Problem Statement/Kudler Fine Foods

Kudler Fine Foods is a gourmet shop that provides fine quality foods and services to their customers including wine, cheese, produce, and bakery products. Kudlers is committed to providing the best products to their customers. There are three locations in La Jolla, Del Mar, and Encinitas. According to the business plan Kathy Kudler plans on expanding to other geographical areas. In order for this to take place it is of most importance to look over the management staff and how it is currently structured to see how it can be improved to be able to handle any growth in the company.
Kathy has been taking care of the majority of the duties in all three stores except for the everyday light duties that the managers and assistant managers handle that were hired in each of the three stores. Kathy handles all of the purchasing of the products for all three stores that takes up most of her time considering the products need to be closely watched since the shelf life can be very short for most of the products. With the management team having many responsibilities and also Kathy holding many of the responsibilities there is no room for error or any time to spare in case any one person would have an emergency or want to take a vacation.
What needs to be determined is who is exactly able to handle some of these tasks and delegate them out. Some of the work that the management is currently handling needs to be delegated out to other position if they can. What can be handed down to management that Kathy is currently handling? After the above is taken care of it should then be discussed what positions may need to be added to handle some of the excess work. A Plan for Cross-Training should also be put in place for those times that someone is unable to follow through with their job details. This needs to be handles before any future stores can be opened.