Article

Use Systems to Improve the Guest Experience in Your Restaurant

If we could not convince you of the critical importance of operations systems in your kitchen before the pandemic, then consider the following. If you were primarily a full-service concept now serving a significant portion of your meals via curbside and delivery, you have limited opportunities to save an inconsistent or bad meal.

When guests dine on-premises, you can fix problems quickly. When a guest discovers the eggplant parmesan he enjoyed last time at your restaurant fell flat the second time he ordered it, or finds chicken parmesan in the to-go container (and he is vegetarian), you've lost control over the experience. Is he going to return to your restaurant to complain? More likely, he will complain to his friends and family.

The success or failure for most restaurants is typically tied to operations. If you want to ensure your customers receive the ultimate guest experience you must focus your attention on improving the systems that most influence your guests -- your operational systems

Moreover, systems not only ensure consistency and guest satisfaction, they help with your cost control, which is also especially vital when you are fighting for every penny. The success or failure for most restaurants is typically tied to operations. If you want to ensure your customers receive the ultimate guest experience you must focus your attention on improving the systems that most influence your guests -- your operational systems.

The time-tested message of the restaurant business is as relevant today as it was last year: Why in the world would we want to spend so much effort on marketing simply to gain first-time customers, unless we are certain that we can deliver a guest experience good enough to make them want to come back.

You see, if we cannot ensure a great guest experience then the only thing aggressive marketing will accomplish is to let more people know faster that we are not a great restaurant. A bad shift is an opportunity to turn off guests in your and their dining rooms and ensure they will never return - let alone recommend you to their friends and family.

Systems Are the Only Method for Ensuring a Consistent Guest Experience

A system is a procedure, process or series of actions designed to achieve specific results. An excellent system is one that achieves the intended results 100 percent of the time. When we speak of systems, Ray Kroc and McDonald's come to mind. Kroc built the McDonald's empire by systematizing every aspect of their operation. In doing so he not only established the McDonald's brand as one of consistency and dependability, he also created a system for duplicating that McDonald's has more than 35,000 restaurants.

The reasons for success of the chain restaurants should not be lost on the independent restaurateur. Keep in mind that every chain restaurant began as a single, independent operator. By establishing systems and processes they were able to duplicate the successes of their first store.

If you liken a business to a "stool," every enterprise, including restaurants, has three legs: finance, marketing, and operations. If one of these legs is missing or weak, you know what happens.

It's critical to develop systems in each of these core areas. Marketing systems help to establish your brand and your guests' expectations. You need financial management systems to maintain profitability.

That said, the success or failure for most restaurants is typically tied to operations. If you want to ensure your customers receive the ultimate guest experience you must focus your attention on improving the systems that most influence your guests -- your operational systems.

Operational systems include:

• Back-of-the-house systems.
• Front-of-the-house systems.
• Management systems.
• Personnel systems.
• Catering/banquet/delivery systems.

Back-of-the-house systems include kitchen management and the dish room. Improving your back-of-house systems ultimately improves the consistency of your product. For instance, if your restaurant constantly runs out of product in the middle of a shift, you may need to revisit your purchasing and receiving systems.

Specific Tools

One of the most basic tools for kitchen management is an order guide. The order guide lists all products your restaurant uses and includes a column for par levels. Consistency in the amount of product available is achieved by simply ordering a sufficient amount of product to bring the amount on hand up to the par.

Another common tool used in the back of the house to ensure availability and quality is the line checklist. Line checklists typically include a listing of all products, utensils and other supplies needed to stock a particular station such as the sauté or fry station. Line checks are typically conducted prior to the beginning of the shift. Line checks should be used to not only ensure the proper amount of product is available on the line but also to visually inspect the quality.

Some of the other tools used in kitchen management systems include recipe manuals with specific portions, procedures and daily prep lists to ensure prep-ahead items, such as sauces, prepared produce or other preassembled items needed for the line, are available in sufficient quantities.

These are just some of the standard tools used in restaurant kitchens across the country. The systems you incorporate in your restaurant need to ensure that hot food is served hot and cold food is served cold. If your restaurant does not have these very basic systems and simply relies on the memory of the kitchen manager or chef to keep shelves full or maintain consistency in the recipes, then your efforts to provide the ultimate guest experience are being undermined.

Front Is Center

While kitchen management systems used in the back of house chiefly dictate the quality of product you serve, it's ultimately the front of the house and management systems that have the greatest effect on the guest experience. Regardless of whether you are a quick-service restaurant, casual-theme or fine dining establishment, to create a predictable guest experience requires a plan for each step along the way.

I stated earlier how your marketing systems should be geared toward lead generation and lead conversion. I've also established how marketing and word of mouth play a huge role in creating guest expectations for your restaurant. The next logical step in the lead conversion process is for your new guest to actually come to your restaurant. So, if we want to plan the entire guest experience for our customers, the first thing you need to do is to view that experience from your customers' eyes. What is it they will first see when driving up to your restaurant? Will it be an attractive sign and immaculate landscaping? Or, will they see a littered parking lot, dirty windows and burned-out lighting? It's human nature for first impressions to shape our expectations. When you see flaws in the beginning it's only natural to wonder what other flaws are to come.

It is the responsibility of management to prepare the restaurant for business every shift. The manager opening, shift change and closing checklists are essential tools for keeping restaurants in a state of readiness. The opening checklist is particularly important and should include a detailed check of everything that needs to be done prior to opening.

