Multi-Unit Operations Execution: A Guide to Managing Performance Across Multiple Locations

Multi-unit operations execution is not only about increasing operating scope; rather, it is also about keeping uniformity, efficiency, and quality in all outlets. 

No matter whether your business is a chain of restaurants, a retail franchise, or a convenience store, having two or more locations complicates operations. Although each place will belong to the same brand, every place will have its team, customers, and business specifics, which can become a challenge to keep everything consistent.

The higher the level of scaling your business is, the more at stake it is. Unstable operations may result in a bad customer experience, wastage of resources, and eventually reduced revenue. Multi-location businesses can, however, guarantee problem-free implementation, quality, and high operational effectiveness once there are effective systems in place.

In this blog, we are going to understand how the execution of the multi-unit operation is done, the issues that businesses that have multiple locations are confronted with, and how to optimize operations in all the places using Xenia.

To make sure your operations are consistent and more efficient, we will demonstrate how to concentrate on key pillars of operations, turnover, constant monitoring, and responsibility.

What is Multi-Unit Operations Execution?

Multi-unit operations implementation means operations optimization of day-to-day activities in a multi-unit company. You may run a restaurant chain, a network of retail stores, or a multi-store franchise, but operating the locations of a business on a daily basis, systematic management is needed in order to make each of the sites work to its maximum and be part of the overall corporate strategy.

For operations of multi-units, effective execution means ensuring that:

• All the locations have standard operating procedures (SOPs) for multi-units.
• The effective management of resources allows for maximizing costs and productivity.
• Employee outputs are checked and improved so that the customers are satisfied.
• The level of compliance in every place is maintained to prevent fines and violations.

In its essence, the practice of successful multi-unit operations execution and delivery lies in the ability to incorporate the systems of standardized processes, the immediacy of data availability, and responsibility metrics to every location. 

This is done to ensure that its operations are uniform, effective, and absolutely flawless on a huge scale.

Problems While Maintaining Consistent Operations Across Multi-Unit Businesses

As you scale to more locations, it’s common to encounter challenges that make it difficult to run operations smoothly.

The following lists some of the common problems businesses have in achieving consistent multi-unit operations execution across all units:

1. Inconsistent Execution Across Locations

In large companies that have several different facilities spread out over a large area, it becomes quite difficult to maintain uniformity in the operations, wherein every unit executes and operates on the level of SOPs.

Challenges arise when management and other employees are not following the expected protocol, and when variations of what should be a standard product/delivery system/customer service occur at other locations.

2. Siloed Data Across Locations

One of the biggest headaches for multi-location managers is data scattering. Deprived of a 360-degree view of the business, managers can not be agile. If sales and inventory data are maintained independently at each location, for instance, it is not possible to monitor the performance of the entire business as it happens.

3. Onboarding and Staff Training

Recruits across all locations mean a hefty investment of time and resources. If training isn't implemented consistently, and employees aren't prepared to deliver positive consumer experiences, performance can suffer from the top down. And communicating new policies, or changes to procedures, or even the use of technology, is also more challenging and complex in multi-unit operations.

4. Compliance and Regulatory Challenges

In some organizations where some of their branches are located in various geographic locations, it might not be simple to ensure that all branches are conforming to the local regulations and corporate policies. Without a central point to track all compliance activities, organisations may miss vital compliance activities and end up paying hefty non-compliance fines or having a damaged brand reputation.

If you’re running a multi-location restaurant and don’t know where to start? Here’s a super helpful manager's red book guide for multi-location management.

Core Pillars of Effective Multi-Unit Execution

Multi-unit operations execution can be effectively controlled by taking into account the following pillars:

1. SOP Management

SOPs are the lifeblood of operational consistency in multi-unit businesses. An organization without Standard operating procedures (SOPs) for multi-units sets itself up for each operation to be a different interpretation of the company’s intended standards, meaning the products and level of service differ consistently.

Whereas Xenia disrupts this process by digitizing and automating SOP management using AI.

This reason alone ensures access to all current procedures at all customer sites and removes out-of-date manual processes. This lowers the risk of manual errors and makes it possible to be consistent at a large scale.

Not only does it allow easy access to standardized processes and new operating procedures, but all employees are trained the same, regardless of their physical location. Such standardization is essential to ensure good quality and efficiency, in particular at scale.

2. Task Distribution and Tracking

In a multi-site business, the efficient management of task delegation and completion is a key factor for success. For managers, Xenia provides an easy-to-use task management system where managers can assign tasks to locations or employees and track their progress.

Automatic reminders ensure that no activity is missed or postponed.

Xenia also delivers visibility, offering such managers a bird’s-eye view of what is taking place. This instantaneous visibility enables managers to proactively deal with issues before they compound.

What’s more is that Xenia’s system measures completion rates and quality of tasks to make sure every location is up to company standards and operating at peak performance. By bringing all tasks together, businesses can simplify their operation process as well as increase efficiency and hold team members responsible for their duties.

