(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 […]
Tag Archives | Servers
The Best of The Manager’s Office
The Manager’s Office joined The Hospitality Formula Network as the smallest blog. I had tried to avoid discussing issues related to management on tipsfortips. To the extent that I did discuss them the posts were designed to provide greater understanding of how restaurants worked to servers and foodies. After I started the site, I realized […]
The Truth About Credit Card Theft In Restaurants
As discussed yesterday, Yahoo ran a front-page story from creditcards.com on Friday discussing types of people who you cannot trust with your credit card. The Yahoo headline is pictured above and makes it clear that servers are on the list. While the actual article includes eight groups, the headline very clearly implies that you should […]
Food Allergies: A Responsible Approach
I have one hard and fast rule when it comes to waiting tables. No one dies on my watch. I have had several guests leave the restaurant in an ambulance, but none of them have died. It is a simple thing, but it helps me sleep better at night. I may not be changing the […]
Leadership: Empowering Others
“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 […]
Leadership: Creating A Shared Goal
“Leaders don’t force people to follow-they invite them on a journey.” -Charles S. Lauer The fundamental question behind the desire to manage rather than lead is, “How can I get people to do what I want them to do if they do not want to do it?” Failure to answer this question is what leads […]
Hot Schedules Reviewed: Part One
A few months ago the restaurant I work at (and who my opinions in no way represent) began using the Hot Schedules program for scheduling. For those of you not familiar with this system, it is a web based system for scheduling employees. It is experiencing incredibly rapid growth and is becoming more commonplace within […]
Making a Difference
The weekend is upon us. Friday and Saturday nights get busy and take a lot out of us. The pace is faster, the side stations are more crowded, and all of the saucers in the restaurant seem to hide. The guests do not seem to understand any of this and have far less patience. This […]
Aspirational Dining Defined
I am a Mac guy. This means only the occasional interruption for updates from Microsoft. These are most often for Word for Macs. Yet in none of these updates have they added to my spell check dictionary words like “Barack Obama, Al Qaeda, or Facebook.” If they do implement this change they can use this […]
The Greatest Customer Complaint Response Ever
I had lunch today with my friends Emma and Senor Esparza. They ate at Justus Drugstore last night. Justus is on the outermost outskirts of what could be considered Kansas City. In the few years that it has been open it has developed a reputation of being well worth the drive. I personally have never […]
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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.