Workplace culture, from how a business looks to employee attitudes and communication, reinforces how an organization, or team, operates. It’s a fundamental element that can have a huge impact, whether it’s positive or negative is up to you.
Key ingredients
Businesses that have strong and positive workplace cultures have two things in common:
1. The soft skill behaviors that are high-priority are clearly defined.
2. Those high-priority behaviors are shouted from the rooftops, loudly and often.
And this is no coincidence. By establishing and emphasizing the key soft skill behaviors that are at the core of the business, or team for that matter, employees have a clear picture of what is expected, which leads to better performance in the workplace– even the youngest, least-experienced employees.
These powerful cultures don’t just happen. They are the result of a company that knows exactly what its high-priority behaviors are, focuses on them relentlessly, and systematically drives those behaviors throughout the organization in all of its management practices. The message is crystal clear and on auto-repeat.
Where to start
When designing a positive workplace culture, first ask yourself what are the high-priority behaviors that are most important in your sphere?
For example, if I’m the bar manager at a popular fine-dining restaurant, the high-priority behaviors for my team might be attentiveness and professionalism, which are applicable to the restaurant’s staff as a whole, as well as cleanliness as a messy bar is off-putting to guests.
Once the soft skill behaviors are defined, it’s easy:
Make them the foundation of your culture. Focus on them relentlessly, and systematically drive those behaviors throughout your sphere in all of your management practices. This means leading by example
Then sing it from the rooftops—make it 1000 percent clear.
And start doing everything within your power to drive, support, and reward those high-priority behaviors with every employee within your sphere.
How managers fit in
Creating and sustaining a positive workplace culture is not solely on the shoulders of the owner or general manager; managers with small staffs are also responsible for propagating the message throughout their own spheres regardless of whether or not the organization as a whole has a strong culture. In this case, it’s up to the manager to design a positive culture that will drive performance.
If your organization has a strong positive culture by design, then you need to be in alignment. Ask yourself:
What are the high-priority behaviors?
What are you doing in your sphere to drive and support and reward those behaviors in everything you do as a leader?
If your organization has a less-than-strong positive culture, then it’s all up to you. You need to create your own culture within your own sphere—not just for the young talent, but for everybody.
You don’t need to start a revolution. But you can be a little bit of a maverick. You can certainly be a change leader.
Your results will speak for themselves because your team will stand out, not just in its business outcomes, but in cohesiveness, morale, and retention.
Common roadblocks to positive culture
When policy and message do not align:
Some organizations are all talk and no action when it comes to culture. They have great slogans, but they do not drive, support, nor reward key behaviors among employees that are in alignment with the messages. If employees have regular run-ins with customers because management has very strict policies against, say, exchanges and returns, then it really doesn’t matter how many placards there are in the store that say, “The customer is always right!”
When there is a call for immediate change in culture:
We all know change doesn’t happen overnight. Yet, there are organizations in which leaders get very serious about changing their corporate culture—all of a sudden. It’s as if these leaders have an epiphany and realize what they’ve been missing and decide they want a strong positive culture—and they want it now. They want culture change overnight, by decree: “From now on, our culture will be ___________!” Fill in the blank: “honesty!” “teamwork!” “innovation!” But you can’t force culture change overnight. It takes time because behavioral changes take time.
When the organization’s culture lacks cohesion:
Of course, plenty of leaders pay no attention to corporate culture whatsoever. Many senior managers have never considered workplace culture until now, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. This is what Bruce Tulgan, CEO of the management research and training firm RainmakerThinking, refers to as ‘culture by default’,
“Just because you have never paid any attention to culture, doesn’t mean you don’t have a corporate culture. It just means you have a culture by default instead of by design.”
That is your corporate culture is simply the combined web of prevailing shared beliefs, meaning, language, practices, and traditions that have developed over time between and among the people in your organization. Whether it’s overall nature is positive or negative, cultures that are developed by default lack cohesion. There is no central message that defines employees’ overall mission.
The idea of putting work into building a positive workplace culture is not a new phenomenon (because of millennials). In fact, it’s just common sense: happy employees are good employees!
As a business owner or manager, it’s your job to make sure your customers have positive experiences when they encounter any issues with your company. Whether you run a restaurant, hotel, or software company, you can, and should, provide amazing customer service that will keep customers coming back. To do that, you need to make sure amazing customer service is a top priority.
The importance of customer service
Many believe customer service is hard to quantify because it depends on relationships. That’s actually not the case. The quality of your customer service is directly connected to your company’s bottom-line.
If you have great service, customers are more likely to continue using your company’s services, even if they have to pay more.
In the end, great customer service can differentiate you from competitors, help you retain customers, and encourage customers to pay premium for your offerings. Plus, if you run a restaurant, customer service ties into the sorts of reviews you get on sites like Yelp, as well.
