Food Service Company Case Study: Douglas Fine Foods

Douglas Fine Foods
Douglas Dairy which later grew into a successful food services company Douglas Fine Foods (DFF) was founded in 1929 by Matthew Douglas’s father and grandfather. By 2008, DFF had grown to be the largest privately held Canadian food services company. The business serviced clients in many industries, schools, sports arenas, concessions, warehouses, government offices and corporations. Matthew Douglas (Douglas) had two older brothers Jason and Mark. Douglas was an independent, hard worker and a successful entrepreneur. Douglas played only a limited role in DFF prior to 2007 and in 2007 bought one-third stake of DFF. After middle brother Mark’s sudden death Douglas became the interim chief executive officer (CEO) of DFF so that

The food services industry in Canada is very established however economic slowdown and increasing competition are effecting food service related vendors drastically.
DFF’s competition involves international, regional and local players. Because of economic downturn international players such as Sodexo, Compass Group and Aramark could become a threat to DFF.
Another reason for worry was, Canada Auto Corporation, DFF’s largest client, which had a different business model than other clients. Canada Auto Corporation is not well-matched for DFF’s essential competencies and has been causing a loss of concentration.
In order to become a professionally accomplished multimillion-dollar company DFF had some internal issues too. First, Douglas has a background more on the entrepreneurial side and himself has no experience being CEO of an organization. Managing DFF was very challenging for him. Values, clothing, employees’ flexibility and adaptation was not in a sink of a multi-million dollar organization. Employees were very impervious to adjustments or changes. Half of the executive team members were not delighted to accept Douglas as CEO and his new direction. Douglas had no choice of dismissal these executive team members as they were aware of many confidential and crucial information of

Douglas should gauge the business and select what his visualization is for moving onward. To improve company’s face, reputation and employee’s mentality he needs to bring an evolution in DFF by being a transformational leader. Transformational leaders are commonly spirited, keen, and passionate. Transformational leadership is a style of leadership that can motivate optimistic variations in those who trail. Through the strong point of their visualization and behavior, transformational leaders are able to motivate cohorts to change outlooks, insights, and enthusiasts to work towards mutual aims. By following transformational leadership the most momentous conclusion for DFF would be that it would develop as a robust, more monetarily comprehensive