Today I witnessed a prime example of bad management. I stopped by McDonald's today for lunch and there were about 5 people standing around waiting for their order. When pulling up, I had noticed a very long line for the drive-thru but then again it was about 12:30. There is a certain amount of chaos you expect to see during a lunch rush but this was bad.
I stood at the cashier's station for about 3 minutes before the manager noticed me and came over to take my order. She yelled out "where's Stacy" before stepping up to take the order. After giving me my receipt, she walked back toward junction of the drive-thru and kitchen aisle. This manager started yelling at the people in back telling them to step it up. She then started calling off the times on the oldest orders and asking who had them. To press her point about long wait times, she gathered five workers around her and made them look at the screen while she berated them on not working fast enough.
While this was going on, a line was forming at the cash register and a queue of 6 people formed up waiting for their orders to be taken. Someone also came in who had gone through the drive-thru and he stood at the register holding his bag beside of those awaiting to give their orders. The manager walked over when she saw him and he leaned over speaking softly to her. She took the bag and yelled out "Who gave out two sausage and eggs? This man ordered two sausage biscuits and someone messed it up. Who gave this man the wrong order? Who did you people give his order to?"
It got worse fairly quick. She started yelling that they should have her sausage biscuits to her as a priority. Meanwhile, she made sure that she was standing at the "pinch point" between the kitchen, front, and drive-thru where anyone going for food or toward a customer had to edge their way around her. She wasn't a small woman.
During this time I had seen a couple people get their orders through the drive-thru and employees had brought out two orders to those waiting. The Manager apparently wasn't getting the two sausage biscuits quickly enough and started yelling "Seven minutes! Seven minutes now! What are you people doing? Seven minutes we've got them waiting." Two more people had been added to the line waiting to order (nobody was running the cash registers) and one person left the line and headed to the bathroom.
A young woman came out from the back, slit by the manager, and stepped up to take orders. After taking two orders, the manager yelled at her "Candy, get back there and help these guys. They are falling behind." The woman simply took a deep breath and asked the next person how she could help them. A few moments later the manager came up with the bag of two sausage biscuits and handed them to the man who had gotten the wrong order. She leaned over and said something to the woman she had called Candy that I was unable to hear. After this she went back and stood in the same spot and continued to tell her staff to step it up.
I was watching this happening as the employees were having to detour around the manager to fill orders and move from one area to the next. One girl even stumbled sliding by the manager and dropped the order for the drive-thru eliciting the manager to say "That's trash, you people need to get it together!"
After a couple of minutes more, a woman brought my order out and I was able to leave. All told, my wait was about eight minutes, long but not unreasonable. As I left, I felt pity for the employees working under that manager. In the short time that I was in the building, I saw several examples of what not to do as a manager. Instead of jumping in and working, she decided to spend her time obstructing her employees. She loudly and publicly berated them. By standing in the "pinch point", she was actually causing the problems that she was yelling about. What was worse though is I heard several other customers complaining about her actions. She was making a spectacle of herself while customers stood waiting for someone to help them.
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