Parable of Two Managers

[Chiral]

…when you eat a fry on the line, you put one end in your mouth and nothing else gets touched and there are no crumbs.

I thought the night manager was wiser, because he understood the purpose of the rule and he knew no real harm was done, and he knew the cook knew. So there’s no reason to discipline the cook. The rules are meant to serve us, and he judged the cook in light of the real issue, sanitation.

The day manager did no harm either, but he childishly thought some kind of “justice” would be served if he punished himself for nothing. He thought the rules were at least as important *in themselves *as what they were made for.

Also, the rules could have been otherwise, and it is possible to make rules that allow you to eat on the line without contaminating the food, but that would be a complicated rule like “you can eat on the line if you don’t touch your mouth, and if you do, you must sanitize your hands before touching the food again, and you need to keep your fork off the prep surfaces, or else sanitize the place where it touched them, and … and … and”, but that’s insane.

“No eating on the line” is just a way of saying, “Be sanitary”.

Wow, I guess fewer people than I thought have worked in food service or studied microbiology. I have done both (and am now a biomedical researcher). Every time you open your mouth, you both inhale and exhale potential contaminants, as well as shed material from your face. This number increases exponentially when masticating. The studies performed discerned a real and significant threat to consumer health which led to the health-code requirement ‘No eating on the line’. It was also determined that, so long as the preparers were in relatively good health and refrained from eating on the line, wearing a mask was unnecessary to prevent contamination - the first rule is sufficient.

You are correct, “No eating on the line” is just a way of saying, “Be sanitary”, BUT
one CANNOT ‘Be sanitary’ and also eat on the line. Period. No further editions to the rule need be made, and therefore none have been.

The night manager clearly did NOT understand the purpose of the rule, and he cannot know that ‘no real harm was done’ until at least a few days afterward, if no customers get sick from consumption of food prepared on the line prior to its sanitation.
The day cook, whatever his issue, at least realized that the rule IS as important as what it was made for, i.e. protection of consumer health.

Wow. I thought this was common knowledge for people? Just because you do it at home does not make it ‘sanitary’. And when other people besides yourself are at risk, you do not have the right to decide what constitutes ‘sanitary’ and what does not.

Again, there is NO DIVISION between the ‘spirit’ and ‘letter’ of the health code.

 

[Apollos]

I would say: let’s get away from the particulars of the story and get more generic. The story addresses a kind of “employee theft” and there is lot of employee theft going on. The managers are supposed to prevent such theft, by sticking to some procedure. In the example the story is about petty theft, the taking of something which has no value. In any reasonable company such losses are never taken seriously, they belong to the acceptable loss (like a fry falling on the floor).

In this light the day manager is an idiot. He knows about the rules, ways and means to prevent theft, and yet he engages in it. When he committed the act, he was aware that he should not do it, and he was aware that if he caught someone else, he should report it. Only a total idiot would do it under such circumstances. (Caeteris paribus, of course).

The night manager is more reasonable. He decides that the loss to company is less than negligible, and the price of prosecution is a much bigger loss than the material loss in question. He should warn the employee about it, and that is all. Or implement a better policy.

Fascinating … I never thought about it as a theft issue. But in the bigger picture, many restaurants either allow employees free or discounted meals - it varies from place to place. On a technical note, nothing prevents the day manager from counting it as part of his free meal or whatever. The day manager was thinking of it as a violation of the no-eating rule, not as theft.

Let me ask you a straight question and trick question.

• In a country in which human rights violations are a de facto part of life, and the correction of which would bring great harm and expense to the society as a whole, should you correct the violations or tolerate them? (Yes, I’m thinking about US slavery and the civil war.)
• If you are a wheat farmer and you use an ox to to get the kernels off the stalk by making the ox walk around on it, would you put a cap over the ox’s face so that the ox can’t take a nibble?

 

[Apollos]

Incorrect. The price of an FDA or OSHA investigation and penalty is MUCH higher than the cost of a french fry. As others have noted, the problem isn’t a negligable loss of materials, but rather 1) the unsafe practice of consuming food on the line and 2) the unsanitary process thereby serving legally contaminated food to customers.

