NCR Country Club Case Study

The recommendation that should be offered to the management of NCR Country Club would be to add additional facilities and programs to the club that will increase participation among adults, families with children, and children. The main objective that NCR is trying to accomplish is to offset the dwindling membership numbers by attracting new people to join the club. Adding these programs and changing the facilities to be more family oriented will increase the incentive for new members to join the club. The club must also address the concerns current, older members have in regards to these changes; some of the members might feel threatened at the prospect of alterations in traditional business operations. This can be addressed by maintaining
and continuing to improve the high quality standards of the already established activities of golfing and dining; even though the club specialized in only these two entertainment activities, there were still flaws in how the operations were carried out. The management of the country club needs to create an overall positive experience for new and current members to alleviate the decreasing membership enrollments. As mentioned before, the issue for NCR was its ineffectiveness in attracting new members to join. This was highlighted by the findings from the research the McMahon Group conducted: younger members (under age 46) and nonmembers perceive golf-only clubs as less attractive compared to the other competing country clubs encircling the area who offer other activities besides golfing and dining. Only the current and older members of the country club were attracted to the current facilities: the golf course and the dining experience. However, if a new member isn't as interested in the current programs offered by the club, the country club has no quality or core, such as different additional entertainment programs that caters to other social activities other than golf and dining, that will increase the incentive for the member to join. Consequently, this will set the club at a disadvantage in attracting new members over their competitors. This phenomenon was solidified by even more evidence from the study: while members, approximately 63%, saw the club as an "Adult Golf and Dining Club", many of the members believed in order for the club to remain competitive to their rivals and relevant in their respective industry, the club would have to diversify its programs to include venues that are more family oriented. This fact was true for members under the age 46. Due to the facts that nonmembers and younger members view golf-only clubs as less attractive, the perception of the club being strictly of golf and dining, and the problems the club ran into to just trying to meet the standards to maintain the quality of those experiences, placed the club in a vulnerable situation in comparison with their surrounding competitors. While potential members, who seek to join a club, witness the many benefits and fun entertainment other clubs will offer that allows more family participation, they may be put off by the absence of these same programs when they encounter the services of the NCR Country Club. The lack of family oriented facilities, activities and programs will place them at a disadvantage when it comes to attracting newer, younger members who may or may not be parents to young children and/or teenagers. However, it should be mentioned the probability of potential issues arising from the proposition of adding additional programs to increase family participation.
A main issue is addressing the concerns older and current members might have in regards to the proposed changes; older membership may be already currently satisfied with the operations and facilities of the country club and see no reason to implement changes. They may see change as a threat or an inconvenience to ending the old way of conducting business rather than as an opportunity to increase socializing and family oriented entertainment. This concern actually addressed a deeper issue the country club was facing: the potential deterioration of the golfing and dining services they were supposedly specialized in. This was pointed out through the findings of the McMahon's study where there were major concerns about the speed of service, the professionalism of the wait staff and the variety of menu items for their dining facility, the 37th hole. Since, the dining portion of the country club is currently half of their entertainment program, any flaws within the dining experience will be detrimental for the country club, in the perception of not only attracting new members, but also maintaining their current members. Management should look into the operations of the wait staff and seek out strategies to increase a favorable outlook from the members in this dimension. Some questions management should pose to evaluate the effectiveness of the dining facility should be: are the servers properly trained to handle customer service related issues?; are the dining halls up to health standards and do they make the members feel comfortable?; etc. Some of these basic lines of questioning can lead to more effective evaluation to ensure the dining experience of the club is up to par. Questions dealing with the personalities of the servers and wait staff will also address the concerns of dwindling membership due to the
declining quality in the dining services. If employees do not exhibit the professionalism and motivation to serve their customers in an excellent manner, the customers will feel that they're taken for granted and will take their business to another organization. Ganesh (2016), explains the connection of motivation and customer retention: "It is imperative that satisfied, motivated employees will create higher customer satisfaction. Satisfied customers are happy to stay with the same organization which in turn positively influences the organizational performance." Hard working, professional employees will make satisfied, loyal customers. Another strategy that management should take into account, when it comes to maintaining their current programs, is to invest more into the maintenance of their golf courses. Although new members are not as attractive to an only golf centered program style country club, the new members will be even more discouraged to join if the golf courses of the NCRCC fall below expectations in standards compared to their competitors. Also, this could increase the incentive for current members to leave the country club if the golf facilities are allowed to decay without proper attention paid to its conditions. The attention paid to maintaining the qualities of these facilities will squash any concerns that the current, older members have in regards to adding new programs; it will eliminate the fear that the old status quo is in jeopardy of perishing. It's mainly an improvement of the way operations are carried out for the country club. If management combines the addition of programs aimed at increasing family participation with the aggressive maintenance of their dining and golfing facilities, they will accomplish their mission in attracting new members and retaining the older ones. The objective that management should aim for is to create an overall positive customer experience that increases the incentives for new customers to join the club and protects the interests of the older, current and more loyal club members; thereby creating an environment that will address the issues of their dwindling membership numbers. If any organization wishes to survive in the business world, it's the foundational truth that the creation of strong, positive customer experience is the only way to achieve this goal. According to a recent study by Accenture, as cited by Lemon and Verhoef (2016), "improving the customer experience received the most number one rankings when executives were asked about their top priorities for the next 12 months." Larger multinational firms understand the importance of establishing a strong customer experience to create more lasting, productive and profitable relationship between the customer and themselves. Management should take these bits of information from the McMahon Group: diversify their activities to include family oriented programs to attract newer and younger members, and at the same time, keep attention to the maintenance of the current facilities they specialize in to retain the membership of the current and older consumers. If management tackles these two strategic suggestions, they will find the solution to the decrease in their membership numbers.