Episode 117 Reducing Restaurant Turnover, Best Practice

The biggest challenge today, amongst other unprecedented hurdles, is staffing.  Not only hiring but getting them to stay.  First impressions matter. They can make an employee feel valued, feel special and mostly, just feel comfortable. By now, you probably know you need to invest to reduce your turnover.

The obvious investment isn’t necessarily the ideal one in this context. Wages and benefits matter, but what we are seeing as the most overlooked aspect in regard to employee retention happens within the first week or two.
In this episode, Dave and Anthony dive into yet another topic revolving around the omnipresent elephant in the restaurant room, staffing.

If you listened in, you might be interested in this video – enjoy!

• The biggest challenge today, amongst other unprecedented hurdles, is staffing.  Not only hiring but getting them to stay. 

• Invest to reduce your turnover
  • Invest in training
    • Proper training sets your employees up 100% for success if done right
    • If they are taught your standards, they know how to achieve them
    • Training sets expectations
      • If expectations aren’t set, how can anyone achieve them?
      • If they don’t understand your expectations, holding your staff to them will inevitably lead to discord
    • It reduces mistakes, which cause rifts
    • It creates success, which is synergistic
  • Invest in re-training
    • Professional development is key to keeping veteran staff engaged
      • Hone their “edge”
      • Make them feel and be more valuable
      • Create job flexibility
      • Shows your interest/care in developing them
      • Makes them feel more valuable
      • They become better at their jobs
      • Increases skills and productivity  
      • Types of retraining:
        • General organization-specific content
        • Computer apps/systems
        • Techniques and competencies of cooking, serving, and managing  
• How to get it done
  • Review your training process
    • Make it more than just shadowing/mentoring
    • Areas of training checklists
    • Mini “exams”
  • Develop strategy and subsequent calendar
    • What do you want them to learn?
    • What do they want to learn?
  • Identify your best and most willing trainers
  • Styles
    • In-person, lecture-based
    • Seminar format
    • Video conference
    • Hybrid – listen and watch…then practice on your own