At any rate, the managers are set to follow corporate policy. That’s what they’re hired to do. They don’t have the moral right to change that corporate policy unless they’re specifically instructed that they are given that authority.

In that light, the first manager messed up, and then he did his job and wrote himself up as he was hired to do. He took the moral high ground despite the personal hardship.

The second manager doesn’t care for corporate policy, and doesn’t enforce the rules as he is paid to do. He’s immoral in that if he did wrong, he would fail to report it, and that he is cheating his employer by failing to do his job. He’s jeopardizing his company’s time and money with his actions in order to give leniancy that ISN’T HIS TO GIVE. It’s morally wrong, he’s a terrible employee, and he should be fired.

Naturally, managers follow corporate policy and do not have the authority to change it, but wouldn’t it be more accurate to say that they enforce it on a case-by-case basis, that they are empowered to interpret and apply it for individual situations, and that the manager decides whether something is in fact a violation or not?

Also, what’s the difference between contaminated and “legally contaminated”?

 

[Chiral]

Neither. There is clearly a problem with employees being able to follow the rule, as not just one employee, but also a manager violated the rule. This suggests a discrepancy between the rules and the real on-the-job world which needs to be addressed.

Perhaps the rule is unneeded and needs to be removed. Perhaps there is a valid reason for the rule, and more employee education needs to take place. Perhaps a “free food” station for employees needs to be set up outside the kitchen. However, the repeated violation of the rule is indicative of a systemic problem that will not be solved by merely continuing to write up employees that break the rule.

There is a real and valid reason for the rule: the health-code, established after food contaminant studies demonstrated a significant threat of contamination and food-borne illness due to food-preparers eating on the line. Removing the rule would increase the danger to the consumers.

The ‘discrepancy’ lay with how seriously employees take their job, science, and the health of others, how heavily they weigh these issues against their own negligent selfish desire for a snack at any given moment in time. If they cannot learn to control such negligence, they should be fired, which is indeed what happens after an employee has been ‘written-up’ for repeated violations, thus stemming the problem in each particular case. There are plenty of other people waiting to fill in who might be more capable. The system continues to function.

Most restaurants DO provide a single free or discounted meal to their employees (often one is allowed to eat a meal that another customer rejected). During a meal break, the employee eats ELSEWHERE, i.e. NOT on the line, maybe taking a booth or table in the serving area as is appropriate.

 

[Chiral]

Naturally, managers follow corporate policy and do not have the authority to change it, but wouldn’t it be more accurate to say that they enforce it on a case-by-case basis, that they are empowered to interpret and apply it for individual situations, and that the manager decides whether something is in fact a violation or not?

Also, what’s the difference between contaminated and “legally contaminated”?

There is NO ‘case-by-case basis’.
And the difference between ‘contaminated and “legally contaminated”’ is one of litigation, i.e. “legally contaminated” food is ‘contaminated’ food being used as evidence in a legal suit against the food-preparer.

 

[Apollos]

Besides, the hot oil or fat sanitizes whatever falls into it… so “contamination” should not be an issue.

Yeah but youtube.com/watch?v=raBbMxxISXw

I think you are more concerned about following a rigid rule-set than the spirit of the rule.

That’s part of what I wanted them to wrestle with.

 

[Apollos]

If the manager in question were the owner and wanted to excuse the theft of a pencil, I’d probably say he’s the better owner. If the manager in question didn’t have a clear policy directing him to write up employees who steal pencils in effect, then the discretion falls to the manager, and such a manager is probably better.

Would you say that a manager who thinks like an owner is a better manager?

 

[Apollos]

Apollos, I would have to say, given R Daneel’s confusion as to the subject-matter of the story (thinking the issue is about french-fry theft vs health-code violations, noting that the story does not specify that the french-fry was eaten over boiling oil and quite possibly was eaten over the sandwich-making station where contamination is a ‘real risk’) that your parable requires significant revising.

