Monday April 17 2019

The restaurant patio was finished and Lorne had worked his magic. One side was the pub door and motel wall and the other was a 6 foot high fence with lateral boards that formed a back wall and blocked off the view of the pool. It allowed dappled sunlight through and had a living herb garden that Mark loved. Most importantly it maintained the privacy of the motel guests

The other end was open to the parking lot and plants in permanent planters provided some screen, air filtering and car barriers. The architect’s drawing had a canopy built between the two buildings but that was scrapped when they decided cars couldn’t stop there. There was no ambiguity around where the door to the motel, the bar or the art gallery was accessed. They had 35 more seats, 4 booths against a low planter wall, at the edge of the patio facing the reception area and 4 more tables. Now it made sense to open the bar for lunch. It really looked like a nice place for motel guests or visitors to the art gallery to gather.

Bobbie called her first official motel ‘All Staff’ meeting. It was held in the new boardroom and the first order of business was to unwrap all the boardroom furniture and get arranged. Under Lorne’s direction, it only took about 10 minutes. Rocco even had the garbage and recycling sorted.

Bobbie began. “Thank you everyone, I am proud that we have made it this far. We are just days away from finishing the restaurant and the motel rooms are completed and ready for occupancy. The reception area is finished too and I asked Quin to have an estimate of the number of staff she’d need to be operational. Quinn’s position, is full time now as a graphic designer, motel receptionist and office manager. I also asked both Mark and Effie to think about their staffing needs. They will now have more responsibility. Trixie I will provide mentorship to help them be supervisors.”

They went around the table and started with Quinn.

“I’m glad that Bobbie brought me into this project, I have seen everything grow from just an idea to an art gallery, two restaurants, a motel and a business office. We are a potentially a boutique convention centre. I’ve been working hard to give this all a digital presence and Bobbie and Trixie have helped me understand business and organizational software and how it intersects with my web design.” She turned on the smart screen and started her presentation. She went to the Art gallery website and demonstrated how the collections would be catalogued and previewed. Then she went to the motel website and demonstrated the reservation software. The SPOKES website was live with wine and martini menus and pictures. They no longer advertised evening happy hours because they were soon phasing them out. There were few “awws” in the crowd.

“I am able to manage the reception desk for 4 hours a day and still work on my websites. But we need weekend staff and mornings from about 7, depending on guests needs and we need late night staff too; I don’t know how many.”

Bobbie thought a minute. “Thanks so much Quinn. We will never have enough reservations to keep a crew of 3 round the clock reception desk workers busy, we only have 14 rooms. I think we should engage an answering service that monitors calls for us and we can check the activity any time or go live and answer our own phones when we want. I suspect more reservations will come digitally anyway.” Quinn was nodding. “Maybe in the future you need one assistant but for the time being, we need to fill your position for your upcoming maternity leave. It would be good to hire someone and begin training them.”

Staff around the table agreed that this was the best way to handle things and

Bobbie asked Quinn to find someone and She and Trixie would interview them.

“Do we have any more cousins?” Shouted Lorne. Everybody laughed.

Bobbie made a crack about the peanut gallery and asked Effie to go next. Effie looked uncertain so Quinn helped her set things up, then she began. “We don’t have a ‘workers coffee service’ any more and I have been mostly keeping busy cleaning things outside, cleaning up after the workers, cleaning SPOKES and helping out where I can. It will be a big change to be in charge of keeping rooms clean for guests and handling all the laundry and all the other cleaning stuff too.”

“Bobbie nodded, we are going to have to hire at least one more cleaner. I want to have all the offices cleaned too so there will be janitorial work too. You’ll probably clean the guest rooms and manage the other workers for now, find someone you trust and we’ll interview them Effie.” And she sat down.

Next Mark stood up. “I have been working at SPOKES during happy hour and doing some bar tending. If we expand the menu, then open the restaurant too, I’ll probably need at least one sous chef and two or three more people that can be either bar tended or be servers. The guy helping me with bar tending now is starting exams and wants to leave.”

Bobbie got up and said. “Thanks Mark it’s too bad you’re losing Todd, 4 more people sounds like a lot of staff but it just highlights how much you each have been doing. A full restaurant and pub needs a much larger staff. So we’ll start small for the restaurant and scale back the bar. I have imagined the restaurant having an afternoon tea service, Monday to Thursday for the short term along with a continental breakfast that is served in the bar. As well as a lunch service in the restaurant on weekdays. Spokes(bar service) will be opened Thursday, Friday and Saturday evenings until 11, with pizzas (that you pay for).”

