial objectives

3. Changes to customer service objectives

The learning and growth perspective is also strongly linked to the customer service objective, and, in particular, it affects Objective 3 of customer service (To improve the quality of staffing, involving more employees, who understand customers well): again, employee involvement is more appropriate for the learning and growth dimension, while the focus on customer satisfaction is appropriate for the customer service perspective. Therefore, Objective 3 of customer service perspective can be reformulated as “improvement of customer satisfaction via increasing the quality of customer service”. Further changes to this objective are listed in Table 3.

Objective Measure Target Action
Objective 3: improvement of customer satisfaction via increasing the quality of customer service The rate of customer satisfaction outlined in confidential surveys and in-person interviews Increase customer satisfaction by 20% during the next three years The company should hire employees who have the right qualities and skills for the job, and provide further training for improving the quality of their work further. Hiring local employees will be very helpful because they can better serve local customers as they operate in the same cultural context. Increasing employee motivation and rewarding them for customer satisfaction will also help Starbucks reach the target for this objective.

Table 3. Changes to the customer service objectives

Overall, learning and growth dimension is the “root’ dimension which has links to all other perspectives of the balanced scorecard, and it should be carefully considered while developing strategy for Starbucks.



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