For one thing, the ‘rule’ the story focuses on is more akin to Jewish prohibition against ‘unclean’ food, e.g. pork. This was a rule meant to serve the people, but a normal starving Jew would probably still eat pork rather than die and not expect divine retribution for the act. I very much doubt that the manager or cook were ‘starving’ when they ate the fries. Theirs is a selfish negligence or lack of self-control with regard to health-codes set in place to protect all. Kant’s categorical imperative is sufficient argument against them. The rule is not meant to protect the cook, but to protect individuals external to himself. The cook will not likely get sick from his own germs/viruses/contamination, but someone else might. Only the person who afterward gets sick has the authority to forgive him the offense - he cannot justly forgive himself nor allow some other unaffected person to forgive him.

Please note, the health-code rule was put in place because the reality is that people really do get sick as a result of contamination from negligent food-handlers, and that eating on a prep-line really is a significant source of contamination. The reality is that the ‘letter’ and ‘spirit’ of the law are invariant in this case.

The Sabbath prohibition against labor is not comparable. This law does not protect the recipients of the labor (unlike how the health-code protects the recipients of the food being prepared). Instead, the law protects the laborers themselves. It prevents abuse by employers who might otherwise refuse the laborer a weekly holiday, it maintains the health of the laborer by offering a day which he/she can use for rest and relaxation, a chance to take stock of the creation which surrounds him, of his family and personal health, etc. The benefits to the laborer are myriad. And it furthermore establishes a pattern of piety, the morals of which will suffuse the rest of the individual’s life, his connections to others, etc. Lastly, it is a duty owed to God as Creator. By violating the prohibition, the laborer offends primarily himself and God. Offending God hurts that relationship, which in turn again hurts himself, so he mainly is hurting himself.
But not all labor on the Sabbath offends God, only that which insults piety or the dignity of the laborer. THAT is the ‘spirit’ of this law. Can you think of a similar example in our daily lives from which to formulate your alternate parable?

Let’s say he ate it at the packing station, where there is no oil. At the fry station it would be too hot to eat, usually. I guess you’d know if you actually did the job.

If I were the fry-muncher and you were the manager and you went off on me like above, I would reply, “Chiral, it’s a FRENCH FRY!”

As for the Sabbath, I think it’s similar enough, because what both have in common is legalism.

But I want to raise a deeper question. Is it proper to even discuss the alleged “spirit” of any law? If so, then what is the point of making a law at all, since the reason why we distinguish the “spirit” from the “letter” in the first place is because following the “spirit” violates the “letter”?

 

[Apollos]

I hardly think eating one french fry qualifies as “eating”.

LOL thanks, I didn’t think of that approach either

 

[promethius]

First, when you eat a fry on the line, you put one end in your mouth and nothing else gets touched and there are no crumbs.

Irrelevant. The health code says absolutely no eating on the line no matter what manner you use to consume. Thus the corporate policy reflects the justly passed law of the government and the manager is bound morally to enforce it.

I thought the night manager was wiser, because he understood the purpose of the rule and he knew no real harm was done, and he knew the cook knew. So there’s no reason to discipline the cook. The rules are meant to serve us, and he judged the cook in light of the real issue, sanitation.

No, in this case the rules are made to serve the consumer. The manager failed utterly in that duty. The rules are likewise made to protect the vendor from litigation, again, the manager utterly failed in that regard. The manager is paid to enforce corporate standards. Again, the manager utterly failed in that regard.

The night manager has thus accepted a paycheck for a job he is not doing. He is failing to follow the law as he is morally obligated to, and he is stealing money from his employer by pretending to do a job whilst shirking his duties. He’s a sloth who doesn’t want to do the paperwork or provide discipline to enforce policy and so he should be fired.

The day manager did no harm either, but he childishly thought some kind of “justice” would be served if he punished himself for nothing.

The rules regarding food sanitation are not for nothing. They are for the protection of the lives and wellbeing of consumers. Two things:

1. remind me never to eat at a restaurant where you cook
2. watch an episode or Ramsey’s kitchen nightmares to see how critically important sanitation is to a world renouned chef.

He thought the rules were at least as important *in themselves *as what they were made for.

No, he realized the gravity of the situation in that he had broken a law as well as a corporate policy and thereby had endangered consumers from contaminating food and endangered his company by opening it to litigation and government penalties. He realized that the rules are important because they are his job and he is paid to enforce those rules. Instead of being a theif and stealing his paycheck while failing to do his job, he stuck by the rules and punished himself. That is valient.