The breakdown of customer service
No matter the business or team within the business, customer service is made up of the same components: the processes you have in place, the tone you use with customers, the content you provide to help customers, and the measurement of how well you’re doing. Let’s take a look at each.
Utilize processes
Even if you have the best intentions, disorganization ruins customer service. Thankfully, it doesn’t have to. This is where processes come into the picture.
When managing employees and delegating responsibilities that relate to customer service, you need to have processes in play so that your team knows exactly how to interact with customers and handle problems should they arrise. This includes specifying who is responsible for each task, how your staff is held accountable for their duties, the chain of command, and how to proceed when customer service issues come up.
For example, if I’m managing a restaurant’s service staff, I would have a clearly defined process for set-up, service, and take-down, as well as for problem situations. This way, everyone is on the same page about what they’re doing and how to treat customers and their complaints should they have any.
Don’t forget tone
No matter how clear your customer service processes are and how closely they’re followed, if an innapropriate tone (irritated, nonchalant, angry) is used with a customer, nothing else will matter because tone is heard before the actual words. So much so that sometimes it’s the subtleties that make the big difference.
For example, the following two messages say exactly the same thing, but vary greatly in how they come across:
Tone 1: Dear Sir, thank you for your inquiry. You will receive a message from us shortly.
Tone 2: Yo. Yeah sure. We’ll hit you up.
The latter may not go over so well if the call was in regards to setting up a reservation at a restaurant. The customers are likely to go elsewhere because, from the tone, they pervieced there would be no follow up.
Instruct your staff on how to speak to different types of customers and in varying situations. This will ensure that the message is being heard as it should.
Measure success with sentiment
Customer service isn’t any good if you’re not measuring it. You need to know whether or not it’s working, and if it isn’t, what needs to change. This can only be done with feedback. At all times, you need to be checking in to make sure that your staff is performing well and that your customers are happy with the service they’re getting.
There are a number of ways you can do this:
Speak to customers while they’re in house. Walking around tables and asking how everything is going can be a good starting point.
Collect customer surveys using survey cards or by way of a digital platfrom such as Survey Monkey. To increase response rate, try including an incentive for giving feedback.
Look to Yelp reviews, Google reviews, Angie’s List reviews, and other review sites.
Amazing customer service can make all the difference. Great service is about a lot more than business– it’s about fostering relationships with your customers that are long-lasting and mutually beneficial. As a leader within the business, it’s your job to make sure your company is doing all it can to provides experiences that delights your customers, exceeding their expectations with every interaction.
As a manager, in a restaurant or otherwise, it is your responsibility to ensure that business is running smoothly. This ranges from how staff is performing to business outcomes. It can be a heavy load. However, there are still many easy and inexpensive things you can do to make sure your establishment is running the way it should and to prevent problems before they occur.
Get involved
No one thinks of the phrase “absentee boss” in a positive context. Being in the establishment is a good start, but you need to get out of your office and on the floor and in the kitchen.
Be seen.
Even if the general manager and/or owner are not, you can be. In fact, putting in the effort to be available to your staff and customers will help you in the end. Employees will respect you all the more, making your job that much easier.
Drop in unexpectedly
When I was working in the industry, my manager would pop in and out all the time. She would tell us that she had an appointment the next morning and was coming in late, then show up early and say that the appointment was rescheduled. After I moved on, she let me in on her little secret and explained that it was her way of keeping everyone on top of their game. And it worked.
The first few times you do this though, it may catch a few off guard. Give them some slack the first few times, but if they don’t shape up, you’ll know and can then do something about it.
Stop by after hours
You know those restaurant ‘spy’ shows where they go undercover to find out who’s behind the business’s shortages? Well, one of the recurring things on those programs is that abuses are happening after hours; bartenders are throwing parties, chefs are using your place for a pop-up restaurant, etc. Well, even though those shows are overdramatized, they’re not off the ball.
To ensure this is not happening at your business, especially if you’ve noticed something suspicious, go in when the place is closed, and do it often. For many restaurants, a drive by will suffice. No lights on and no parked cars are both good signs when the place is supposed to be closed. A similar tactic is to check with your alarm company to see when the alarm was turned on and turned off.
Hire an experienced person for the role of mystery shopper
Again, those ‘spy’ tv shows are on to something here.Using a mystery shopper can help uncover that which you would not discover otherwise. This can be anything from poor service and inconsistencies in food/beverages to comps, and more.
It’s best if your mystery shopper is experienced in restaurant and hospitality operations and someone you’re familiar with, but you’re employees are not.
Also, having your mystery shopper visit regularly will allow him or her to form relationships with your staff, increasing access to what’s going on behind the scenes.
