1

THE PEPPERCORN DINING

Dipalibahen Patel

CALIFORNIA INTERCONTINENTAL UNIVERSITY

MGT 517 and Organizational Development

Professor Aamar Moorjani

20 February 2022
 2

Peppercorn Dining Case

Today's organizations are becoming dynamic and continuously evolving to conform to high de-

mand and supply about processes, methods, tools, and technologies. Therefore, these changes

must conform to the business environment, desires, and tendencies of customers. These changes

are essential to the achievement and development of any organization. This medium is because

an organization with no organizational development is cursed to deteriorate. In this scenario,

Peppercorn Dining is good eatery at All-American university campus. The compeer's named

Roger, Lynn, and Erica from Square One Consulting were having lunch there in the afternoon.

Dining identifies Erica, who had worked there before. Then, the consultants have a brief conver-

sation with Drew regarding the challenges that Peppercorn Dining is facing now. Looking for-

ward, Drew highlighted mainly the staffing issue. Their major issues were:

 the shortage of staff,

 finding qualified people for the job and retaining them with no raise in pay,

 lacking moral and operational aptitude, which forced many students to quit.

Though Drew knew it, he could not determine the fundamental cause of the problem affecting

Peppercorn's workforce. Thus, Drew came across professional advice from the consultants,

raised his concerns about the performance of the diner, and transparently expressed that his main

aim was to "increase productivity and improve employee's morale."

As Erica was a former employee at Peppercorn Dining, she had distinctive relationships with

most current employees. This medium has enabled the consultants to negotiate a contract with

Peppercorn easily and quickly. Apart from that, the process of identifying the organization's cul-

ture, sources of power, and informal practices were also easy and smooth. Erica was also sea-

soned with the language of the organization and was, therefore, able to find out the leading cause
 3

of most of the problems faced by Peppercorn. Finally, the contract offered to the company

drafted the consultants' fees and the proposed schedule of the times and dates that they planned

to gather information from Peppercorn.

Ethical Issue Identified

Peppercorn dining, analyzing against its working conditions; although there is significant

productivity at the restaurant, team building needs more. More emphasis on worker morale is

required to make Peppercorn a better workplace and attract more student workers. The

consultants from Square were to analyze possible problems residing at the restaurant. Detailed

interviews and observations are supposed to bring about among different workers, including

management, full-time employee, temporary staffs, union and student workers. For three days,

conflicts between all employees, staffings and workers, were lack of communication was

evident. In the end, the organization's overall structure was causing problems with productivity

and morale. Fundamental restraining forces in Peppercorn are:

• Incompatible organizational structure.

• Lacking ability to perform effectively in timely manner.

• No creativity and productivity while performing task.

• Lack of inter-communication between management and line employees.

• Ineffective order and inventory systems are another reason behind the increased inefficiency of

the restaurant.

• Conflicts among them.

• Employee morale and productivity are reduced because of the shortage of required equipment.

• The workers feel unrecognized and disrespected because of the manager's high inaccessibility.
 4

• The technological problem also acts as a significant issue that makes the food order and the

inventory delay, and they had to use the computer system of the university as they do not have a

computer in Peppercorn Dining.

• Management is more concerned about customers and not workers as they do not give feedback

to the workers and are less concerned about their development.

• Innovation is also not entertained as the chef who tries to set a new menu always faces

resistance even though the new menu trials worked out.

• Cost-oriented Management did not consider the best quality product to be used in the

Peppercorn Dining.

Entry and Contracting Process

Their entry and contracting went effortlessly; Drew Randal expressed his concern about

the performance of the dinner and clearly stated his aim, which was to” increase productivity and

improve the morale of the workers (Cumming and Worley, 2019). Because Erica was a formal

employee at Peppercorn dining, she had a personal relationship with most of the current

employees at the dinner, resulting in an excessive deal with ease and speed at which the

consultants managed to negotiate a contract Peppercorn. The development of organization begins

with entry and contracting activities, which helps to find out the parameters of either plan

modification, change or developmental phases like planning, design, execute, assess, and

institutionalizing the organizational swap entry specified for purpose by applicable client. This

initiated Square One’s improvement through this process because the manager, Drew Randal,

realize Erica’s ideas. The manager did not actually intent to reach the services of the consultants;

however, the idea came up while discussing the issues regarding the dining unit during the lunch

at the eatery. This process consisted of common prospects like the hours, flow and resources
 5

required to work together as team with one common aim and developing ground rules. Square

One created a detailed contract that display total time they would take to complete the numerous

activities involved in inspecting the operations of Peppercorn Dining (Cummings and Worley,

2019). This process may help in improving together with the efficiency of the consultant’s

activities. The contract presented to the organization outlined the consultant’s fees and a

proposed schedule of the time and date that they intended to gather the information.

