We Suck at Training, But This is How to Do It Better (ENCORE)

Summary

Podcast Summary: "We Suck at Training, But This is How to Do It Better (ENCORE)"

Restaurant Strategy Episode released on November 11, 2024, hosted by industry expert Chip Klose, delves deep into the prevalent issue of inadequate training in the restaurant industry and offers a structured, three-tiered approach to enhance employee development and retention.

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1. The Training Crisis in the Restaurant Industry

Chip Klose opens the episode by highlighting a critical problem: the restaurant industry's struggle with effective training.

Chip Klose [00:01]: "We suck at training and we've sucked at training in this industry for a very long time. And that's a problem because most employees want to stay put. But they churn. We churn at roughly about a 76% rate industry-wide."

This high turnover rate not only disrupts operations but also incurs significant costs, estimated between $30,000 to $45,000 per employee to replace staff, as supported by various industry research studies.

2. Understanding the Impact of High Employee Turnover

The conversation underscores the financial and operational strains caused by such high churn rates. Chip emphasizes that the root cause lies in the initial interactions with new hires and the lack of structured support systems to set them up for success.

Chip Klose [00:47]: "The bottom line is it goes back to the way that we first greet new hires when they walk in the door and the way we set them up for success. We're really bad at it, but we don't have to be."

3. Introducing the Three-Tiered Training Approach

To address this issue, Chip proposes a comprehensive training framework divided into three levels:

• Level One: Rapid onboarding to get new employees operational within seven days.
• Level Two: Developing employees to match the proficiency of top performers by 90 days.
• Level Three: Ongoing development to retain employees for the long term, ideally a decade.

Chip Klose [06:00]: "Level one training says, how can we get a new person ready to take a station on their own by the end of seven days? Level two training says, how can we get that person to be as good as our best person by the end of 90 days?"

4. Enhancing Level One Training

Level One focuses on effectively welcoming and equipping new hires. Chip outlines actionable steps:

• Preparation: Create standardized new hire packets containing employee handbooks, service manuals, menu descriptions, and necessary paperwork.

  Chip Klose [09:03]: "You set pars on those things. I used to do this all the time, set pars for those things, just like you set pars in the kitchen."

• Welcoming: Personally greet new employees, provide them with their packets, and offer a comprehensive tour of the restaurant to make them feel valued.

• Assessment: Implement daily quizzes to ensure new hires have absorbed essential information, such as phone numbers, menu items, and key personnel.

  Chip Klose [10:15]: "You need to see their skills. You need to see that they have, that they've taken on, that they've internalized all the things that they've been taught."

5. Advancing to Level Two Training

Level Two emphasizes deeper knowledge and skill enhancement over the first 90 days. Chip shares his experience from a New York City restaurant group that excelled in this area by offering specialized classes:

• Structured Learning: Regular food, wine, and spirit classes to deepen employees' product knowledge.

  Chip Klose [12:30]: "There was a method to the madness. And I'm so much better off. I'm such a better salesperson."

• Continuous Improvement: Encouraging employees to engage in ongoing education to enhance their sales techniques and service quality.

6. Sustaining Growth with Level Three Training

Level Three is about long-term development and retention. Chip advises regular interactions to understand employees' evolving personal and professional goals:

• Regular Check-ins: Monthly or quarterly meetings with both managers and hourly staff to discuss career aspirations and provide growth opportunities.

  Chip Klose [15:45]: "Understand where they are and what they care about, and then make sure you're supporting them."

• Pathways for Advancement: Creating roles like wine directors or assistant sommeliers to cater to employees' interests and strengths, thereby fostering loyalty and reducing turnover.

  Chip Klose [16:18]: "They had the level one, level two and level three training dialed in."

7. Practical Implementation Tips

Chip offers practical advice for restaurant owners to implement this training framework:

• Standardization: Use manila folders and set pars for training materials to ensure consistency.
• Engagement: Actively involve employees in their training journey with quizzes and feedback sessions.
• Flexibility: Adapt the frequency and structure of Level Two classes to fit your restaurant’s unique needs.

Chip Klose [14:01]: "I'm sure you could do one class... Where there's a will, there's a way."

8. Real-World Success Stories

Sharing his personal journey, Chip recounts how effective training transformed his roles and passion within the industry, illustrating the tangible benefits of a well-structured training program.

Chip Klose [17:10]: "This allowed me to do the very sexy part of the job... It sparked creativity and curiosity in me."