Also, the rules could have been otherwise, and it is possible to make rules that allow you to eat on the line without contaminating the food, but that would be a complicated rule like “you can eat on the line if you don’t touch your mouth, and if you do, you must sanitize your hands before touching the food again, and you need to keep your fork off the prep surfaces, or else sanitize the place where it touched them, and … and … and”, but that’s insane.

Such a rule would not be in keeping with federal laws and therefore you will never see a restaurant with a corporate policy that allows consumption of food on the line. An owner could make such a rule, but not a manager without permission of the owner. Likewise, when the government found out about such a policy, the restaurant would be heavily fined or shut down.

“No eating on the line” is just a way of saying, “Be sanitary”.

No. It is a way of saying that it is impossible to eat on the line without legally contaminating the food. No eating on the line means per corporate policy and federal law you will not eat on the line.

 

[promethius]

If there was a nuclear war and only you and one other person survived, and you were a policeman, and you caught the other guy jaywalking, would you ticket him?

No. The laws are contingent upon the state. No government, no state. No state, no laws. No laws, no ticketing.

To wit: if there was a nuclear war and only you and one other person survived, you would no longer be a policeman as the legal authority which made you such would have been destroyed in the blast.

Would you say that a manager who thinks like an owner is a better manager?

Absolutely not. The owner is the one who invests money into the business and the owner is the one who will ultimately pay the price if the manager causes the business to be fined or shut down. That could potentially drive the owner to living on the streets for the rest of their lives. Thus the owner either creates or works with corporate or top level managers to form policy which protects the interest of the company in conjunction with the law, which is in place to protect the interest of the consumers.

A shift manager who then takes it upon themselves to modify those policies without the express authority to do so is jeopardizing the money of the owner as well as the consumer. As such, it is not his place to go behind his corporate policy for his own personal reasons.

Such a shift manager is taking a paycheck for a job he is failing to do. He’s a dishonest, theiving coward who deserves to be fired.

Naturally, managers follow corporate policy and do not have the authority to change it, but wouldn’t it be more accurate to say that they enforce it on a case-by-case basis, that they are empowered to interpret and apply it for individual situations, and that the manager decides whether something is in fact a violation or not?

If that is the case then it will be explicitly stated by the policy or on the terms of hiring from the manager. However, you will never find a restaurant that allows case by case violation of the federal laws regarding food sanitation. Managers are empowered to enforce policy on a case by case basis when the policy so allows, but never when the policy does not authorize it.

For example, in my job, I am free to not enforce most policies. However, if someone comes to work high on an unauthorized narcotic, I have no option but to remove them from their position and report them to authorities for prosecution. I don’t have a right not to do that: I accept a paycheck based on the expectation that that policy WILL be enforced each and every time.

Also, what’s the difference between contaminated and “legally contaminated”?

legally contaminated means that an unsanitary method of production has been used to make food, thus the government considers that food unservable and contaminated regardless of if contaminants actually entered the food. In other words, the action of eating on the line legally contaminated the food station even if no real contamination occured. Food on the station must then be disposed of and the station must be sanitized before production can legally begin again. You do NOT eat on the line, ever.

 

[promethius]

I hardly think eating one french fry qualifies as “eating”.

Fortunately for consumers, what you think is sanitary or not is irrelevant. The government defines any consumption of food on a food line as an illegal and unsanitary act.

 

[Just_Lurking]

If enough people break a law, should that law be repealed?

Not necessarily. If enough people break a law, then something needs to change to increase the adherence to the law. Maybe the penalty should be increased, e.g., immediate termination on first violation. Maybe the restaurant needs to hire a line supervisor to continuously monitor the employees who are working on the line. But I know that the correct response is not to maintain the status quo and just keep on accepting that the law is being violated willy-nilly.

In this example, a bad thing happened on the day shift that endangered the health of the restaurant’s customers. Also, a bad thing happened on the night shift that endangered the health of the restaurant’s customers. Neither manager is getting a passing grade in my book.

 

[Chiral]

…If I were the fry-muncher and you were the manager and you went off on me like above, I would reply, “Chiral, it’s a FRENCH FRY!”

