People Management Techniques for Reducing Restaurant Problems

It is said that good employees are a battle half won. It sounds funny, but anybody who has worked on a restaurant business before knows that good employees (good attitudes + good abilities) who work in the restaurant can eliminate more than half of the problems and headaches occurring in the restaurant. This is because half the problems inside restaurants originate from employees. These problems include frequently arriving late, not working to meet restaurant standards, working in their own ways, using mobile phones while working, not paying attention to customers, looking frown and tense, not cheering for sales of snacks, preferring to stand around and chat, working too slowly and lots of other problems. Regardless of whether there are lots or few problems, employee problems exist almost everywhere and in almost every business. So are there some ways to prevent employees from becoming problems? The answer is yes. If you do the things that we are about to tell you, a lot of problems inside your restaurant can be eliminated or appropriately managed and kept from escalating.

Step 1: Create disciplinary rules.

You have to set these clearly from the very beginning and in accordance with Thai labor laws. The issues that you have to set regulations for are as follows:
–Salary cycle format. Salaries are paid by what channels, every which day and for how much?
–How many types of leaves does the restaurant have? How many days can each type of leave be taken per year? And are these leaves paid? Do employees receive leave entitlements as soon as they start work, after they complete probation, or after one year?
–What are the disciplinary actions for employees? In cases of wrongdoing, light and severe punishments have to be set accordingly.
–The restaurant’s methods for calculating OT and benefits for employees.
–Appropriate dress code and other work conditions.

If no specifications exist for these things, a problem that will later occur is the use of “double standards”.

Step 2: Specify the characteristics and duties of each work position.

For example, what are the required characteristics of waiters? What is the preferred age and gender? Are there educational requirements for job applications? What are the primary and secondary roles of waiters? All of these things have to be set to provide clarity for employees working in each position and for use in measuring the monthly performance of employees.

Step 3: Specify salary levels for each work position.
For example, salaries for waiters can be set in the range of 10,000-12,000 baht, and remark that inexperienced employees will receive 10,000 baht for their salaries, while employees with six months to one year of experience will receive 11,000 baht, and employees with more than one year of experience with a previous salary base can receive more than 12,000 baht. If an experienced employee can perform only one work position and cannot work in other positions, the employee can receive 12,000 baht, while employees who can work in many different positions such as in the kitchen, at the bar or waiting tables, these employees may be given consideration for receiving more than 12,000 baht salaries, etc.

Setting salary levels also benefits labor management.

Step 4: Specify the restaurant’s manpower requirements.
For example, specify the restaurant management team, waiters, order-takers, cashiers, head chef, cutting board employees, Thai stove employees, Western stove employees, dish washers, etc. Specify how many people are needed in each position for effective work operation.

Step 5: Set career tracks for advancement.
Do this because one major cause of resignations is lack of prospects for career advancements. Lack of prospects for career advancements cause employees to stay for awhile and then leave. Therefore, entrepreneurs should specify clearly how many months or years each position becomes eligible for a promotion and salary raise. Also specify eligibility conditions and so on. If you can perform all of these five steps, you should be able to reduce problems related to employee management. As the last tip in employee management, in order to reduce problems, every business owner should view employees like members of your own families and believe that they can improve and be built into great employees. If you don’t have these beliefs, it will be difficult to develop employees into good employees. If all you do day after day is point out their faults and criticize, believe it that they will feel like you don’t trust them and if they have some where they could go one day they are going to immediately leave you.