Do an accurate inventory, and do it often
Whether you’re responsible for both food and beverages, or just one or the other, don’t just do an inventory on one time of item or before placing weekly orders. If possible, aim to do a thorough inventory 2-3 times per week. While inventory should always be done when the business is closed, don’t do it on the same days every week.
This is a lot to take on, but there are tools that can help. It’ll be worth it in the end; you’ll not only be protecting the business from unnecessary spending but also ensuring that business operations are running as they should.
Rotate staff between units and shifts
The more comfortable staff is with each other the more likely they will get together to do things that should not be done. This is a tough tightrope to walk.
You need to have people together enough that they work smoothly with each other, but not consistent enough to become overly friendly.
The side benefit of this is that everyone starts knowing how to work with everyone else, which is a plus if you have to switch around people for special events, staffing shortages, etc.
The bottom line is that there are several small steps that you can take to tighten up business operations and ensure that everything is being run as it should be.
Taking inventory is an unpopular task at most restaurants, but one that is critical to controlling food costs and improving profitability. Yet, when we speak with restaurant owners, many admit that they either do a poor job at it, or do it infrequently. In most cases, the underlying issue is a lack of structure around the inventory-taking process.
With that in mind, here are ten tips to help improve inventory accuracy at your restaurant:
Take inventory frequently. For some items it should be done daily, for others twice a week. At a minimum, it needs to be completed before placing weekly orders.
Take inventory after the restaurant has closed, or before it opens. You cannot take accurate inventory while goods are being sold. Whatever time you pick, stick with it. If you always take inventory on Tuesdays, but sometimes you do it at night and sometimes in the morning, there will be fluctuations in week to week results.
Take inventory before a new shipment arrives and then add the new stock to your counts. Do not attempt to take inventory while deliveries are being made. Items will end up being double-counted.
Clean out and organize your stock areas before taking inventory. Throw out items that have expired, move similar items to the same shelf and in general, tidy up.
Use Inventory Count Sheets. Have one for daily, one for weekly and one for monthly counts (or whatever periods you use) and standardize the items included and the unit (pounds, number of items, boxes etc) each item is tracked in. Changes in what items are tracked can cause large fluctuations in recorded inventory. Use a product like LiveInventory to create these sheets and track results over time.
When taking inventory, make part of the practice ensuring that items are being used on a First In, First Out (FIFO) basis. Older goods should be rotated to the front of shelves so they are used first. Additionally, try to keep the amount of items you have on hand as low as possible to reduce theft and spoilage.
Use two people to take inventory. They should count items separately and then compare results for anomalies. Pairing reduces errors and the temptation to manipulate results or pocket goods.
Use the same staff to take inventory. They will not only get faster at it, but they will tend to be more consistent.
If you use scales to weigh inventory and measure portions, calibrate them weekly.
Standardize what your unit cost is. The price of many items (like ground beef) changes week to week.
Use the latest price paid as the standard. It is the easiest to find and remember.
The most critical piece of the inventory puzzle is consistency. Using the same staff, taking inventory at the same time and counting the same items are some of the easiest ways to improve your accuracy.
Being a manager in a restaurant, or in any hospitality business, is a constant juggling act. From supervising staff to heading business operations, it can be a struggle to keep up. So that ‘s why January’s Hacks Series is all about management tips and tricks. To kick it off, we’re sharing our list of the best apps, online tools, and digital solutions to help streamline your management processes.
Number of reservations by party size and seating arrangement by table size
Cost: Free
The tool from the Center for Hospitality Research (CHR) allows restaurant operators and managers to optimize their reservations and seating by inputting key parameters into a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet, then using the Solver add-in to view the outputs. The tool’s creator, Gary Thompson, explains that it does so by determining the “best mix of tables in a restaurant, while simultaneously determining which reservations should be accepted from forecasted demand.” The inputs include party size, table size and number, average dining time, and average revenue by party size as well as the degree to which to inflate the amount of time guests will be seated at a table, termed the ‘Round-Up’.
The full description and instructions document depicts the components of the tool and explains how to use the tool by presenting a practical example of table mix optimization for two nights. The tool is provided by CHR free of charge and can be downloaded here.
Maintain an online guestbook to track diner contact info, food preferences, allergies, and more
Available for iPad
Cost: Free trial; $99/month
It should be no surprise that Yelp, an industry leader, has developed a restaurant management tool. SeatMe is an advance management system for your front-of-house needs, allowing you to take online reservations, manage seating, keep track of available tables, and even text waiting patrons when their tables are ready.
Enable ordering on your restaurant website, from you Facebook page, or from within the ChowNow app
Available online or for iOS and Android
Cost: Free Basic Account; Pro Account from $8.99/month
Online ordering goes fancy with ChowNow, a handy app that gives foodies access to your menu via your own website, Facebook page, or the ChowNow mobile app. Allow diners to customize their orders, so your kitchen knows just what to make, and check out online – orders are beamed straight to your restaurant’s main tablet, where employees can check and complete the order, and finally notify patrons when their orders will be ready.