Issue Addressed.

Square One sufficiently addressed the issues Peppercorn had by gathering sufficient information

through observing the staff whiles they worked and interviewing some of the various relevant

parties. They also examined the organization’s mission statements, records, rules, regulations,

and policies to gain information about the dining’s culture and structure. Erica was a student

manager some years ago, so she was well versed with the language of the organization and was

therefore in the position to get to the root of the problem facing the organization. The

observation and interview allowed them to have decent information and determine the various

part at the dining unit’s operations that may not even notice during observation. The consultants

observed the on-the-job behaviors and attitudes of the staff members. The consultants also

defined how the staff members related to each other. All the staff members were stressed out,

i.e., student supervisors, Temp workers, and full-time workers. There was also much

misunderstanding among workers at Peppercorn dining (Cummings and Worley, 2019) which

could impact the business of dining unit’s operation. The consultants were clear about their goal

to enhance employee productivity and morale. The clearness of their goal helped them in

enhancing employee effectiveness. The consultants at Square one was also interested in ensuring

that this ingenuity was a success. After they examined the information they gathered, they
 6

recognized that there were personal conflicts between the three major groups of workers and was

the cause of employee productivity and morale.

Recommendation

Examining the information gathered will be the most suitable method since statistics collected

through observation and interviews are easy to track and recap the information into meaningful

groups. It will help break the information down into a few easily understandable themes.

(Bryman & Bell, 2015).

Feedback:

The consultant should provide feedback to a peppercorn, and this feedback involve are:

 Lack of communication which is a crucial significant issue at Peppercorn Dining.

 Conflicts existing among the three major employee categories, i.e.., Temp workers, full-

time workers, and Student Managers/supervisors. Repair and Maintenance was an issue

they needed to address, like poor dishwashing machines for the restaurant.

 Also, they will have to try and get one more cashier to help so the cashier can keep a

proper account of cash flow.

 They also need to improve their order and inventory system to increase efficiency and

maximize profit. i.e.., staff can be trained on keeping records, so they order things before

they run out.

 Portion control: There should be a piece of the standard equipment used in measuring

food, so the company does not make a loss.

 The managers need to be more accessible, so the workers feel their voices are being heard

and respected.
 7

 Poor Management: They should have a limit on decisions staff can make on their own.

They should follow their own goals.

Conclusion

It can be concluded that the difficulties Peppercorn Dining faced could be solved if they

asked Square One consultant's services and implemented all the recommendations and advice,

they provided to improve its systems, operation, and employee morale. The restaurant may need

to take vital measures to implement its recommendations. However, failure to fully implement

the consultants' put forward will result in the company failing to address the issue at hand, which

is to improve the productivity and morale of employees, and the activity would not have profited

them in any way. The consultant should also play an important role in implementing the change

not only restricted to diagnosis. Thus, the whole session should be conducted so that they are

effective to execute the change in the organization and could have taken place more effectively

to boost the overall fluency and flow of transitions.

 8

References

Unique Writers Bay. (2021, June 26). Peppercorn Dining Case Study Questions and Answers.

Unique Writers Bay. Retrieved February 19, 2022, from

https://uniquewritersbay.com/peppercorn-dining-case-study-questions-answers/

Venus. (2021, March 10). Category: Sample essay: Free sample essay. Online Assignments

Help. Retrieved February 19, 2022, from https://www.onlineassignmentshelp.com/blog/

category/sample-essay/

Garcia, H. (2021, July 5). Peppercorn case study. studylib.net. Retrieved February 19, 2022,

from https://studylib.net/doc/25552909/peppercorn-case-study

Cummings, T. G., & Worley, C. G. (2018). Organization Development and Change (11th Edi-

tion). Cengage Learning US. https://online.vitalsource.com/books/9780357446881

Anderson, D. L. (2018). Cases and exercises in Organization Development & Change. SAGE.

White, L. P., & Wooten, K. C. (1983). Ethical dilemmas in various stages of organizational de-

velopment. Academy of Management Review, 8(4), 690–697. https://doi.org/10.5465/

amr.1983.4284684

Peppercorn dining final case - peppercorn dining A. case brief background peppercorn dining is

a restaurant located on All-American University: Course hero. Peppercorn Dining Final

Case - Peppercorn Dining A. Case Brief Background Peppercorn Dining is a restaurant lo-

cated on All-American University | Course Hero. (n.d.). Retrieved February 19, 2022, from

https://www.coursehero.com/file/12205118/Peppercorn-Dining-Final-Case/