9. Conclusion: A Call to Action for Better Training

Chip wraps up by urging restaurant owners to commit to enhancing their training programs. By adopting the three-tiered approach, restaurants can significantly reduce turnover, foster employee loyalty, and ultimately improve profitability.

Chip Klose [19:00]: "If we do this, we can make a better industry. We can hold on to more people. Ultimately, that's going to breed loyalty between our customers and the people who serve them."

Additionally, Chip offers a free copy of his book, Restaurant Marketing Mindset, to listeners, encouraging them to leverage his insights for further growth.

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Key Takeaways

• High Turnover is Costly: With a 76% churn rate, improving training can save significant costs.
• Structured Training Enhances Retention: Implementing Level One, Two, and Three training can transform employee experience and loyalty.
• Continuous Development is Essential: Regular check-ins and opportunities for growth keep employees engaged and committed.
• Practical Steps Lead to Success: Standardized materials, active engagement, and flexible training schedules are crucial for effective training programs.
• Real-World Examples Validate the Approach: Success stories from industry leaders demonstrate the effectiveness of comprehensive training.

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By addressing the training shortcomings in the restaurant industry with a strategic, layered approach, Chip Klose provides actionable solutions aimed at building more profitable and sustainable restaurant businesses.

Transcript

[A]

Hey, so newsflash. We suck at training and we've sucked at training in this industry for a very long time. And that's a problem because most employees want to stay put. But they churn. We churn at roughly about a 76% rate industry wide. And what happens is it costs us anywhere between 30 and $45,000 per employee to replace that employee. Those numbers are provided industry wide. Several research studies have supported that. The bottom line is it goes back to the way that we first greet new hires when they walk in the door and the way we set them up for success. We're really bad at it, but we don't have to be.

[B]

We can get better.

[A]

I'm gonna talk to you on this episode about how we get a little bit better. Don't go anywhere.

[B]

There's an old saying that goes something like this. You'll only find three kinds of people in the world. Those who see, those who will never see, and those who can see when shown. This is Restaurant Strategy, a podcast answers for anyone who's looking.

[A]

Hey everyone, thanks for tuning in.

[B]

My name is Chip Close and this is Restaurant Strategy Podcast dedicated to helping.

[A]

You build a more profitable restaurant.

[B]

Each week I leverage my 25 years in the industry to help you build that more profit profitable and sustainable business.

[A]

I give talks all over the world.

[B]

On the topic of profitability. I wrote a book called the Restaurant Marketing Mindset which has everything to do with how we separate our brand from the competitors in the market. How do you make yours something that people crave? I run a Mastermind called the P3 mastermind geared towards independent operators helping them dial in their profitability. And then of course I have this podcast. Do me a favor. If you get any sort of value from this show, I want you to take just one minute, go to Apple Podcast, leave us a five star rating and review. Let people know what you've gotten out of the show and just let them know why you think they should tune into it. That more than anything else would help this my small business. It helps us grow our community. I'd be internally grateful again. Apple Podcasts 5 star rating review Just let people know why you love this show. Now Torque understands that expectations for food service, sustainability and guest experience are higher than ever. That's why Torque provides products and services that help restaurants meet those demands. With more than 50 years of global food service expertise, TORC can help you keep up with hygiene standards and food safety guidelines in all areas of your business. Front of house, back of house, restrooms and drive from Express Snap, the world's favorite napkin dispenser to multipurpose cleaning towels that clean smarter and high capacity restroom dispensers that reduce runouts. Torque offers better hygiene for better guests and staff experiences. You can check them out and get more [e-mail] Restaurant Again, that's T O R K usa.com Restaurant as always, you're going to find that link in the show notes. Now Pop Menu has reimagined the restaurant. They're breaking the mold of the menu, taking the kitchen doors off the hinges and serving up their most comprehensive technology solution yet. It's called Pop Menu Max.

[A]

It comes with all the previous ingredients.

