“If you don’t understand that you work for your mislabeled ‘subordinates,’ then you know nothing of leadership. You know only tyranny.” -Dee Hock You have two choices as a manager. You can force every staff member to do things as you would do them or you can encourage them to achieve the results you […]
Tag Archives | How to motivate servers

Leadership: Empowering Others
Management Mentality Mistakes
Motivating servers is a tricky business. Without question servers crave autonomy and tend to resist being told what to do. At the same time, managers in general are given very little guidance on what is perhaps the most important part of their jobs. Two similar restaurants in the same company with the same menu and […]
What Motivates Servers: Purpose
(Note: This is the final part of a six part series dealing with what does and does not motivate servers. It is based upon research presented in the first part. If you have not read the initial post entitled “The Epiphany”, I highly recommend you do so to fully understand the series. Later parts dealt […]
The Epiphany
“Epiphany: noun- a sudden, intuitive perception of or insight into the reality or essential meaning of something, usually initiated by some simple, homely, or commonplace occurrence or experience.” I suppose there is nothing more simple or commonplace than scrolling through Facebook. I was scrolling through Facebook today trying to decide what to write about for […]
Ways To Motivate Servers
Given the popularity of last Monday’s post on management styles, I decided to follow up with another management post. This may become a regular Monday feature depending on the feedback. While I am a server, I have worked on the other side of the office door. I prefer serving. I enjoy making guests happy and […]
- The Greatest Customer Complaint Response Ever September 23, 2010
- A Food Critic Intervention August 31, 2010
- My Response: 25 Things Chefs Never Tell You September 16, 2010
- Advice For A New Restaurant Manager January 18, 2013
- Learning Restaurant Spanish (Nouns) June 2, 2010
- Advice For A New Restaurant Manager January 18, 2013
- Was The 20/20 Restaurant Episode Fake? A View From The Cutting Room Floor November 21, 2012
- How To Hire Professional Restaurant Servers Fast September 10, 2012
- The Importance of Speed in Hiring Restaurant Servers July 2, 2012
- Six Dangers Of Restaurant Server Understaffing June 19, 2012
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- Ina Stefanova: This is an excellent resource, David! I will defin...
- John Blackman: My first visit to this site and what a great lesso...
- Master_Rabbit: Here’s advice from a 10 year veteran. Try anot...
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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.