A PROPOSED STUDY AND QUALITY IMPROVEMENT PLAN FOR FEU KITCHEN FACILITIES AND EQUIPMENT
A Thesis Submitted in Partial Fulfillment
For the course requirements in Total Quality Management
Submitted by:
HRMFR1 Group 1
Submitted to:
Professor Sofronio “Toti” Dulay
Acknowledgement:
This research project would not have been possible without the support of many people. We would like to express our gratitude to our professor Sofronio “Toti Dulay” who was abundantly helpful and offered endless assistance, support and guidance.
We would also like to thank our parents for providing a loving environment for us, helping us through the difficult times, and for all the financial and emotional support, friendship, entertainment, and caring they provided.
Special thanks to Michael Baldos and Neil Louis Tayo for giving us their time to help improve our research. Also, we would like to thank all our friends and all the students who participated in answering our survey forms, this study wouldn’t have been completed without their participation.
Additional thanks to our professors back in high school, They required us to make a baby thesis, investigatory projects and other research related projects to help us prepare for our thesis in college, they were our inspiration to persevere, they were the ones who molded us to become better students.
Table of Contents
1. Preliminaries
a. Title Page ……………………………………………………………………………….Page 1
b. Acknowledgement……………………………………….. ……………………..Page 2
c. Table of Contents………………………………………… ……………………..Page 3
2. Contents
Introduction………………………………………………………………………..Page 4
Executive Summary………………………………………………………………Page 6
I. Problem Statement
A. Major Problems………………………………………………………Page 7
B. Minor Problems………………………………………………………Page 8
II. Root Causes of the Problem……………………………………………Page 9
III. Fish Bone Diagram………………………………………………………Page10
IV. Recommendation and Benefits…………………………………………Page 11
V. Implementation Plan……………………………………………………..Page 13
VI. Survey Results……………………………………………………………Page 15
Appendix
A. Survey Results
Introduction:
The kitchen in any home or school is like the heart in a person’s body. It provides the energy giving factor that fuels the operations in other rooms – food.
Since food is essential for the students’ vitality and quality performance in class and home, its preparation is important, too. More so the area where the ingredients are prepared, cleansed and cooked—the kitchen.
Quality food results in quality performances of its consumers. Therefore, it is important that the main source of all these is a quality kitchen.
In this regard, this thesis aims to study how to achieve a perfect, if not a high quality kitchen, among others. It focuses on the fundamental elements needed in order to make a kitchen workable and highly productive.
On a larger scale, this thesis focuses on how to make the FEU-Hotel and Restaurant Management Department be competitive, if not the best, among other schools offering the course. It studies on how FEU-HRM could make a mark among stakeholders in the hotel and restaurant industry.
This study realizes that the HRM-FEU boasts of a building that houses a kitchen that has served as training ground for successful and future chefs as well as hotel executives. In this regard, this thesis strives to study areas for improvement in the FEU-HRM kitchen to make it have a distinguishable niche and stand out among the rest.
As HRM students, the proponents of this study personally experienced and witnessed the inadequacies of the university kitchen. Observations gleaned include how tasks remained unfinished due to limited or lack of equipment, damaged facilities, sharing, among other factors.
During lab sessions at the kitchen, the makers of this thesis also personally noted how the FEU-HRM could greatly improve by eliminating all the obstacles they had encountered.
Executive summary:
This study proposes to Improve the quality of the ITHM equipment and utensils so that the quality of education we are getting will increase. First off, the researchers have presented the Major and Minor problems regarding the equipment and utensils in the ITHM kitchen. The problems that were stated are currently being experienced by majority of the students.
The
The study will be within the University Belt, since most of the universities and colleges nowadays offer Hotel and Restaurant Management course. The researchers have conducted a survey about the kitchen equipment that are being used by the students in different schools, the facilities and how the operation is implemented in each school.
According to some students here in FEU there are some issues or problems that have been observed regarding the kitchen equipment. Some problems in the kitchen include: availability of some equipment, malfunctioning, and missing utensils.
The purpose of this study is to request the FEU Management for regular maintenance of the equipment and utensils in the kitchen, and provide what the equipment and utensils the kitchen lacks.
Problem Statement:
The Following are the problems encountered by FEU HRM and Tourism students during their cooking subjects. There are problems with the facility, the equipment, the utensils and the staffs. The purpose of this study is to find out if these problems are affecting the quality and efficiency of the education the students should gain; also, this study has been conducted to find remedies for the said problems.
Major problems:
1. Lack of utensils and equipment
The utensils and equipment that are being use in the kitchen laboratory is not enough for the students. The utensils and equipment are limited only that some students/class needs to wait for the other section to get finish before you can use the things that you needed. There should also have a proper ratio of utensils to students or a group per section.
2. Lack of space in the kitchen laboratory
The proportion of the space and the students are not equal. There are too much students per group that they cannot maximize the usage of kitchen space.
3. Frequent shortage of gas
The staffs do not check regularly the volume or supply of gas in the kitchen. There are instances that in the middle of an activity there is a sudden shortage of gas.
Minor Problems:
1. The utensils are not well organized.
Kitchen utensils are not well organized that’s why it makes the kitchen look cluttered and messy; however by organizing these kitchen utensils, the kitchen would be saving a lot of space and having a well arranged kitchen would also make our cooking chores simple and faster.
2. The kitchen equipment is not properly maintained.
They should organize the kitchen utensils in specific drawers. It would make accessing the utensils easy. They can use one drawer for all flatware while another drawer could be earmarked for spoon and fork and yet another drawer for the larger cooking utensils and so on. They should make sure that they do not keep kitchen knives with these cooking tools as it could result in cuts and bruises as we rush through our cooking chores.
3. Arrogant kitchen staffs.
Some of the students are saying that there are kitchen staffs that are arrogant and some are impolite. FEU Management should make sure that all of the kitchen staffs should be well trained.
4. The ingredients in the refrigerator are not secured by the kitchen staffs.
Some of the students are saying that some of their ingredients in the refrigerator are being lost. Kitchen Staffs should improve their security with regards to the facilities of the kitchen.
Root Causes of the problem
II. Root Causes of the problem
1. Manpower
The kitchen staffs lack good social skills
There are times when the staff already went home or cannot be found when the students need to borrow or return equipment.
2. Maintenance
Failure to regularly check the condition of the kitchen equipment and utensils
Some of the Utensils are already rusty or broken
Some of the equipment are dirty, and gives off foul smells, and the kitchen is infested with pests.
3. Management
Broken equipment or utensils are not immediately replaced
Provides insufficient financial resources resulting to failure of good maintenance of the kitchen.
4. Space Allocation
The space in the kitchen is not enough to accommodate all the students per section
Limited work area
Fishbone Diagram
IV. Recommendation and Benefits
Here’s the researchers recommendation together with its benefits: the group proposes to address the major and minor problems stated above.
Kitchen and Facilities improvement:
Additional recommendations for the study and improvement in FEU kitchen facilities:
1. Maintenance is important because lack of adequate maintenance of the structure of the premises, equipment and utensils can result in the following:
- Pest may enter the premises and defective drains may also permit access.
- Crockery, cutlery and containers may become badly worn, broken or unable to be effectively cleaned and disinfected.
- Some utensils and equipment such as glassware may present a risk of physical contamination when cracked or broken.
- Sanitation of the kitchen is jeopardize
Implementation Plan
VI. Survey Results
Our group conducted a survey to support our study. 62 ITHM Students from Far Eastern University were requested to participate in answering our survey forms. The survey is composed of 15 questions which are related to our study.
