Abstract
The purpose of this project is to strategize how I approach designing catering events. I document my design for NCDC Summer Dance Camp 2014 while considering how to make all of my catering events more efficient: templates for accounting, ordering, employees, contract, sample menus, recipes, action sheets, material data sheets. Recognizing which information I can copy from event to event and deciding what may become more automated is useful so that I don't reinvent the wheel for each catering or during each catering. I can arrive at events with all the necessary food and equipment and have feedack loops in place for easy marking to make changes since many of my events are annual or semiannual .
First Mind map Brainstorm for Design
My first mindmap attempt at creating a design for Catering NCDC 2014 was mostly me after NCDC 2013 brainstorming all the ways I could imagine it being better/easier next year. Creating this immediately after completing NCDC 2013 yielded the crucial insight that the closer to an event I reflect upon how I would do things differently in the future, the more material I am able to easesfully generate. GaiaU is truly helping me grasp the value of reflection and documentation. Concrete, specific, actionable items are of great value but any reflections are valuable.
Second Mind Map for catering NCDC
In my second xmind map, after recognizing that my first mindmap was a brainstorm of details and mostly actionable items, I tried to identify patterns/themes. There are fewer segments directly off the main trunk, thus demonstrating a pattern level of concerns that lead into specific actionable items.
Third xMind Map for Catering in General
The third mindmap both simplifies and complexifies by making the second minp map more general by attempting to apply to all catering events rather than this specific one of NCDC. In becoming more resilient and applicable to more situations, the content necessarily becomes slightly more complex.
Design of Three Mind Maps
The clutter was streamlined from the first mindmap to the second. Patterns were recognized and the actionable items moved from the first layer to the tendrils. I believe that these three maps represent growth from recognizing the patterns within the details of the first map. Then the third map creates general themes for any catering event from this specific. The practice in both cases was me moving from more specific to more general. In the third mindmap I also recognize the importance of a space for reflection/feedback as well as some general administrative items that were not represented in xmindmap 2.
Goals Articulation
1. Design a good workflow for catering events that I take on
2. Design concrete steps to accomplish NCDC 2014 event as an illustration
3. Design a system to record the things that I do every event that takes time to tell people each time -- Write that down.
4. Create action sheets for each meal at NCDC 2014
5. Create material data sheets for any equipment that which workers or volunteers may not be familiar.
6. Create a useful catering spreadsheet -- Brigid (and tax spreadsheet).
Illustrating my design process through two Designs -- GaSADIE & OBREDIMET
Ga (goals Articulation) Make all of my caterings more efficient by having good templates for accounting, contracts with client, email clarity with workers, action sheets for the meals.
Specifically, create much of this material for the NCDC event next summer.
S (survey) NCDC is the largest catering event that I run. It has more features than most of my other events including Work Exchangers, largest employed crew, largest numbers, remote location. This has become the perfect opportunity to use this as a framework for all catering events, a chance to design how I design.
A (assessment/analyze) -- Clear communication with my client and with my workers is invaluable. Pre planning/Design with ordering and action sheets prove especially valuable when events are away from easeful shopping and time pressured.
D (design) Create templates: spreadsheets for accounting, action sheets for my meals (ideally with a volume x #'s (and cases)/ person (more resilient for same meal at different caterings)-- clear notes as to how many we are feeding.
I (implement) Buy more measuring stuff that I can record how much we make of various things. Execute clear communication with workers, organizers and purveyors. Create and utilize templates that I have created including feedback loops to iteratively improve.
E (evaluate) The proof is in the pudding. There has been during the design process a constant evaluation of both what is valuable to do and the quality of the action sheets, emails and recipes, etc. . .
Design Methodology
Designing for catering was the perfect design project for me to explore. I recognize the dynamic nature and the iterative process of desing on many levels. At its most basic, I design recipes for each dish, then I design multiple dishes for each meal, then I design multiple meals (and prep) for each shift. I design a menu for the entire event. I am able to copy some of my standard menu choices and recognize ratios for different sized events. Within all of these layers of cycles, the design cannot be held static as ingredients may not have come in or may be short. Indeed, how we dance with the opportunities life offers to us is critical to putting out a good meal in a timely fashion to nourish the physical needs of this temporary community. The mind maps below represent an engagement with designing the patterns for all catering events from this specific event. A recipe, for me, shows that beautiful dance of structured improvisation. Design creates the structure or form in which we can emergently improvise. Being a chef, I rarely follow recipes to the T; however, simulatneously, I recognize that having the design documented and articulated to create a meal offers a great lens into how to begin.