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday	Hours
Continental Breakfast	Continental Breakfast	Continental Breakfast	Continental Breakfast	Continental Breakfast	Continental Breakfast	Continental Breakfast	6-9AM
lunch	lunch	lunch	lunch	lunch	lunch	lunch	11-2
High tea	High tea	High tea	High tea				2-4
				Pub pizza dinner	Pub pizza dinner	Pub pizza dinner	11-11

Bobbie shared printouts of the table around the table. “I foresee us operating for 2 months with this schedule.”

Mark studied the plan. “I could handle the cooking as long as they get a baker from the community college to help with baked goods for high tea.”

Bobbie assured him she and Joan had already talked about this and what they really needed were 2 full time servers experienced enough to do a little in the kitchen and behind the bar.

“I am not alone, Effie helps me a lot, but I’m losing her. We should serve the continental breakfast in the restaurant so we can keep the bar closed until 11. I’ll be doing all the cooking, now. I can get the breakfast going and still prep for lunches, I need a sous chef and a dishwasher”

“Maybe a sous chef that does dishes and 2 servers.”

They all agreed that sounded good.

Lacey stood. “I have always dreamed of running an art gallery and the light and space is more than I could hope for. Thank-you everyone for helping me so much.”

Trixie assured her that they would help any way she needed and were supplying her with her IT needs like a website and database for collections. Lacey (Uncle Greg) could hire and pay staff as she wanted.

Lacey nodded. “I will run things myself for a while. I will open 11 – 6 and hope to attract people that lunch or have afternoon tea.

“Exactly said Bobbie, I hope our business travellers like Mark’s quality continental breakfast and I hope Gallery clients and people that rent the boardroom have lunch or tea depending on how they roll.”

Trixie was taking notes “So we need another ‘Quinn’ in reception who knows computers and customer service and maybe art, we need 1 or 2 in housekeeping that are cleaners and handymen who do laundry, we need 2 servers in the kitchen, who are servers and bartenders and a dish-doing-sous-chef that likes to garden. That’s a tall order.”

Bobbie thanked everyone for the meeting “It is great to see you all and we’ll try to meet soon to see where we are. Please come to me with any concerns or ideas or suggestions anytime. And make sure to make note if you feel overworked so we can see what’s working and what isn’t.”

She saw Lorne and Mark and Rocco had their heads together. Mark called her over. “I really want a charcoal grill for the patio and Rocco can make a worktop and shelter for one, on one side.”

Rocco nodded. “Lorne has a fancy barbecue that apparently you bought on one of your shopping trips and He is helping me with the design.”

Lorne spoke up, Rocco and I are heading to Cid. City on the weekend and I heard of a couple of waiter friends that have been talking about moving here. If they do, I want us all to meet.”

He sounded a little cryptic so Bobbie just agreed.

Bobbie was still trying to make her way to the door when Effie snagged her.

“I have an idea about the housekeeping staff. I have a cousin, like Lorne joked, who is mentally and a bit physically challenged.” Bobbie nodded and Effie went on. “He always worked with his Dad, at his landscaping business but his Dad passed away. He’s a hard worker but now he’s home with my aunt all the time and she would love for him to find the right job.”

Bobbie smiled. “Send me a text about him and let me know if you need help finding your other staff member.”

“What about Drey?” Asked Effie.

“You still live with him, right. Will he be OK with having you as a boss?”

“We do live together and we’re just friends. Ha, I already boss him around a bit. He’s just not into romantic relationships and that suits me fine. He’s pretty happy at the big box store but they have reduced his hours and it’s all the way on the other side of town. His car’s not so great and he’d rather work here. He likes you and Trixie and Mark too.”

Bobbie nodded. “I like him too and I know Drey is a hard worker, do you think he’s be OK cleaning offices and doing handyman stuff?”

“He’s worked as a building superintendent before and also worked for an office cleaning service. I should let him tell you all this himself, Bobbie.” She said thanks and moved away.

Trixie was waiting. “Bobbie I’ve been thinking, we can rent out this boardroom now. Small companies that are not large enough to have their own boardrooms could pay to use it. The restaurant could supply coffee and muffins or something in the morning and they can have lunch at SPOKES.”

“Wouldn’t Greg get rent money from the boardroom?”

“Yes but you would sell the refreshment package. That will be your profit. Maybe you can help Quinn get a boardroom reservation system running for the web.”

“That’s a good idea.” Bobbie spent a quiet evening making notes and writing code for a custom boardroom renting page for the website.