There is no doubt that there are some great examples of focussed, progressive training programmes around hospitality today. You can see silky cultures guided with training as soon as you walk through the doors of some properties. That said, there are vast voids of areas with minimal training or no training at all. Why is this?
In a survey of 231 hotels the following top 5 reasons were highlighted as preventing training being undertaken in the workplace.
- The cost of training doesn’t produce ROI.
- The business is too busy to train and develop.
- The calibre of staff we have are poor.
- Staff say they don’t get paid enough to bother.
- HOD’s require train-the-trainer coaching.
What I found true of these replies is that none of these issues can’t be quickly fixed and yet all of these replies point to a cultural failure either in part or fully.
Key Question: Who owns the duty of training in your business?
The Mechanics of Successful Training – no matter who you have to play with.
Each of the 10 points below begins with a headline strategy followed by t rationalisation of concept
1. Training should be daily, in micro burst documented and planned 10-15 minute sessions, 7 days a week around a cyclic repeating programme 30 days long, in all departments.
Building a culture of training begins at the interview where candidates are sold the dream of a career with potential promotion rather than just a job. This filter will light up the eyes of some candidates but frighten off those who have no passion for the trade. Those in the middle are worth hiring too. Use team briefings each day to drive in more knowledge, focus on new and existing skills, enhance sales opportunities and understand how all departments need to keep pace with each other.
2. Don’t just train the task, train the people to do the task at the very best standard they can, and to empower and equip people to drive forward.
Once induction is completed in many hotels that signals the end of their training. They’re unlikely to receive any focussed training again and will wallow around their role forever and a day. The daily training helps push higher and higher standards. There’s suddenly quite a bit to think about and all of a sudden the team begin to feed of each others growth and development.
3. Follow the 90:10 rule. 90% is what they should be perfecting now. The exciting 10% emerges around what’s coming next. Link content into PDR’s and sign off.
A perfect example of this was experienced in a hotel when we were undertaking cocktail training. The 90% represented the day to day refinement and technique. The 10% was the steady introduction of smoked cocktails, frozen cocktails and cocktails. At the end of the process the bar team were totally running the show and delivered the widest cocktail list in the region.
4. Make training inter-generational and fun. Different generations learn in different ways. Mix it up. How you teach is secondary to how people learn. If your team don’t learn it maybe because you’re a poor teacher.
How a 50 year old waitress learns is completely different to your Gen Z or Millennials. The former prefer written documentation (mostly) whilst the latter generation want info on their app (Hotel Academy), videos and photographs. Play to your audience.
5. Supervisors aren’t just more senior people who organise things. Supervisors must manage team performance and assist in increasing team quality and efficiency.
The title of supervisor may just be the most misunderstood role in hospitality and points to grey area that requires greater definition. Often used as a promotional chair to retain staff leaving for promotion elsewhere, the true job description for a supervisor seems to alternate between what they used to do (for more money) and not being fully trained to deputise for the HOD. The supervisor role seems to have become a destination in which team members seem to stagnate. The truth is that the role of supervisor is just a stepping stone of a journey, a journey not all businesses have fully mapped out. Our live PDR’s take this grey area.
6. Avoid cliched, clever terms. Keep training language simple and include everyone at every level, again and again and again.
This is a term that represents low hanging fruit as you reach out to your team. It’s important that they get ahead of the curve and put the hard yards in! I hear you yawning already! The most effective language of training is the simplest you can make it. The fire and passion within your training is what makes the most impact.
7. Test your team frequently with online tests to support current and future products and services. You must validate your training and who’s listening.
One of the biggest disappointments when it comes to service is repeatedly a lack of product and property knowledge. The amount of times I receive a ‘don’t know’ or ‘I’ll check’ is exhausting and quite frustrating from a guest perspective. If your team don’t know the product they’ll never see the sales opportunity. Your team need to be much more than arms and legs, they need to have sales radars. By testing your team frequently (uGrow+), you’ll not only know what your team know but it will also top off their knowledge and thus maximise sales.
8. Assist your trainers with Train the Trainer. GM’s should be getting involved and signing off training content.
The transition from floor staff to supervisor and then to HOD MUST include an element of train the trainer. I’ve worked with so many great floor managers whose Achilles heel was that they just couldn’t get their heads around what structured training looks like, how it’s measured and how it’s output shapes development. If the GM hasn’t time to assist with this then an external training resource needs to be brought in.
9. If it’s just a job for the trainer, it’ll just be a job for those being trained. Inspirational training needs an injection of passion.
When promoting an individual within your business your effectively repositioning their energy, influence and positivity and in doing so broadening the culture base you’re looking for. If you promote for the wrong reasons (staff retention), you may end up with someone of influence who brings little or no positivity to the party.
10. Training costs money but register the fact that 4 trained waiters can do the job of 7 untrained waiters. Think what 7 trained waiters could do.
This old chestnut focusses on focussing on the cost of head count rather than the commercial capability of your team. If you have a fully trained team who can focus on great hospitality with commercial awareness you can literally increase your restaurant revenue by 50%. But this does depend on you understanding the vital role training plays within this scenario.
This falls to departmental managers having the strengths to constantly (and politely)