If you were located in a place where food-contamination was not a potential threat, I wouldn’t care, but there also wouldn’t be a health-code in place forbidding the act.
However, if you were in a location where food-contamination was an actual, potential threat, such as on the line (where a cook works), then regardless of your reply the action was unsanitary and in violation of health code. Your response or how seriously you regard the threat isn’t important… unless you’re being paid to take such threats seriously, in which case you are in violation of contract and are committing a crime against your employer. Funny how something as little as a ‘french-fry’ can become so serious… NOT funny is how something even tinier, microscopic food-contaminants, can cause something even MORE serious. shrug

As for the Sabbath, I think it’s similar enough, because what both have in common is legalism.

Nope. ‘Legalism’ is the concern of the pharisees. ‘Food-safety’ is the concern of the FDA.

…Is it proper to even discuss the alleged “spirit” of any law? If so, then what is the point of making a law at all, since the reason why we distinguish the “spirit” from the “letter” in the first place is because following the “spirit” violates the “letter”?

You are confused about ‘spirit’ vs ‘letter’ in regards to law. ‘Spirit’ is the reason or rationale behind the law, usually what it intends to protect and what it intends to defend against.
We only distinguish ‘spirit’ from ‘letter’ when a discrepancy in practice is found. Laws are often left general so that a legally-appointed judge may arbitrate over specific cases involving violations of said laws, determining whether they violate the intended purpose of the law in some way, and even recommending sentence based on the severity of that violation. Following the ‘spirit’ NEVER violates the ‘letter’, but it may violate someone’s subjective interpretation of the ‘letter’. But following ONLY the ‘letter’ MAY violate the ‘spirit’ of the law. This is an important distinction.

Regarding the Sabbath, it was the pharisees who were violating the law by violating the ‘spirit’ per their interpretation of the ‘letter’. Jesus and his disciples were obeying BOTH the ‘spirit’ AND the ‘letter’.

 

[Apollos]

There is NO ‘case-by-case basis’.
And the difference between ‘contaminated and “legally contaminated”’ is one of litigation, i.e. “legally contaminated” food is ‘contaminated’ food being used as evidence in a legal suit against the food-preparer.

Prosecution would have to prove actual damages though. If there’s a dead mouse in your coke, it may still be safe to drink.

This sort of issue came up in my neighborhood bar. They used to sell cherries steeped in Everclear. One bartender used to serve them by reaching into the jar with her bare hand. An argument arose between Mrs Authorityoneverything and Mr Taughthighschoolsciencefor30years. The one side argued that the bartender’s practice was unsanitary because for her, “bare hands” equals “unsanitary” and something or other about the health code. The other side argued that pure ethanol is self-sanitizing. Mr Wiseguy suggested a solution: the bartender should sanitize her hands with alcohol before reaching into the jar.

At length the problem solved itself. Repeated exposure to pure ethanol dried out the bartender’s fingers and she started using tongs instead.

 

[promethius]

Prosecution would have to prove actual damages though. If there’s a dead mouse in your coke, it may still be safe to drink.

No. That would be for a lawsuit. If the government is going to assess a fine against a company for violating federal food sanitation laws it does not need to prove damages, only that the violation occured. The law itself provides penalties regardless of damages.

This sort of issue came up in my neighborhood bar. They used to sell cherries steeped in Everclear. One bartender used to serve them by reaching into the jar with her bare hand. An argument arose between Mrs Authorityoneverything and Mr Taughthighschoolsciencefor30years. The one side argued that the bartender’s practice was unsanitary because for her, “bare hands” equals “unsanitary” and something or other about the health code. The other side argued that pure ethanol is self-sanitizing. Mr Wiseguy suggested a solution: the bartender should sanitize her hands with alcohol before reaching into the jar.

At length the problem solved itself. Repeated exposure to pure ethanol dried out the bartender’s fingers and she started using tongs instead.

irrelevant. The government provides that food service staff can cook with bare hands so long as their hands are washed and sanitized before handling food. That argument was over one of practice irrespective of laws which allowed either practice. The situation you referenced was one in which there is no gray area. The law states food will NOT be consumed on a food preparation line.

In other words, that is a false analogy. However, it may work better for your original intent than the “parable” you came up with.