Group M*A*S*H
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Background:

Our Management 320 group chose to name ourselves after the television sitcom M*A*S*H. Our group consists of the following members:

After exploring numerous options for a quality team project, M*A*S*H settled on Target, a major retail store. It saw the potential to eliminate waste in employee overtime hours.

Operation:

As part of the Dayton Hudson Corporation, Target is a discount retailer with over 752 locations across 39 states, and provides employment for approximately 140,000 people. At Target, customers are referred to as "guests". Target's mission is to provide "guests" with the highest quality goods at low prices. Target stocks everything from name brand televisions to tools, frames to family fashions, and emphasizes on fashion-right merchandise in clean attractive stores.

The Problem:

M*A*S*H visited a local Target to see if it could provide any assistance to improve the operational management system with in the store. Since, one of the "soldiers" of M*A*S*H works for Target, M*A*S*H was able to gather a better understanding of store operations and employee concerns. After casually interviewing employees, M*A*S*H came upon a recurring theme. A great deal of undesired employee overtime existed.

The Solution:

In order to address this overtime problem, M*A*S*H asked the employees "why" they had to work late. M*A*S*H learned that employees did not have enough time to finish their assigned job tasks. M*A*S*H then asked "why" didn't employees have enough time to finish their tasks. M*A*S*H discovered that after employees clocked in s/he had to find his/her's assistant or executive store manager to ask for his/her job task. M*A*S*H found this as a waste of time. M*A*S*H posted a listing of each employee's job tasks next to the company time clock. Now, when employees clock in s/he just has to look up and find what they are suppose to do. After implementing M*A*S*H's job listing, Target experienced a decrease in unwanted overtime hours and an increase in employee efficiency. Employees also have a higher moral because they are more able to complete their daily tasks.

*This page was published for The University of Georgia's course in Organizational Management 320 instructed by Tony Polito.