8 Restaurant Management Tips to Improve the Way You Work

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Your staff represents your brand. From a perspective, they are the actual brand ambassador of your business. In a journey towards success, representation plays a significant factor in an environment where customer satisfaction matters the most.  

If you are in the restaurant management business, your service quality will be reflected in the quality of your staff’s behavior towards the customers. 

Customers always look for quick and efficient service. Anything that is substandard will draw them away from your business. 

A restaurant’s standard is not only limited to serving delicious meals. To be efficient, you have to go the extra mile to make a brand identity. 

That will range from the restaurant’s interior to the presentation of the meals. 

In this ‘social-media’ driven society, presentation plays a major factor. 

If you want to know how to improve your restaurant’s service quality, the one word to this is staff training. 

Here are a few pointers to help you improve the performance of your restaurant’s staffs.

Tips for Improving Efficiency Through Staff Training

Staff training should be a prerequisite part of your restaurant business strategy. 

Here is how you can employ staff training and improve your restaurant’s efficiency and speed of service. 

Draw A Specific Plan for Restaurant Staff Training

Every restaurant should have a well-defined training program. An all-inclusive training program will help your restaurant’s staff be more efficient and help them deliver better service. 

Adequate staff training is the best way to maintain coordination and efficiency in the back house and front horse operation. 

A comprehensive training program, such as Quick Service Restaurant (QSR), will matter to ensure consistency in experience and taste. 

You need to follow a few steps for creating a training plan that will improve your restaurant’s delivery and efficiency. 

• Set out goals that need to be achieved by the staff
• Ensure the set goals are measurable, which will help you to decide what works and what needs to be changed
• Create different plans for each role. For example, the front desk should be trained in tackling typical customer-facing situations. The kitchen crew should be taught how to work under duress while maintaining high standards.
• Keep consistent plans and have a designated role in making sure every employee is on the same page and has the same set of standards. 

Assign Roles to Staffs

As per the Heinemann and Greenberger 2002 survey, a large portion of employees feels dissatisfied with their jobs when they are assigned roles and responsibilities that don’t come under their skills set or knowledge. 

Assigning roles to staff should be well planned to ensure that assigned personnel is comfortable and can carry out the job effortlessly. 

Assigning staff roles is a vital part of staff training that should be carried out with thought and care. 

Moreover, your staff should be well trained to perform the assigned role. Even if the team has a general idea of their responsibilities, their skills need to be assessed and brushed up every once in a while to fit the necessity of the restaurant. 

It will provide an idea of how the business works as a whole unit and how each employee can grow and perform better in their duties. 

Assigning roles precisely will help in improving their restaurant’s service quality as well as the service speed. 

While providing training to your staff, you should lay out the anticipated duties as well as their position in the business. 

Assumption can lead to disasters and ruin the whole purpose of the training. 

Moreover, during the training session, you should also cover the what’s, who’s, & why’s of the business. 

Only then will your personnel be able to deliver outstanding results. The absence of ambiguity and keeping expectations clear of what is expected of them and their contribution to the team will help build a super-efficient team. 

Assigning relevant jobs, roles and tasks will be well-executed and performed without overlapping. 

Explore the Other Arenas of Staff Training

The learning curve of every process is different. Based on your employee’s data and their performance during different training sessions, you can use props and presentations during staff training. 

Auditory, visual and kinesthetic is helpful while planning staff training. 

You can take the help of experienced staff or a senior to demonstrate a particular task and ask the trainee to replicate the same. 

You can also provide instruction manuals to the new joiners and let them finish their job without any supervision and also learn from their mistakes. 

Role-playing is a fun activity where you can play a customer and create a real-life situation and advise how to handle such situations. 

If you own a group of restaurants or branches, then you should train each outlet differently using different techniques. You can also form a big group that includes staff from all outlets and let them share ideas of how they handled a situation. 

Interactive sessions are proven to be functional and highly productive for sharing ideas.  

There are multiple realms to explore in a staff training session, and experimentation is the key to success. There is no one-full-proof technique or one technique that fits all shoes. 

Specify Procedures of the Training Procedures

Each member and staff of the training process should know about the exact process and how their respective team works. 

That is only when your restaurant can become fully productive and works as an efficient engine. 

No matter when your employee resumes their shift, they can immediately fit in for complementing the team in the best possible way. 

Moreover, you should also set out standard training procedures that will assist new staff in speeding up in no time. 

You should also learn how to properly assign and manage your workforce and shifts so that work is spread evenly among the employees. 

This will ensure that a single employee is not overworked and their productivity stays uncompromised. 

Introduce Technology as A Part of Your Staff’s Training Sessions

Technology has helped in the transformation of many industries, and the restaurant business is no exception. 