The stucture or methodology used for designing any system can be quite complex. Part of the spirit of this Output Packet is to articulate and document and experiment with various methodologies to see how my brain interacts with design. Templates/methodologies/mnemonics that have been offerred by the Permaculture community includes Dave JAcke's GADIE: Goal Articulation, Assess and Analyze, Design, Implement and Evaluate. While designing the catering aspect of this project, I used the GaSADIE and OBREDIMET which offered other words of inspiration: Survey, Observation, Boundaries, Resources, Maintenance and Tweaking while including many of the same from the GADIE model. I realize that the language we use to construct our own models needs to resonate with us. I was inspired by a fellow associate at GaiaU, Simha's page on Design, in addition to these models to create my own: my mnemonic methodology is ORGBADIE. (See OP Design for more)
First xMind map for catering NCDC
Second xMind Map for Catering
Third xMind Map for Catering in General
Points of Intervention
The first major point of intervention was when I realized that this project was more about how to design than about designing for this particular catering event. This broadened my scope to try to emphasize/define how I design rather than trying to design this particular project. It also inspired most of the last two pages of revealing the design process for this OP as well as for this Catering Event. The next major point of intervention occurred when I realized that good practice in design is to look at the ways in which I
can ease all future catering gigs: so what are the themes and efficiencies to design into my work as a caterer. I also ask myself what I can do to ease all future OP's as the awareness that I am looking at myself as a designer more than as a man designing this one catering event. Then I also ask what I can do to ease all future OP's since design is particularly efficacious on repetitve products when a system can be established.
Actionable Items
1. 18 Action sheets for the days at camp
2. Print out and laminate 18 action sheets
3. Material data sheets
4. Create clear email to workers including job responsibilities and wages and hours
5. Create file Liam Wednesday night
6. Craft email to Gary
7. Brainstorm ways to save time/labor by doing things together (Labor saving)
8. Create a sheet for Thursday to pre do many things so that camp flows more smoothly.
9. Create list of recipes Liam doesn't have
10. Make notes of common cooking techniques (a la Britt) -- Aioli, stock, hard boiled eggs, chai,
11. Email Mei Ling -- RE: Laminated signs, Garbage
12. Gather all shopping lists in one place. . .
13. Create a system/template to record information during event. Make this a priority
OBREDIMET
O (bservations) -- My sense is there are many ways I could record well what happens once and not reinvent the wheel each time I cater. I don't even have recipes for the most part but ingredient lists and approximate volumes make the ordering infinitely easier and the execution simpler and more profitable. Good documentation makes catering events so much easier. Constantly asking ourselves what we did 'last year' (re: volume, meals, ordering, special needs)
B (oundaries) -- Working off of notes from last summer and memory, I can devise a pretty good first attempt at templates for summer 2014. I realize that I want to design in the resiliency to have any of my caterings working off of similar spreadsheets and actionsheets.
R (esources) -- Notes from NCDC 2014, internet (to research things that I don't want to look up then)
E (valuate) -- There is opportunity to sift through the writings that I have and create new ones that have inherent feedback loops so that I can improve the ease at which catering happens.
D (esign) -- Compile good templates for action sheets for daily tasks and ordering sheets and recipes. Compile what information is not available this year to put on the sheet for the future. Create form letters that I send to facility managers, organizers (contract),
I (mplement) -- Templates for taxes, templates for feedback loop, letter to workers/facility, recipes for desserts, action sheets for each shift
M (aintain) -- I have read and reread and more maintenance will come in when this design is further implemented in practice.
E (valuate) -- Proof is in the pudding. There has been during the design process a constant evaluation of both what is valuable to do and the quality of the action sheets, emails and recipes, etc. . .
T (weak) -- Create resiliency for real time tweaking at camp/ Spend time each night editing the action sheets that I have created. It will be invaluable to have a hard copy of what to do and then record any shifts and how that went. . .