tagged front door staff, hiring, maitre d, managing, restaurant host, Restaurant hostess, restaurant training, training. The first impression your guests receive of the hospitality and competency of your staff is the professional host or hostess standing at your front door. This hospitality industry veteran of forty years greets all returning guests by name and asks […]
Archive | Training Restaurant Staff RSS feed for this section
The First Impression
It was 7: 45 am on April 2nd of 2007 when I arrived for my first day of work at my previous job. I hadn’t slept much the night before because of nerves. I had closed my old restaurant the night before and departed that night knowing that I was leaving a great deal of […]
Skill Focus: Creating Regulars
Last week I discussed how to create and build rapport with your guests. This week I am taking it a step further. The reason you want to establish rapport with a guest is to earn an exceptional tip and make them want to return to the restaurant. The only thing that would be better than […]
Skills Focus: Spotting The Complaint
The last three skills focus segments have focused on selling entrees by recommending them. These should have proven successful in getting your staff engaged in communicating with their guests what items they might enjoy. This week the focus is going to shift to another vital task that too many servers fail to execute. What happens […]
Teaching An Experienced Server New Skills
Recently, I received a comment on a past post from a manager asking for advice on how to handle an experienced server who was resistant to implementing the new skills he was trying to teach his staff. This is an incredibly common dilemma and one that deserved more focus than a reply to his comment […]
Why Server Training Saves You Money
In the current economic climate most restaurant companies have been searching for a way to attract guests. They have turned to a variety of discounts and value-oriented options to keep guests coming through their doors. In order to maintain profitability, they have also looked for ways to cut costs. One of the most common cutbacks […]
Why Server Training Fails Servers
I have been reading a great deal lately about training and education models lately for a series on training I am working on. The conclusion I am coming to is that restaurant training is suffering from far poor design and purpose. It is based on an outdated and ineffective model. It is structured in the […]
How To Make Hostile Guests Love You (Part Three)
(Note: in order to get the most out of this post you should read parts one and two. They create the foundation for this summary post and will be referenced frequently.) My friend Marcy has the innate ability to intimidate people. She is a beautiful 5’8” blonde attending law school. She is aware of having […]
How To Make Hostile Guests Love You (Part Two)
Years ago I had the good fortune of working for a man named John Maria. I have had many bosses over the years, but none had a better fundamental understanding of human nature than John. One day he gave me a book and told me to read it. He said the answer to almost every […]
How To Make Hostile Guests Love You (Part One)
One of the most difficult situations any server faces is the hostile guest. I call them hostile, because they are angry with you long before you have even greeted them. Some people just bring all the hostility of their day in to a restaurant and dump it on their server. From the moment you greet […]
Let’s Get Connected
The Hospitality Formula Network Is Home To These Outstanding Sites:
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.