For example, it may begin with walking the exterior of the property to ensure parking lot debris has been picked up, signs and lighting are in good working order and have been turned on, a visual inspection of the building and property for maintenance issues, and windows and doors have been cleaned. It should also include making sure the interior is ready to receive guests such as checking the lighting level, temperature control or background music. There should be cleanliness checks for specific areas such as the lobby, restrooms and dining room. Opening checklist should also include a list of managerial functions that should be completed, such as making a bank deposit, reading the manager logbook for notes from the previous shift or placing vendor orders for product.

In addition to the manager's checklist, each position should have a checklist to ensure their stations are likewise prepared. Bartenders should use checklists to make sure sufficient product is on hand, glassware is clean and ice bins are filled. Servers should have a list of station duties with specific instructions to be completed prior to opening.

One of the most important systems for every restaurant is the system they establish for greeting, order processing and payment settlement. In other words, the service experience. The service experience should be intentional, with specific time allotments for each step. The service steps for a full-service restaurant differ from that of a quick-serve or counter-service restaurant.

The chart below illustrates the basic service steps for a full-service restaurant and begins once the guest has been seated. The hostess should have a similar chart outlining the proper method for greeting customers, seating them and handling reservations and the waitlist.

The service steps chart is an important training tool that links the front-of-the-house service cycle with the back-of-the-house food preparation timing. Many a kitchen has been put in the weeds when too many orders are requested at one time. For every kitchen line - whether big or small, and dependent upon the number of cooks manning it -- there is a limitation to the maximum number of menu items they can prepare at any one time. Therefore, it is important to design your service system to match the kitchen line capacity.

Better Systems Means Better People

The systems you design should be geared toward meeting the basic service expectations that are common to all restaurants. These are:

• Prompt acknowledgment.
• Courteous and well-groomed staff.
• Timely service.
• Hot food hot and cold food cold.
• Consistency.
• Professionalism.
• Attentiveness.
• Cleanliness and sanitization.
• Comfortable dining experience.

Independent operators much too often rely on good people rather than good systems. What they fail to realize is if you want to develop good people you must first have good systems. Statistician W. Edwards Deming, who is attributed with launching the total quality management era in global manufacturing, told us that difficulties in business are never really people problems, only system problems. If you develop the right systems, including systems for hiring and training the right people, then the results should be predictable.

If you want to create a better culture in your restaurant, then you must have good systems. Culture can be defined as a set of shared attitudes, values, goals and practices that characterizes an organization. How people think, feel and act while they're on the job is a result of the culture created. Your restaurant's culture is not something that should happen by chance -- it must be intentional.

If you're serious about establishing a better culture, then you cannot rely on seat-of-the-pants-style training for new employees. Many operators stick the new guy with "one of our best" servers and then hope that they're able to learn "how we do it." The problem with this approach is that the new employee learns the way the others do it, not necessarily the way you want things done. Over time, bad habits, shortcuts and self-serving attitudes take precedence over doing what's expected. If you want to be successful in creating a better culture, you must be willing to provide them the resources and proper training to do their jobs according to systems you have in place.

CHECKLISTS ARE CRITICAL

Checklists are arguably the most important part of any system for any business. Airplanes cannot afford to break down and "pull to the side of the road" in the middle of a flight. A restaurant cannot afford to break down in the middle of a shift. It is truly "showtime," and you risk alienating dozens of guests who will not return and caution their friends and family about the experience.

Here we divided the service experience into 12 different steps beginning with the table greeting and ending with the table turn. The first column lists the different steps. The second column lists the service time goals for each step. The third column lists the expected amount of time needed for product preparation and the fourth column lists the objectives you want to accomplish at each step.

Keep in mind the service steps for your restaurant may differ due to your unique menu or service style. The meal preparation times for a fine dining restaurant will obviously be longer than that of a casual-theme restaurant specializing in burgers and salads. Remember also that your guest may want to draw out the dining experience, and therefore the timing for when each step begins will depend upon your guest. But once a step is initiated it's important that the delivery or prep time of that step adheres to your system.

GOT LAGNIAPPE?

If asked, the majority of restaurant patrons would probably tell you that the ultimate guest experience for them is for a restaurant to simply meet their expectations. It's true; simply delivering basic service expectations goes a long way in building customer loyalty. However, to create a truly memorable experience, one that your customers will most certainly tell others about, a restaurant should go beyond the expectations by delivering something extra. The term "lagniappe" is often used in southern Louisiana and Southeast Texas when providing the guest with something unexpected -- a bonus or indirect benefit. A restaurant that differentiates itself from its competition is more likely to develop positive word of mouth. For as long as there have been restaurants there have been restaurateurs with creative points of difference. For instance, Truluck's, a 12-unit steak and seafood fine dining restaurant, is often remembered by its patrons, among other things, for the complimentary mouthwash dispenser in its restrooms.

La Casa del Caballo, a fine Mexican steakhouse with a passion for fire-seared beef located in Houston, goes out of its way to provide something extra. Parties celebrating a birthday are greeted with a complimentary glass of champagne -- immediately upon being seated. When ordering a steak or other item requiring a steak knife, guests are presented with a beautiful wooden box containing specially designed, high-carbon Henckels steak knives to choose from. At the end of the meal servers are trained to ask the guest if they have a valet ticket, upon which the waiter takes to the valet so the car will be waiting when they leave.

Restaurateurs are typically a creative bunch. With a little thought and effort you'll find it is not really that hard to come up with points of difference. It just takes a little planning. Once you understand your restaurant's key business drivers and work to create systems to ensure your guests' expectations are met, you'll be well on your way to creating the ultimate guest experience -- sprinkled with a dash of lagniappe.