Supervisory skills

Mini Case 2 • This is the second of two cases, this one is worth 15%

• This case is an individual assignment

• For this case, it is based on theory from chapter 11, but you are welcome to use theories from other chapters as well.

• Be sure to review the “Mini Case Guidelines” framework before getting started. All the guidance is in there.

• Please review the feedback you received in your first case study and address it in this case assignment.

___________________________________________________________________ Note: This case is a fictional story created to illustrate a workplace dilemma. Any similarities to persons or actual events is merely coincidental.

Getting to teamwork Annie sunk down into a booth seat in the corner of her restaurant. She was exhausted. This was her restaurant’s 3rd year in operation and she was just starting to get into a groove. Profits were starting to look promising. But the covid-19 situation had thrown her for a serious loop. It was 12:30am. The restaurant closed for the night at 11:00pm and the last of the kitchen staff just left. She wasn’t sure how to deal with the team dynamics boiling over between the kitchen staff and front of house. The Pivot Annie thought about the recent and sudden conversion of her restaurant from sit-down service to 100% take-out. She was into her second week of this new structure. The kitchen staff were tired, stressed and frazzled. The front of house staff which was comprised of two servers and Annie, were also feeling the stress. The whole system had changed. The dinner rush was much more intense, but short-lived. There was triple the number of customers in a shorter window of time. The servers were busy doing tasks they’d never imagined prior to this: wiping down and disinfecting surfaces, menus and point of sale keypads. They were organizing the line up outside so they were away from the centre of the sidewalk and spaced apart. This was all on-top of the phone ringing off the hook with customer orders. Losing Trust The kitchen staff was not used to the intensity of the dinner rush. Usually customers had a seat, a drink and were comfortable waiting for their food in a relaxing environment. Now, once a customer showed up, every minute they waited outside seemed like forever. The kitchen staff still hadn’t gotten used to the different pace of orders, the increased volume of items per order, and the hasty order-taking being done up front. In the haste, there were sometimes order errors which meant the kitchen staff had to remake orders. They were losing trust in the front of house staff.

Handling the New Type of Dinner Rush The front of house staff was frustrated with the kitchen staff. The orders were scaled up yes, but why couldn’t they just perform as they do during a regular dinner rush? The servers and Annie would often follow up on orders where customers were getting impatient outside. The kitchen staff would snap back stating it was their issue as they should have told the customer a more realistic pick up time. There was five kitchen staff members cooking now, one more than usual. The space might be a little tight, but with lots of hands, why couldn’t they handle the rush? Annie took a deep breath as she turned off the front of house lights and set the alarm to close the restaurant for the night. She didn’t know how to bring the two groups together. It was as though it was the front of house staff versus the kitchen staff. Her “pep talks” at the start of the dinner shift weren’t inspiring or leading to stronger teamwork. She needed to figure out a new approach. Bibliography

“Getting to Teamwork.” Accompanying case study for BUSA 1305: Supervisory Skills. Adrienne Petersohn. 2021.