Hundreds of questions cover requirements from the ServSafe Food Protection Manager Certification Examination, the American Food Safety Institute (AFSI) Food Manager Certification (FMC) exam, and the National Registry of Food Safety Professionals (NRFSP) Certified Food Safety Professional examination
Choose study mode or test mode
Available online or for iOS, Android, Blackberry, and Palm
Cost: $3.99
The Food Safety Exam Prep app from Upward Mobility offers the most comprehensive food prep information, health requirements, and U.S. safety standards of any mobile app. The test module is perfect for keeping your kitchen current on safety standards, and will help anyone prepare for certification or re-certification.
Built-in extras include a barcode scanner, multiple currency support, database backup and restore, password protection, and auto-default values
Filter by item, category, company, location, supplier/client, payment and shipment
Available for Android
Cost: $5.99
For simple inventory tracking – and streamlined bookkeeping and tax reporting – Inventory Tracker delivers with an easy-to-use solution. The handy app makes it easy to track your restaurant inventory, sales, revenues and balance sheet – daily, weekly, monthly and yearly. Create reports and transfer data to spreadsheet format.
Wine pairing, not to mention keeping track of an extensive wine cellar, is one of the most challenging and rewarding parts of the restaurant business, especially without a Sommelier. Enter Uncorkd, an iPad-based wine menu that also keeps track of your wine inventory. Customers can get a comprehensive view of your restaurant’s wine menu including a bottle’s origin, vintage and recommended pairings, while you can easily track inventory.
Publicly accessible business pages that display open jobs
Multi-admin business accounts
Re-usable job listings
Applicant tracking system
Messaging hub
Cost: Free for the moment
Sirvo helps businesses in the hospitality industry hire by connecting employers and job seekers on a platform that simplifies the hiring process, from posting jobs to reviewing applications. With Sirvo, you don’t have to worry about your job listings getting buried under more recent postings because your business page acts as your own hosted careers site. This makes advertising positions easier on you and finding jobs easier on professionals. Plus, you can invite admins to help manage your business page, search and message candidates, and organize applicants using the applicant tracking system.
WorkBright provides businesses that need to onboard new employees rapidly with paperless HR. By reducing the time it takes to collect and process new hire forms and automating the tedious workflows and data entry involved in onboarding new employees, WorkBright virtually eliminates the hiring costs associated with dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s. Plus, WorkBright ensures that your HR files are compliant, organized, and easily-accessible.
Digital access to staff schedule, from anywhere at anytime
Forecast labor costs with an as-you-schedule dollar tally
Available online from any computer or mobile device
Cost: Free trial; Accounts from $19/month
The purpose of ScheduleFly is to make restaurant staff scheduling easier by simplifying communications between you and your employees. The app turns any mobile device or computer into your communications central: post time schedules, your employees can request shift changes, and you can all coordinate on time off. Best of all, the app makes it easy to avoid costly overtime and forecast labor costs.
Manage your social presence across sites, from one platform
Log on once to schedule posts throughout the day, week or month
Available online or for iOS and Android
Cost: Free Basic Account; Pro Account from $8.99/month
Chances are, your restaurant has gone social and chances are, all that required networking is overwhelming. HootSuite steps in with a simple tool that makes it easy to manage all your social networks, scheduling posts and cross-publishing photos, status updates, and more to multiple social sites. Integrated social profiles include Facebook, Twitter, FourSquare, LinkedIn, Google+ Pages, and others.
Magic resize to automatically create images for all social media platforms (instagram, twitter, google+, etc.)
Cost: Free Basic Account; Canva for Work $119.40/year, $12.95/month
Canva makes designing graphics for social media, presentations, posters, and more exceptionally easy. Included are tons of different layouts to get your design started that are available in pre-set dimensions (for social media) as well as in custom dimensions. Build your designs with Canva’s integrated images, icons and shapes, backgrounds, fonts, and photo filters, many of which are free. Plus, you can upload your own images!
To help businesses produce on-brand marketing materials, Canva recently introduced Canva for Work, which allows teams to collaborate, save brand colors, logos, and fonts, and build their own templates. Also included is automated resizing for various social media images sizes.
Fishbowl is not new and is an industry standard, but we wanted to include it anyway because it should definitely be in you business tool repertoire. With several analytics-based solutions available, Fishbowl focusses on helping restaurants optimize their marketing, strategy, and revenue management. From measuring dining behavior and defining target segments to analyzing and optimizing digital marketing efforts, Fishbowl will help maximize your marketing returns.
Integrating digital solutions and apps in your management practices will not only increase efficiency but also improve your processes and save your business money, so take a few minutes to check out your options! Coming up next are tips on business operations, so be sure to check back in.
