In Martinez v. Joe's Crab Shack Holdings (2014) 231 Cal.App.4th 362, 182 managers (including general managers and several types of assistant managers) at 13 California Joe's Crab Shack eateries sought class treatment in an overtime case, which, like this one, appears to hinge on the employee classification question. (Martinez, supra, 231 Cal.App.4th at pp. 369-371, fn. 4.) According to the Martinez plaintiffs, "what was common to the manager plaintiffs, in addition to ... standard policies implemented ... at each of their restaurants, was their assertions their tasks did not change once they became managers; they performed a utility function and routinely filled in for hourly workers in performing nonexempt tasks; and they worked far in excess of 40 hours per week without being paid overtime wages." (Id. at p. 376.) Martinez did not view all the managers equally. The appellate court distinguished between the assistant managers, where "many of the tasks they performed ... are identical to those performed by nonexempt employees" (Martinez, supra, 231 Cal.App.4th at p. 376), and the general managers (a large number of whom opposed certification), where many mainly performed "higher rung" functions, manifestly exempt, and spent a minority of their time on tasks that nonexempt employees typically completed (yet the general managers asserted these tasks were done in a training or supervisory role). The appellate court suggested the trial court had erred in its analysis as to the "subordinate managerial employees" and remanded for reconsideration of certification. (Id. at p. 376; see id. at pp. 377, 380-381.) As to these subordinate managers, who continued to perform the same sorts of tasks they did when nonexempt employees, the appellate court viewed "the crux of the matter"--the key question for trial--as "whether a typically nonexempt task becomes exempt when performed by a managerial employee charged with supervision of other employees." (Id. at p. 381.) As to general managers, however, whose tasks were more varied and "higher rung," the appellate court indicated the trial court could, on remand, "exercise its discretion ... to exclude them entirely from the class definition" (id. at p. 376).