Archive for June, 2007

Join My New “Marketing Coach” Program

Join now and get 50% off a Restaurant Coaching Solutions “Basic Coaching” package!

Popularity: 3% [?]

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Marketing Can Be Fun, Amazingly Simple & Work!

What’s the most creative way of playing with your guests you have come up with?

Try this one on for size!

Popularity: 11% [?]

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Kid Stuff

If you cater to children and their families, you really need to look at this product and consider putting it on your kid’s menus.

Dog On It! 

Popularity: 10% [?]

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SBA introduces new loan program for military

The Small Business Administration on Wednesday unveiled a government-backed loan program especially for members of the U.S. military. The loan program – named the Patriot Express Pilot Loan Initiative — is built on the SBA’s Express 7(a) loan program and will grant loans of up to $500,000 to U.S. veterans, certain active-duty military, reservists, National Guard members and spouses. The program will require that borrowers pledge collateral on amounts over $350,000. The agency says the loans will carry interest rates of 2.25% to 4.75% over prime, depending on the size and maturity of the loan, and will be SBA-backed for 85% of the loan value for loans up to $150,000 and 75% guaranteed by the SBA for larger loan amounts. Those interest rates and loan guaranty levels are the best the SBA offers, the agency says.

The loans will be available for “most business purposes, including start-up, expansion, equipment purchases, working capital, inventory, or business-occupied real-estate purchases,” according to an SBA news release.

“More than 14% of businesses in America are owned by veterans, and SBA is proud that we guarantee more than $1 billion annually in loans for veteran-owned businesses,” SBA Administrator Steven Preston said in the release.

Popularity: 9% [?]

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Questions From Readers

Q: I have been asked to become the GM of my restaurant - I am currently the AM. The previous GM ran things into the ground to the point that everything pretty much sucks. The owner is no help. What can I do to turn things around?

A: Working with Your Boss. You must first make sure you have the owner’s mandate for the level of change that is necessary to turn this place around - without it, you are just wasting time. Identify specific strategies for conversations with the individual who can most impact their transition’s success: your boss.

Diagnosing Your Situation. Given that all transitions are unique, this task provides a framework that helps identify the most critical skills and strategies to apply in this unique transition - and which ones to NOT!

Assessing Your Situation and Yourself. You have to first realize that any negative attitudes and comments need to stay in your head. You cannot vocalize about “…how bad things are screwed up…”. You will kill any goodwill you have with the staff and help to perpetuate the negative culture that exists. Also, many leaders fail because they rely too heavily on the success of actions they previously took—actions that were appropriate in a different context. Identify your potential strengths to leverage—as well as your vulnerabilities that could significantly impact the transition.

Accelerating Your Learning. You must learn a vast amount of information at the beginning of a transition. Learn the guests, staff, the systems the good and the bad before you begin to change the situation. Then…

Prioritize to Succeed. Coaches have much to do in a limited amount of time. Identify early wins and establish A-item priorities to ensure short- and long-term success. Eliminate inefficiencies in the existing systems by focusing on refining your food cost, beverage cost and labor cost as soon as possible so that any business increases you start to effect will allow more profit to flow through to the bottom line while you fix the rest of your business.

Building Your Team. Speaking of culture, that’s what you have to work on. You must become the walking talking expert and Coach for everyone. Be positive and find good behavior to reward. Start now to create the type of high-performance culture you need to be successful in the future. While a Coach is in transition, so is his or her team. Focus on building a team to generate team momentum. Remember to never waste time solving a problem you can eliminate. Get rid of the C & D level people now. It would be better for you to run short handed than to keep these people aboard who will do everything in their power to maintain their status quo. Plus you wont be able to hire “A” level staff when they see the “C’s” and “D’s” they must work with. Also, do not befriend any of the staff. Be a leader - yes. But do not fall into the trap of the employee who bemoans the previous management and is instantly your best buddy/employee. Maintain your distance with them. You may have to terminate anyone at any time as you uncover the “dirt”.

Popularity: 8% [?]

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Questions From Readers

Q: “What can you do to make people care about service?”

A: “Nothing.”

[Could be service, food, sales, profits, cleanliness, organization, manners, other people, etc...]

You can’t make people care about anything. They have to care about something on their own. The only thing you can do with people who don’t care about your business is to replace them with people who will. Same goes for motivating people. You don’t motivate people. You can only create an environment in which they are inspired enough to motivate themselves to do better work.

Popularity: 6% [?]

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Try This On For Size

“Maybe the reason it seems that price is all your guests care about is that you haven’t given them anything else to care about.”

Hmmmmm…..

Popularity: 2% [?]

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Seth On Coachability

Now when Seth starts talking about Coaching, isn’t it time you got off your butt and started moving yourself - and your business - to the next level?

Check it out here..

Popularity: 7% [?]

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Tired Of High Chairs In The Way?

Check this out…No More High Chairs!

Popularity: 6% [?]

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Service Pet Peeve Numero Uno!

“Hi Guys.”

When a server walks up to a table of mixed gender and says “Hi Guys”, we in the service business call this a “poor” welcoming statement.

A welcoming statement should do many things, but what it shouldn’t do is alienate one of the genders sitting at the table – or her husband!

I’ve met very few ladies that like being called a guy. In fact, I have a friend who couldn’t get a female free-lance designer to work on his project because he put “Hi Guys” as the opening of an email he sent. Ouch!

If you catch your staff using this phrase with guests, pull him or her aside and offer some Coaching. Have them prepare a planned welcoming statement to use with their guests. “Hi Everyone…” or “Hello thanks for coming in today…” are some simple examples that won’t offend.

A well planned out and rehearsed welcoming statement will make it much easier to break the habit of saying “Hi Guys”.

Popularity: 4% [?]

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