Not Sold Out

CHAPTER

2

Understanding Management’s Context:

Constraints and Challenges

SPOTLIGHT: Manager at Work

Think of a job you’ve had. Now suppose an unimaginable

crisis happened while you were at work. How would you and your fellow

employees respond? Mallika Jagad, the 24-year-old banquet manager

at the Taj Mahal Palace in Mumbai, had that happen one terrifying work

night. November 26, 2008, is a date she will not soon forget.1 Jagad

was managing a dinner event for an important group of clients from

Unilever, which included senior executives, company

directors, and their spouses. About the time the

main course was being served to the guests, the

unthinkable happened. Loud popping noises,

which they first thought were fireworks from

a nearby wedding, were actually the first

gunshots fired by terrorists storming the

hotel. The staff quickly realized that

something was wrong. Jagad had the

doors locked and the lights turned off.

Then she asked everyone to lie down

quietly under the tables and to not

use cell phones. She also asked that

husbands and wives be separated to

reduce the potential risk of losing both

family members. Throughout the night,

the group crouched under the tables,

listening to the violence taking place

in the hotel outside the second-floor

banquet room doors. As the terrified

guests said later, the Taj staff was calm

and continued to care for them by

offering water and asking if there was

Source: India Today Group/Getty Images

Management, Twelfth Edition, by Stephen P. Robbins and Mary Coulter. Published by Prentice Hall. Copyright © 2013 by Pearson Education, Inc.

ISBN 1-323-09230-7

anything else they needed. As morning

Source: Taj Mahal Palace and Tower Hotel/

AFP/Getty Images/Newscom

broke, another crisis erupted as a fire started

in the hallway outside the room. The group

had to climb out the windows with the

staff evacuating the guests first. A fire crew

spotted them and quickly helped...