Case study

PREPARATION ANYONE?
SOCIAL
Ann decided to give her husband a thirtieth birthday party on a Saturday in the fall. The party was not to be a surprise, and the couple’s family and friends would all be there. The party was to begin at 3:00 P.M. and would run until everyone felt like going home. Ann wanted everything to be perfect but did not want to be running around refilling cups and cleaning plates all night, so she hired outside staff to coordinate the party. The two staff, Anthony and Sarah, were hired through referrals from another party they had recently coordinated. Ann was impressed with their professionalism and hired them for her party. Anthony and Sarah do not own any catering equipment, nor do they cook any of the food at the parties they coordinate. The two are only hired as staff. This meant that Ann had to use an outside caterer for the food. Because this was a picnic, a local pork barbecue restaurant was hired for food delivery.
The staff arrived three hours prior to the party. They had been informed previously that they would be responsible for decorating the tables, presenting the food, displaying the birthday gifts, presenting the birthday cake, and keeping the beverages flowing. That Saturday afternoon was warmer than a usual fall day, and the two staff arrived to find that they would now be responsible for setting up a 40-foot tent the hosts had rented. Also, 10 tables and 50 chairs had to be set up, and guests were to arrive in three hours. Remembering that there were many other duties to be done before guests arrived, Anthony hurried into the kitchen, leaving Sarah to struggle with the tent. The hostess had not bothered to measure the lawn before ordering the tent, and after the entire tent was laid out, it was discovered that the lawn was too small. After two hours of struggling, the tent was set up half on the lawn and half
down the hill beside the house. This only left one hour for table setup, decorating, and food. The food had arrived from the restaurant during the tent fiasco and sat in the kitchen for another hour and a half getting cold. As the last tablecloth was placed on and the beer keg was tapped, the first guests arrived. Anthony had just begun to warm up the food. Ann told him to use anything he could find. He grabbed a platter from the cabinet, filled it with pork barbecue, and threw it in the oven to warm. A few minutes later, as Sarah and Anthony stood preparing other food, a loud pop was heard coming from the oven. They threw the oven door open and saw the platter split in three pieces and the pork spilling all over the oven. Quickly, the two worked to carefully remove the platter and pork. They then had to go to Ann and tell her what had happened. She did not seem to mind. Fortunately, the rest of the evening flowed smoothly, although there were many children under the age of 5 and they were left to fend for themselves behind the house as the parents partied. Something that had struck Sarah was that one of the guests had a disabled child. It did not seem to her that the hosts made any efforts to make the child comfortable. There was a step to get into the front entrance to their home and the back was gated off for a dog. There was no possible way to get a wheelchair in the house. Eventually, the child was brought inside, but the father and caretaker had to lift the chair up and over the steps. The lawn was also uneven and the child’s caretaker had trouble maneuvering the wheelchair around.
As mentioned before, the event did not have an official ending time. As Anthony and Sarah wrapped up the last food in the kitchen, they began wondering when they could leave. F finally, after about 20 minutes, they went to the hostess and asked to be dismissed. Ann paid, provided a tip, and wished them well.