In the final installment of the skill focus series, I wanted to bring the series full circle. I began by discussing the value of making recommendations and how to describe food. These were great introductions to basic sales concepts. Your staff should now have had time to either get comfortable with these concepts or abandoned […]
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Skills Focus: Don’t Be “The Server”
I have been asked a couple of times recently to comment on restaurants using iPads instead of menus and servers. I generally respond by asking the question, “Would you rather order that way?” No one has told me yet that they would prefer this method. There will never be a program designed to be more […]
Skills Focus: Building And Maintaining Rapport
This week’s topic is a bit different than the topics I have written about in the last few skill focus posts. Previously we have talked about sales and spotting guest complaints. This week we will talk about the single most important factor in a server’s tip and the likelihood of a guest to return to […]
Skills Focus: Words That Sell
This week’s we are going to talk about something awesome. It is incredible. You could call it huge. Everyone loves it. History will reflect upon it as epic. It is mega-spectacular. If it were any better it would be made illegal. And in spite of all of those adjectives you still have no idea what […]
Skills Focus: Describing Dishes
Skills Focus: Describing Dishes In last week’s skill focus I discussed the power of recommending food to the guest. Helping your staff feel comfortable making these recommendations is an important first step. This allows them to feel comfortable talking with their guests about food. Simply getting them in the habit of talking about food with […]
Skills Focus: Making Recommendations
(Note: This is the first post in a series called “Weekly Skills Focus” that is designed to provide a weekly topic for your pre-shift meetings and instructions on how to teach it. To best utilize this post, plese refer to to my explanation of how to hold an effective pre-shift meeting and the introduction of […]
Weekly Skills Focus: A User’s Guide
(Note: On Monday, I will introduce a new weekly feature to this blog called “Weekly Skills Focus.” This feature will take one previous post each week and discuss it in greater detail. The Manager’s Office will look at the post from a manager’s perspective with notes on how to teach it during the coming week’s […]
The Pre-Shift Meeting (Part Two)
Yesterday, in part one of my discussion of pre-shift meetings, I discussed the things a manager can do to harm the effect of a pre-shift meeting. It was by no means a comprehensive list. There are many other mistakes managers can and do make that harm their pre-shift meetings. It does however beg a very […]
The Pre-Shift Meeting (Part One)
I have worked for a number of companies over the years that held pre-shift meetings with the servers. They have been called a variety of things. Line up, fresh talk, jump start, family meal, and many other names have been used to refer to these meetings. I have also managed at a handful of restaurants […]
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About The Author
David Hayden was born and raised in Kansas City, Missouri. He took his first serving job in 1996. Since that time, he has worked for over a dozen different restaurant companies. He has held both hourly and salaried positions at independent and corporate restaurants. He has waited on over 100,000 guests and trained hundreds of servers. He has been named "Best Server in Kansas City" the last three years by the local weekly paper.