3. Real-Time Visibility

Real-time access is a total game-changer in the multi-unit business management world. Without it, business executives find themselves reacting to issues rather than staying out in front of them.  Xenia gives you in-depth live data on sales, staff performance, inventory, and tasks from all establishments.

Such transparency in itself takes out bottlenecks, allowing for efficiency and increased output.

In addition, Xenia streamlines all performance statistics into one customizable dashboard so you don’t have to compile reports by hand. This creates better decision-making, more efficient operations, and support for ongoing optimization across locations.

4. Team Accountability

The bigger a growing multi-location business gets, the harder it is to keep track of what everyone’s doing. Xenia solves this by taking orders automatically and monitoring actual delivery rates. Every staff role has a defined responsibility attached to staff profiles.

Supervisors can also easily track if tasks are getting done on time and in line with company expectations. This way, Xenia instantly notifies about overdue or not started tasks, and managers can step in before the problem occurs. This is an automated way to foster a culture of ownership and accountability up and down the organisation.

With visible performance metrics and live stats, employees are accountable for their performance, driving productivity, decreasing errors, and ensuring consistent performance is achieved.

5. Compliance and Auditing

For multi-units, it is a nightmare to keep everyone in compliance. Different local restrictions, standard practices in the related sector, and the internal company protocol can apply to different sites. 

Xenia streamlines tracking of compliance, removing the need to manually conduct audits and compliance workflows. This means all your locations are always current with new local laws and company policies.

With Xenia’s live audit capabilities, managers can instantly assess compliance, so no site can ever lag on what’s required by regulation. Automating compliance is also free of human error, to minimize the risks of violation or fines.

The system also provides built-in audit trails so that a manager can simply access past pieces of information regarding compliance efforts and view trends or problems. This will reduce the time and effort required to perform manual checks on compliance, and allows businesses to be in a compliant state without the numerous hours required to manually monitor compliance and reprocess every day.

6. Location-Based Scheduling

If you have a business with multiple locations, then the complexity of scheduling your staff grows in complexity; it is not enough to have staff that is evenly distributed in shifts throughout longer opening hours and overlapping shifts. 

Xenia makes it easy with a location-based scheduling system that creates staffing schedules based on individual location needs.

Xenia leverages live location and staff performance data to schedule locations so each one is effectively staffed all the time. This removes the overstaffing and understaffing problems, reducing labor expenses and maximizing services.

Xenia considers the availability of the staff and shifts they prefer in their schedules, thereby doing away with scheduling conflicts and enhancing satisfaction among the employees. One of such tools is automated scheduling that enables managers to schedule quick changes to the existing shifts, which may generate the most constructive use of resources and enhance the business in general.

7. Hierarchy Management

In multi-location businesses, hierarchical management plays a key role in an attempt to create a transparent organizational structure that enables the smooth development of operations at various levels. With the expansion of businesses, it has become increasingly hard to manage the distributed locations, the distributed teams, and the resources.

Xenia offers a location-based hierarchical design that enables organizations to structure and control operations by region, department, or location. This will ensure that the right level in your organization has access to its relevant data, as well as assignments plus permissions.

Using the customizable hierarchy in Xenia, a company may define roles and responsibilities that vary by business unit or individual location and provide employees with the right information at the right place. As a head office team manager or remote staff member, Xenia aids in defining the lines and duties so as not to foster miscommunication and chaos.

By using granular access control and task assignment options at every location, these features practically guarantee that everyone you work with will operate within the confines of their role, which creates greater efficiency, accountability, and overall better alignment with company objectives.

How Automation Streamlines Multi-Unit Operations

Here’s how automation can boost operational execution and improve outcomes at the many sites facilities must serve:

1. Automated Task Management: Task management at scale without automation leads to delays, errors, to miscommunication. With Xenia’s intelligent task management, you can be sure that ALL tasks are assigned, monitored, and delivered on time.

Since opening the store, or making cycles or ringing a customer, Xenia enables managers to locate and assign tasks easily on the move, and it will be done instantly, anywhere.

Automating (or semi-automating) all these things will ensure that the managers do not forget these things, stick to the deadlines, and hold teams accountable for what they are designated to do.

2. Real-Time Data and Visibility: Being the owner of a multi-location business, it is quite difficult to monitor, something it lacks real-time visibility.

Xenia integrates the various data sources and gives real-time insight into the sales, the team production, and the stocks. They can observe real-time information about any store, which enables them to make informed decisions in a shorter time.

Real-time store performance makes the managers aware of the underperforming store, or a place where service standards are slipping, or even a shortage of stock, long before it becomes a problem.

3. Automated Reporting and Analytics: Managers have the convenience of trend tracking and a measurement of how efficient a location might be with automated reporting. The reporting features of Xenia (pivot tables, pie charts, etc.) help the manager to identify patterns, improve the efficiency of operations, and make evidence-based decisions.

