Date: September 19, 2006
Location: Education Building Lobby at University of Central Florida
Frame: Individual observation exercise

The male attendant serves customers. The amount of customers fluctuates throughout the day. More than half of the Einstein Bagels customers are female. The bagel stand attendants are familiar with the products and the work environment.

Low level of inference
The female bagel counter attendant appears to be involved with the operations management of the food preparation. She was involved in microwaving food, refilling condiments, restocking drinks in the refrigerator, adding more food to the food preparation area, and taking trash out. The male bagel attendant was concerned more with customer interaction, including taking orders, food preparation, and financial exchanges. Neither attendant seemed to be particularly subordinate to the other.

High level inference
The male attendant appeared to know the menu very well as he would ask customers for additional information about customers' orders without referencing a menu. The female attendant was not interested in customer interaction and was happy and efficient at her support role. She did at times stop to talk to individual customers who seemed like they had a past together; whether it was a past that was class or work related was not clear. The bagel attendant team worked efficiently together; each appeared to do things for the other during each food preparation step without asking the other to do so. The rights for the male attendant to work with money in the cash register and to give away a cup of ice for no charge suggests he has some sort of extra managerial role for the bagel stand. The noise, volume of the apparent coach, and traffic of UCF students in and out of the gym, and the short duration of each repetition from the coach, suggested the participants in the gym were not prepared for what ever they were practicing for. Customer 10, the guy in a yellow shirt, was likely dating the girl he was sitting at the table with judging from their body language and his apparent willingness to get anything she wanted from the bagel stand.