[B]

That we've talked about on this podcast. On the podcast, right? So websites designed with SEO marketing tools that are meant to keep you top of mind with your guests and of course the patented interactive menu technology. But now this new recipe brings automated phone answering to the table, third party online order aggregation, wait listing and more. For example, Pop Menu's phone answering technology has your ringing phones covered with AI, right? Artificial intelligence. The simple questions that are now keeping your phone line tied can soon be handled by the computer without pulling a staff member from your in person hospitality. So no more missed reservations. No more having to tell people what your hours are. No more missed revenue. And that's just the beginning. You have a passion for food. Pop Menu has a passion for technology. Together, it's a recipe for restaurant success. And now even more digital ingredients are in their technology pantry. And Pop Menu is helping restaurants attract, engage, remarket and transact with their guests on a whole new level. Trust me, if you're a restaurant owner, you need Pop Menu to take your business to the next level. For a limited time, only get 100 bucks off your first month. Plus you get to lock in one unchanging monthly rate. Go to popmenu.com restaurantstrategy to claim this offer. Again, that's $100 off your first month by visiting pop m e n u.com restaurantstrategy and yes, you'll find that link in the show notes.

[A]

Now the churn in our industry is well known. The last piece of data I saw was that 76% of our staff turnover every single year. That's the majority of the people. It's the people you started off with at the beginning of this year will almost all be gone by the end of this year. That's insane. The bigger issue though is most of them are saying it's because they're not set up for success. They're not, they're not greeted the right way, they're not set up with the information and the training they need. The reality is we suck at training in this industry. We have sucked for a long time. I'm going to walk you through though, a better way of approaching training, right? So most of the time we do what I call level one training and really it's got to be level one, level two and level three. It's a three tiered approach to training and developing our team. And basically what we call training is really only level one and it's just not good enough. So level one training says, how can we get a new person ready to take a station on their own by the end of seven days? Level two training says, how can we get that person to be as good as our best person by the end of 90 days? That's a challenge. That's something we can embrace and try to hit. And then the last one says, how can we continue to develop that person so that they stay with us for the next decade? Seven days, 90 days, 10 years. That's how we should be thinking about training. Level one, level two, level three. It's a three tiered approach to training and we, most restaurants out there do not come anywhere close. We put people through three days of training and maybe give them a quiz at the end and then fire them off onto the floor without any understanding of whether they are ready. We haven't tested them, we haven't checked them, we haven't given them support or oversight to make sure that they are selling the things that we work so hard to create. It's unconscionable, absolutely unconscionable. And the biggest restaurants out there spend two weeks, three weeks, four weeks, they're managing, training their manager. Training programs are six weeks, eight weeks long. I mean, months at a time. And we usually train servers in three days, we train cooks in four days, we train a manager in a week and a half. It's insane. We suck at training. Let's embrace it. Let's swallow that pill and say we can do better. The way we do better and the way I would like you to do better is thinking of this in terms of level one, level two and level three again, Level one, how do we get somebody ready to take a station on their own by the end of seven days?

[B]

Level two, how do we get them.

[A]

To be as good as our best person by the end of 90 days? And then level three, how do we continue to support them and develop them over the course of the next decade? Right. So it's basically setting goals for ourselves, challenging ourselves to accomplish those things. And if you do that, your restaurant will be, be better for it. So let's go in. How do we do it? When we talk about training, level one training, let's start here. You greet the person at the front door with a new hire packet. That new hire packet has the employee handbook, the service manual, the menu descriptions, all of their new hire paperwork that they have to fill out to be onboarded in the first place. You've got a floor plan, you've got the philosophy, you've got everything in there that they need. It's literally you set it up in a manila folder, you put that in a filing cabinet, have 10 of them made for front of house, 10 of them made for back of house. Set pars on those things. I used to do this all the time, set pars for those things, just like you set pars in the kitchen. So when it falls below 10, you got to print off some and prepare another new hire packet. Then when you have a new hire starting on Thursday, you know they're arriving Thursday at 4:00. You just have to grab that folder at 3:50 and go upstairs, meet them at the front door. You literally will wait at the podium or set at a chair at the bar and you wait for them to walk in and you greet them. Hi, my name is Chip. I'm so glad to have you on board. Here's your packet. We'll go through all of this in a minute.

[B]

Let's get your stuff, let's stow away.

[A]

Your stuff and let me give you a tour of the place. Welcome them, greet them, show them around, make them feel like you are ready for them.

[B]

This is the place for them.

