14.5 Exercises and assignments

Practical exercise: Draw your own service blueprint for a restaurant you know, showing each touchpoint with vertical divisions between the dining area and the kitchen.

Case study: Choose a restaurant with dissatisfied guests and describe three touchpoints that have contributed to a negative customer experience. Analyse the causes and propose improvements based on process-oriented methods (Johnston & Clark, 2008).

Group discussion: In a small group, compare service styles between fine dining and quick service establishments, with emphasis on the definition of expectations and the actual guest experience (Zeithaml & Bitner, 2003).

Research project: Design an experiment in which you measure guest attitudes toward different touchpoints, such as music versus lighting. Develop a questionnaire, collect data, and analyse the results.

Critical analysis: Choose a restaurant of your choice and analyse, based on the layout and workflow of workstations, which support processes are most vulnerable to error. Propose an improvement plan, developed primarily with an emphasis on minimising labour use.

Reflective assignment: Write a journal entry of 300–400 words describing your own experience of comparing two touchpoints you have encountered in restaurant operations, and analyse how they contributed to either a positive or negative experience (Walker, 2021).