Project Proposal

Project Proposal

Thursday, September 09, 2010

Project Title Electronic Foodservice POS System

Project Manager Sunny Mui

Problem definitionHayward Japan Grill is a small casual dining Japanese restaurant located in Hayward, California. Our capacity for guests ranges up to 80 people. We have both tables for groups and a sushi bar. Orders to be prepared are currently physically taken to the sushi bar and kitchen separately. Currently, our POS system consists of manual laborhand written checks, cash box, calculators, paper orders, pens, etc. This system of order processing and cash wrap is unwieldy, slow, consumes a lot of resources, is unconducive to analysis, and is prone to mistakes.

This project is intended to improve our current POS system with a new digital system. Benefits of a digital system include reduced waste of paper and supplies, automatic check calculations, faster order processing, error reduction, and easy access to sales information for analysis. In addition, integration into other future computerized systems would be possible. This project will accomplish these benefits through the procurement of a new electronic POS system that will fit our business needs. Ultimately, these benefits will help us better serve our customers and plan more effectively.

Goal definitionOur desired achievements for this project are as follows:Reduce paper and office supply waste from order taking materialsAutomate guest check handling and calculationsIncrease order processing speed from taking the order, delivering the order to the kitchen/sushi bar, to handling guest check delivery and paymentsReduce order errors created by miscommunication from server to food prepProvide information in a usable digital form for analysis

Success will mean the achievement of the above objectives within budget and on time.

Objective definition

Reduce paper and office supply waste from order taking materialsWe want to eliminate the need for paper guest check order books and reduce the excessive amount of pens needed to use these guest check books. If this goal is realized successfully, then we will completely eliminate our budget for guest check books and reduce our need for pens by at least 30%

Automate guest check handling and calculationsIdeally, we will eliminate the need our calculators to hand guest check calculations. In addition, we will be able to conduct order taking, guest check cash wrap, and payment completely within the new POS system. If this goal is realized then we will eliminate calculator purchases and use and we will be able to process guest checks digitally.

Increase order processing speed from taking the order, delivering the order to the kitchen/sushi bar, to handling guest check delivery and paymentsOur goal is to increase the speed at which we serve the customer. Components that determine that speed--outside of food prep time--are time spent taking orders, time spent delivering the order to the kitchen/sushi bar, calculating guest checks to be presented to guests, and processing payment. If successful, after the training period and implementation the new system should be able to decrease the time spent on each of these various activities by at least 10%.

Reduce order errors created by miscommunication from server to food prepOrder errors can be created by a multitude of causes: messy handwriting, misinterpretation of words, differing use of names for menu items, etc. We want to reduce these errors through the standardized digital formatting applied to all order processed in the new POS system. If this goal is achieved, order errors should be reduced by at least 30%

Provide information in a usable digital form for analysisOur current manual system of order taking creates an unmanageable amount of paper that must (if we want to analyze the data) be manually sorted, evaluated, entered into a computer application, and analyzed. Due to the extreme amount of labor and effort required, we currently do not do this. We are letting a valuable source of information on sales composition and trends go to waste. If successful, the new system should be able to provide us with usable data on sales, individual items sales, and guest traits that we can easily manipulate into computer applications for analysis.

Phase definitionPhase 1Develop business case, attain management approval, compose project team, develop needs requirements, develop criteria to evaluate suppliers

Phase 2Research possible technologies, evaluate potential suppliers, choose potential suppliers to solicit proposals from

Phase 3Solicit proposals from suppliers, evaluate proposals, select supplier

Phase 4Enter into negotiations with selected supplier, create contract, create change management procedures

Phase 5Monitor and control progress towards implementation, manage changes as agreed upon in previous phase

Phase 6Finish implementation, train employees, monitor implementation/user problems to report to supplier, ensure proper documentation for system

Phase 7Close project, maintain supplier relationship, update lessons learned from implementation