GMAT Essays (AWA)

Topic -
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The Coffee Cart beverage and food service located in the lobby of our main office building is not earning enough in sales to cover its costs, and so the cart may discontinue operating at GBS. Given the low staff morale, as evidenced by the increase in the number of employees leaving the company, the loss of this service could present a problem,especially since the staff morale questionnaire showed widespread dissatisfaction with the snack machines.Therefore, supervisors should remind the employees in their group to patronize the cart-after all, it was leased for their convenience so that they would not have to walk over to the cafeteria on breaks."



AWA

The author's conclusion that the discontinuation of cart machine service at the GBS will present a problem for the company is highly flawed. The author has based his arguments upon a questionnaire and the answers to it.The author has also assumed wrongly that the morale among the staff members will be further hit if the service of the snack machine is not improved. The author has not bothered about trying to look for other reasons which may cause dissatisfaction among the staff. The author has assumed wrongly that things have not changed since the questionnaire was put up to the staff.

Firstly, the author has not mentioned the timing of the questionnaire .It is possible that the questionnaire was not representative of the people who worked at the firm. The people surveyed may not have been satisfied at the firm and thus did not honestly answer the questions. Also,the author has not mentioned the number of people surveyed .The author must also tell us how much time has passed since the survey was done and whether the answers are still valid to draw the above conclusion or not.

Secondly, the author assumes that due to poor service of the snack cart ,the morale of the employees will be affected.The morale of the people can be affected by the policies of the company as well which may be one of the reasons why the people are leaving the firm. Putting snack cart in the lobby does not mean that people will not walk up to the cafeteria .Cafeterias are the places where people tend to relax and prefer to destress themselves and thus will not bother much about the snack cart. It is possible that people have stopped bothering about the snack carts as most of them get food from home or live nearby enough to get the meals with family. It is also possible that there are a couple of restaurants where people choose to relax.


Thirdly, the author concludes by saying that the staff members must patronize the carts as it is for their convenience.Actually this will be a bigger cause for the company as most staff members look for services and not added responsibilities. Actually,this will be a major reason for low staff morale than anything else as the staff members will conclude that the company does not bother much about them and does not appreciate the efforts they put.It cannot be the responsibility of the staff members alone to look after the carts after a long and fighting day when they would want to relax and look to have a chat with friends.


Thus,the author's opinion from above that employees are dissatisfied with cart service is flawed as it assumes that staff members cannot find other ways to relax . Also,that the staff members will have low morale if service is not improved is wrong as it could be the policies that cause them to leave and it cannot be the responsibility of the staff to look after a service to which they look as a facility.