[A]

This is how you make them feel valued. And if that seems stupid or overly simplistic, you'd be amazed at how infrequently it happens and what a big impression that makes on the new hires that we bring on board. So have the new hire packet ready, greet them at the front door, you give them a tour, you sit them down, you say, great, now fill out your paperwork, let's make copies of all your, all your information and then we'll, and then I'll talk to you about what's going to happen the rest of the night. Then you sit down and you say, day one of training is this. You are going to be with so and so. You pass them off, you hand them off at the end of every training session. I say, you should be sitting down with Them or one of your managers should be sitting down with them. I always say you should be giving them a quiz at the end of every day. Not as a pop quiz, not as a gotcha. You're going to tell them, say, hey, listen, these are the things I need you to learn by the end of the shift. We're going to give you a quiz at the end to make sure you've internalized those things. So, hey, what's our phone number? What's our address? What's the name of the chef, what's the name of the gm? What's our phone number? What's our website? What are our two signature dishes, what are the table numbers, what are the seat numbers? Those are things that let's say a new server can certainly pick up over the course of a six hour training shift. And what happens is that we make sure that they've internalized all that because there's going to be more information for them on day two and day three and day four. We want to make sure that every day is stacking and we are bringing them along at the end of every training shift. I sincerely believe you should give them a little quiz. Eight questions, ten questions for back of house and front of house, and then you should sit down with them, take the temperature of the water, ask them, hey, what did you see? What did you like? What did you not like? What questions do you have? What confused you? How can I continue to get you where I need you to get? You do that at the end of every single training shift, whether that's 4, 5, 6, 7, 10 training shifts, whatever it is, give them a little quiz at the end and sit down with them and talk to them. If there are issues, you'll know that on night one or night two, that's how you don't invest. Seven days of training, maybe you learn in two days, hey, there's something off about this person. Hey, I don't think they're really drinking the Kool Aid the way we need them to. Then you separate there rather than going through and investing Day three, day four, day five, day six, day seven. That's the way you make that really great. I think everybody should have some sort of test at the end. So if it's a server, it's a bartender, it's some sort of written test or maybe, maybe a verbal test for a cook, let's say, or a prep cook. You need to see their skills. You need to see that they have, that they have taken on, that they've internalized all the things that they've been taught, right? If you're starting them on garment, do they know how to do the prep? Do they know how to do their meats? Do they know how to execute certain dishes that will come off garmo, Right? You need to test that. You need to know. You need to know if they're ready to do that. That's how we dial in level one training again. There's a lot of stuff I'm sure you do. I'm sure you do it really well. Those are the ways to dial it in. Tighten the screws on level one. Level two is something that almost no restaurant does. Big restaurant groups do it right. The chains will do it really, really well. What I need you to do is embrace this idea that you need to teach them more than you've taught them just in their first seven days. Now, I always give the example. The first restaurant group I worked for in New York City did this exceedingly well. New servers, for example. So this restaurant was 400 seats in the heart of Times Square, 75 servers on the schedule. You gotta believe that 80% of them were green right off the bus. Didn't have any idea about any of the food or products they were serving. And so for the first 12 weeks, they basically took 12 food classes every Monday, 12 wine classes every Wednesday, 12 spirit classes every Friday. So for the first three months, they had to do food classes on Monday, wine classes on Wednesday, spirit classes on Friday. The idea being that I think we can teach them more about our menu, about the products we serve. And I hated it when I was coming up, it drove me crazy. It was just. It felt like such a waste of time. It was. It was really encroaching upon my life, my lifestyle, all of that. But at the end of it, I gotta tell you, I was like, I see. I understand. There was a method to the madness. And I'm so much better off. I'm such a better salesperson. I appreciate this industry more. It sparked creativity and curiosity in me. That was level two training, right? How they continued to teach us and better us over the course of those first three months. The idea is, how can you get somebody to be as good as your best person by the end of 90 days? That's a good way to start.

[B]

Now, do you have to do three.

[A]

Classes a week every single week over the. No, probably not. Could you do one class?

[B]

Could you do 12 classes?

[A]

So every Friday from 3 to 4, there's a class, and basically, new hires are given a punch card, and they have to do those 12 classes, meaning if they start and we're at week seven, they do 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, and they go around and do 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Could you do that? I'm sure you could.

[B]

Where there's a will, there's a way.

