I hate that law. It is so true it is sickening. I have had a couple of weeks of bad days at work. So of course, when we wanted to make a good impression on the early childhood programs in our 10-county area, I should have realized that Murphy would be right there with bells on.
This group used to come together regularly in "cluster" meetings, where we broke up into interest areas (we call them "content" areas) and share information with each other. It's a great idea and we've missed them for the last four years or so because there had been changes at the tops of several of the programs.
This year, our director decided to try to resurrect them, and convened nearly 60 people from the surrounding counties at a hotel on the lake. I had nothing to do with these arrangements; I only had to facilitate the group of Staff Development people. The director's young administrative assistant made all the arrangements.
This is third time she has done something like this, and each time there have been major goofs. She is still learning how to put together large meetings. They aren't easy to do, I know. I have tried to gently help her with checklists, etc., but she is very defensive and gets huffy quickly. The director doesn't see this, however, so I can't really provide any guidance.
Well, I arrived with another manager about 10 minutes before the people would be arriving, and no sweet young admin. assistant in sight. Also, no continental breakfast in sight for the people who would be driving 2 1/2 hours to get there. No coffee. No registration table. No sign of SYAA. Some of the people coming are old friends of mine in the business, and I didn't want our program people to look like hicks, so I hurried around and scurried up a registration table, tried to find out where the continental breakfast was hiding, and generally get some semblance of order into the chaos.
People started coming as the banquet manager was putting the skirt on the registration table. Still no sign of SYAA or the breakfast. The director arrived. She went out to the kitchen and read the riot act. Still no SYAA. We got people signed in on some lined paper we had (SYAA had the official sign-in sheets, the markers, the pens, the name tags, the list of who had paid for the lunches, etc.).
Another manager, who had also come early to help SYAA, took over the registration table, while I greeted people and assured them that coffee and breakfast would be out in a minute. Finally SYAA arrived, breathless. She had elected to come with a couple other managers instead of driving herself in and they were late. Poor excuse, SYAA, when you are in charge.
We got the meeting going somewhat on time. Lunch came and there had been no plan put into place to indicate who had ordered what (all preordered from a menu of 4 choices). Of course, people didn't remember. So, serving lunch became an ordeal for the kitchen (the same kitchen who was 20 minutes late setting up the breakfast). The two waiters tried their best, but service was very slow.
We were to convene again at 1:15. At 1:10, they hadn't cleared the tables for dessert. The managers from our program pitched in to clear tables. The banquet manager came out to have a hurried conference with the director. They hadn't planned any dessert (!), even though it had been ordered. They promised to bring cookies and coffee out for our break time.
Break time came, we were to reconvene in the big ballroom. It had not been set up from our small group times. So we had to go back to the lunch area, which STILL hadn't been cleared from our lunch. So we met amidst our dirty coffee cups, bread plates, water glasses.
Granted the hotel made several serious mistakes. But I feel that Murphy and SYAA were mostly at fault. SYAA has to learn 1. to be there early, 2. to have her checklist in hand, 3. to check a couple days before that everything is in order for the event, and 4. to check that all arrangements are in place the morning of the event.
My old friends DID come, and it was great to see them. I enjoyed greeting people, but really, it should have been the director who was at the door making our guests feel welcome, instead of her having to run around to get the breakfast and other elements in place.
And where was that checklist we put together so that we would avoid these problems, anyway? Oh well, even SYAAs eventually grow up. And learn. I hope.
By-the-way, coffee and cookies did appear at our afternoon break. So there, Murphy!
7:51 PM
Another Friday! Thank God! It is! This has been the week from hell, and ended with a huge meeting our program hosted and at which the hotel messed up big time. AHHGGG!
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