What Tools Make It Work?

Multi-unit operations can only be performed with the right tools; however, most companies have not yet discarded manual techniques such as spreadsheets, paper-based checklists, and emails. These techniques have previously been helpful to businesses, but not anymore because it does not work on a large scale.

To understand why automation is the future of multi-location business management, it is better to look at the traditional ways as opposed to digital ones, such as Xenia, to identify its advantages of using.

Traditional Methods

• Paper-Based Checklists: They may be lost, misplaced, or forgotten, causing partial accomplishment, and different quality of services in various instances.
  
• Manual Data Entry: With a lack of automated systems, companies are faced with manual data entries, a factor that results in errors and delays, and is coupled with regular updating.
  
• Email Communication: Key communications are lost on email chains, and communication between locations is delayed, missed, and poorly communicated.
  

Xenia’s Digital Platform

• Real-Time Task Assignment: The managers will have the ability to assign, monitor, and control tasks in real-time, which means that the operations in every location are always moving as they should to the required standards.
  
• Automated Data Integration: Since data is centralized in one location with Xenia, there is less possibility of any human error, and the data becomes more accurate.
  
• Instant Communication: Xenia enables managers to update the staff immediately, making sure that the necessary information is exchanged in time and that the duties are accomplished on time

Learn more on Xenia's use cases for multi-unit businesses

Multi-Unit Execution Metrics That Matter

Avoiding the problem of measuring the wrong metrics is a necessity in order to support the operations to run efficiently. These are the key multi-unit execution outcomes that managers ought to log:

1. Task Completion Rate

Task completion rate will help keep an eye on the frequency level of on-time task completion in all places. This measure can be used to determine bottlenecks or places where work can be going unattended.

2. SOP Adherence Score

The SOP is to guarantee that every place is doing what they are doing by utilizing the same procedures. The SOP adherence score assists the managers in monitoring the effectiveness with which their teams are complying with the company protocols and in which areas they have to do further training.

3. Incident Reporting Rate

The rate of incident reporting determines the number of times that matters such as customer complaints, safety violations, or malfunctioning equipment have been reported in all branches. It will be necessary to monitor operational risks and enhance the quality of services.

4. Audit Scores

Audit scores are used to monitor the performance of sites on internal policies and regulatory achievements. The higher the audit score, the more it implies that the location is doing well in the standards set by the company, and the lower the score, the more there should be corrective measures.

Revolutionizing Multi-Unit Operations Execution with Xenia

Managing multi-location businesses involves overseeing many moving parts at once. But with the right tools, you can ensure that all locations are aligned, efficient, and operating at their peak. Xenia’s platform is the key to achieving optimal performance, maintaining consistency, and scaling operations across multiple locations.

Using real-time information, automating tasks, and tracking compliance, companies can dominate in their multi-unit operation and be sure that all their locations run at their optimal performance. 

Task tracking, SOP management, and real-time reporting are some of the features that enable Xenia to give businesses the power to perfect operations, enhance employee responsibility, and even make decisions that are based on data, leading to business development.

Xenia can help businesses that want to grow and enhance their operations at multiple locations because the platform provides software to optimize their processes, minimize inefficiencies, and increase the efficiency of all units. 

Operation inefficiencies should not be obstacles. Xenia will help you to improve the way you administer your multi-unit franchise operations management and how you can help them operate in unison in order to achieve success together.

Ready to optimize your multi-unit operations?

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FAQs

How do you manage consistency across multiple locations?

The ability to manage uniformity across different locations demands powerful systems that would automate SOPs, task assignments, and the monitoring of performance in real-time. Such tools as the Xenia centralize the data and ensure tracking of task completion, and accountability at all locations, expressing the stringency of quality measures at the same high level. This makes the experience homogeneous to the customers and creates alignment of operations.

What tools or platforms help with multi-unit operations?

In multi-unit operations, company-wide performance monitoring, division of labor, and assurance are assured on platforms, such as Xenia, which offers extensive tools to monitor, delegate, and obtain assurance across the units. Xenia combines real-time data, automates task management, and empowers centralized monitoring that assists businesses in streamlining operations and making data-driven decisions in different places.

What are examples of effective SOPs for franchises?

Effective franchise operations management SOPS ensures the same process can be standardized across all locations so as to achieve consistency. Templates of rules and regulations: This can be in the form of rules involved in customer services, health and safety regulations, inventory management, and equipment use. As a result of digitalizing and automating SOPs by using tools such as Xenia, there will be consistency in the product/service delivery to the franchisees as well as adherence to rules and regulations.

How do you ensure compliance across locations?

Managing compliance in geographically disparate locations may be very difficult; however, various platforms, such as Xenia, make this easy by automating the tracking of compliance. Xenia conducts real-time audits and offers automatic reminders to make sure every location complies with the industry regulations as well as the company policies. It is a centralized type of system that minimizes the chances of non-compliance and harmonization of all locations with both the laws and the business.