[A]

And there's probably things you can teach them that will help them be better salespeople on the floor that will help them be better at their job and be better for you. That's level two training. Finally, level three training is absolutely crucial. Right. This has to do with development. I think you should be meeting with your managers every month, and I should think you should be meeting with your hourly employees, your line level employees, at least once a quarter, right? At least once a quarter. If you want to meet with them every month, too, great. But at least once a quarter. Our professional lives exist to serve our personal lives. What we really want to do is hang out with our family and friends and do the things that we care about and travel and all of that. But most of us are not independently wealthy, so we need to make money to be able to do the things that we want to do. That's our professional life. Our professional life is in service of our personal life. And you have to keep tabs. You have to keep your finger on the pulse of where your people are. Our priorities change. Certainly for me, and I'm guessing for all of you, the things that I cared about and were important to me at 20 were different than at 30 and 40 and on. And I'm sure it's the same for you and all of your people. So understand where they are and what they care about, and then make sure you're supporting them and make sure that you're seeing the people who are ready for more, who are interested in more, and you give them paths forward. I'm going to use an example again from that very first restaurant group that I worked in when I first moved to New York City. One of the things they did is they looked at people who are really good servers who had an aptitude and an interest in wine, let's say. And each of their 12 restaurants in New York City had a wine director. That wine director pretty much worked Tuesday through Saturday. So they had Sundays and Mondays off. Those were our slower nights. And if they were going to take two nights off and they needed to.

[B]

Take two days off, those are the.

[A]

Nights they were going to take off. And somewhere along the way, some enterprising individual at the corporate headquarters said, hey, you know what? There are people who really care about wine. And I wonder if we paid them a shift pay of, let's say, $250 and had them put on a suit and walk around with a wine list and speak intelligently about wine if we would sell more wine. Here's the coolest part. What they discovered is that having somebody, even if they were ill equipped and didn't certainly have the knowledge that these wine directors did, just putting somebody on the floor in a suit, talking to tables about wine increased their wine sales. So it didn't matter if this person was as qualified as the wine director, just somebody speaking passionately, intelligently about wine sold more wine. It was a win win. Because on the other side, that server who got to put on a soup for a night, right, Felt like, oh, I get to try this on. I get to see if I like doing this. And one of the trade offs is they would have these servers, right? And P.S. i was one of these people who showed an aptitude and a real interest in wine. And they said, hey, on Sunday nights, do you want to sell wine on the floor? We'll pay you shift pay of 250 bucks and feed you at the end of the night. No brainer. Absolutely. And part of what I also had to do was I had to help check in orders and I had to help be basically a seller rat. And I learned how to do inventory and I learned how to check in log invoices and check in orders and make sure everything was correct. Was that the sexy part of the job? It certainly was not, but it allowed me to do the very sexy part of the job, which sort of went. Took me down that path. Now doing that, I realized, oh, no, this is not what I want. I'm glad I had the opportunity. But for every one of me who said, oh, this is not what I want to do, there were three others who went, oh, God, I love this. I definitely want to do more of this. And they then were shepherded into wine director positions. So an assistant sommelier. I saw my a wine director and they were given other opportunities. So my point being that they had the level one, level two and level three training dialed in. And to be honest, it's not that hard. It begins by understanding what your people want, want and need out of this job and then putting yourself in a position and putting. Providing them with opportunities to do those things, to check those things out. That's how you keep people for longer than a year. That's how we get out of this. 76% churn. You make sure you understand what your people need and keep providing them with new ways to get what they need. I started off by saying we suck at training and I'll finish by saying we don't have to suck at training. Do this thing. Challenge yourself to just continue to grow and broaden your existing training program. I'm telling you, it's not that hard. It doesn't take a lot of effort. If we do this, we can make a better industry. We can hold on to more people. Ultimately, that's going to breed loyalty between our customers and the people who serve them. It's going to be better for all of us. Listen, I appreciate you guys taking the time to be here. One final reminder, right I wrote a book and if you go to my Instagram page, right so restaurantstrategy, so erantstrategy and if you DM the word book, we'll send you a link where you can get the book absolutely for free. The book is called the Restaurant Marketing Mindset. It's mercifully short, 207 pages, I think, but it shows you all these series of systems, frameworks and mindset shifts that are going to help you be better at marketing. I don't talk about it a lot, but we did this about a month ago. We gave away 100 copies of the book. It was such a hit that we've decided to give away another hundred copies of the book.

[B]

So it's totally free.

[A]

You just pay 392 in shipping and then as a part of that, you get a month long free access to our Restaurant Foundations program, totally free included in that. Best way to do that is to go to our instagram [e-mail] us the word book. There's an automation. It'll pop up and provide you with the link to get the book totally for free. Go do that now.

[B]

Get a copy of the book.

[A]

We'll throw it in the mail by the end of the day tomorrow. Thank you guys very much for making making time for this podcast. I appreciate you and I will see you next.