High-functioning restaurant businesses have adopted the latest technologies, such as a wireless waiter calling system, as an integral part of their business. 

Wireless waiter calling systems are helping businesses to make communication between customer-waiter-kitchen more efficient, transparent, and discreet. 

Moreover, it can also help in calculating a total, raising invoices with investing the least effort.

However, the efficiency is not just limited to installing the devices. It is more about training the staff on how to use the technology adequately. 

You need to invest appropriate time in the training session of the restaurant staff. Only then you can speed up your operations and at the same time improve the service quality of your business, 

There are different steps and ways through which you can train your staff to use technology and improve the output of your business. 

• Use videos, podcasts, and hand out manuals to staff to help them understand how to use the technology, the point of using the technology, and when to use the device. 
• Arrange regular mock drills as well as billing processes using the technology so that they can be prepared for real-life situations. 

Training with technology can help in improving time management and reduce errors which will, in turn, improve efficiency. 

Improve Staff Efficiency By Fostering Teamwork

Nothing beats the power of good teamwork. Building a team where there is adequate collaboration, communication, and support will help in improving efficiency drastically. 

Moreover, a team also needs to respect their management in order to deliver productive and efficient performance. 

Moreover, as a team, you need to encourage them to get involved in regular activities. As a manager, you need to ensure that each of the employees gels well with each other and there are no underlying conflicts among staff. 

Any unresolved issue will break the chain of efficiency among the team. 

Set out individual goals as well as team goals. Working together is an essential process towards the success of your business. 

And the performance of your restaurant is directly dependent on the performance of your staff. 

So, invest time in creating a harmonious group which will surely pay off.

Don’t Micromanage

Micromanaging staff and treating them like children is humiliating and builds a toxic work culture. 

A restaurant can only deliver their best when they are given the space to grow and execute their skills. 

If you can’t trust them to work like unsupervised efficient adults, then you can expect them to work as a team and put in their best effort. 

To witness a team flourish, respect is a necessity. 

It is vital to specify goals and provide employees with all the tools that they will need to perform at the best of their abilities. 

When employees feel they are being micromanaged, they will be less inclined to work effectively. Rather, they will be more inclined towards pleasing their manager by doing as told. 

Even if they are performing their duty with utmost efficiency, they won’t be able to show their talent and skills when someone is constantly breathing down their neck. 

Build a culture and environment of trust, honesty, and respect rather than micromanaging. If you create a culture of trust and honesty, teamwork will flourish naturally. 

Make Rewards a Norm in Your Work Culture

Employees expect praise and raise when they efficiently execute the job they were assigned. 

As a manager, it should be your duty to recognize the efforts of your staff and praise them accordingly. Not only does it motivate you to work harder, but it also builds a solid relationship between the customer and the employees. 

Not only employees, since they are working as a team, but it is also important to praise the team for the hard work they put in. 

Money is not the only answer to recognizing the effort of your staff. 

You can definitely find a zillion of ideas to keep your team happy and encourage them to go above and beyond to attain their objectives.

One of the best ways is to set rewards for each goal achieved. Maybe it will be a team lunch, a team outing, tickets to concerts, movies, or games. 

Ensuring that the staff feels appreciated for their efforts will play a vital role in the success of your business. Also, make sure to recognize employees who step out of their comfort zone and go out their way to make a thing happen or help another employee. 

Showing gratitude can go a long way towards building the future of the business and retaining the trust and love of the employees. 

Living under fear and pressure is not the right way to show your efficiency. It will force them to work hard, but efficiency can only be improved through gratitude. 

Bonus Point: 

Flaunt Your Team on Social Media

Social media is a powerful platform. And everyone likes to flaunt their skills on social media. 

Though this is unconventional, businesses who tried have received a positive response from their customers and staff. 

Flaunt the skills of your staff on social media or host a weekly introductory series. In this series, you can introduce a group of your employees with captions like Meet the magicians who create the savories you relish. Or meet the team who brainstorm ideas to make you feel at home. 

Not only will your consumers enjoy the gesture, but they will also appreciate the fact that you recognize your employees’ efforts. Your team will also be happy that they are getting the recognition they deserve for their hard work. 

Sometimes these little acts of gesture are what sets you apart and help you build a team that feels like family, where everyone will put in the extra effort out of love for the business. 

Build a family, not a team of employees. 

Also Read: Best Business Ideas in India with Low Investment

Next Steps

Your staff is an integral part of streamlining your restaurant operations. You need to have a holistic training plan for training your staff consistently and continuously so that they remain efficient. 

They will reflect the values and your restaurant’s personality and also sport the right attitude to match the atmosphere of your business.