Having the natural ability to manage is one of the big parts of becoming a truly successful manager. Knowing how to handle a variety of complex social situations and having excellent communication skills definitely make the job easier. As with any natural talent, however, maintaining that level of ability requires a willingness to learn more about the technical aspects of the job. We’re going to go over what a restaurant business coach is and how hiring one can not only help your management be the best they can, but help your whole team with business tactics as well.
What is a Restaurant Business Coach?
A restaurant business coach is someone you hire to assist you in fixing or creating a successful business plan for your restaurant to run your establishment more efficiently. They’ll help you implement and create systems that keep all your ducks in a row how you’d like them to be. Things should be operating in such a way that even when you’re not there, your values and operational standards will be. You’ll be able to run things how you want without confusion, micromanaging, or guessing. This includes creating and maintaining an appropriate budget, what your core values and mission statement are, and other business aspects of running a restaurant that is often overlooked.
What Would a Restaurant Business Consultant Coach My Team On?
Restaurant business coaches are there to help you transform your restaurant into a well-oiled machine. Your staff is one of the most important parts of this machine and it’s essential to coach them on the expectations you have to run your restaurant.
- Management. A restaurant business coach teaches your management team how to manage in a way that honors staff, customers, and the restaurant itself. Business is business, so taking the leadership skills management already has and guiding it through the context of leading through a business setting can help increase management confidence and competency. It’ll also make it easier to set management standards so there’s no guessing about what’s protocol given a variety of situations.
- How to sell more. When your restaurant business coach helps you better define what your restaurant values, the style of service you do, and other things that hammer down your identity, your staff will have an easier time selling. You can then talk more about how to better upsell to your customers, what your expectations are for customer service, and any other rules or standards that align with your establishment.
- Cost cutting. The time it takes to hire and train new staff will be far less once you have a fully fleshed-out business plan. As the old saying goes, ‘time is money’. Your management team will have a much easier time training new employees and getting them into tangible work sooner than you would with little to no plan at all. Proper training is an important aspect of employee retention as well on both ends. Your new staff will feel secure and ready to work with the training they receive, while your management will be able to confidently train new staff with no issue or ambiguity.
- Effective delegation of tasks. Your team will know exactly what their “mise in place” looks like. Initially, the shift from having no real direction to having a lot of direction feels like micromanagement, but at the end of the day, your team will have a lot more room to think about making delicious experiences for your customers. Your restaurant business coach is giving your team the tools to think less about the small tasks they have to do every day. Everyone will know what needs to be done and everyone will be on the same page about who’s doing what.
What Does Hiring a Restaurant Business Coach Help With?
A restaurant business coach helps your management team blossom. A common complaint many service workers have is a lack of upward mobility and creating an effective business plan can show your staff where they fit in with management. They’ll be able to work towards managing, and because of your business coach, your management positions are worth going after. The overall improvement of management happens as a direct result of your business plan creating a clear vision of what should and should not be done. Rules help people think less about small things that would typically lead them to make poor decisions. All of the building you’ve done with your restaurant business coach will lead you to an overall sense of improved employee satisfaction and a reduction in your turnover rate.
Online Tools if You Can’t Use a Restaurant Business Consultant
Restaurant business coaches can be expensive, especially for smaller restaurants. Luckily there are hundreds of resources on running a business you can use for little to no cost.
- Coursera. Coursera is a website that offers university-level courses to anyone, many at no cost. You can look for specific restaurant management and business courses, but since Coursera has all sorts of courses, you can even get some regular business certifications too. The best part is there are thousands of courses to look through so you can find the ones that work for your specific needs.
- NRA. The National Restaurant Association has several free articles discussing restaurant management tips, business tips, and more. You can learn how to more efficiently hire people, policy-making techniques, and anything else you might need help with in terms of managing your restaurant. They even have seminars and conferences you can attend.
- Reddit. The social media platform Reddit is a go-to for anything and everything. You can connect directly with industry professionals to ask questions about your business, network with other businesses, and learn more about running your restaurant. Since there are so many subsections of Reddit, you can try different avenues to find what you’re looking for. /r/restaurateur is a forum specifically for restaurant owners, but you can try other places too like /r/smallbusiness. Don’t be afraid to look around and ask questions, you might find a supportive community in the process.
- Books. There are thousands of business and leadership related books you can read. In the age of technology, it’s easy to overlook the power of a compelling piece of literature. You might find what you’ve been missing all along. Many writers even post their business advice for free, try digging around to see if you find anything that clicks for you and your business.
How Provi Can Help
Provi’s all-in-one inventory tracking and ordering system is one major tool you can give your management teams to make things faster and easier when it comes to your beverage inventory. They’ll be able to quickly see what they need to reorder, view previous orders, and submit a new order all in the same place. The consolidation of your inventory tasks makes everything run that much more smoothly. Create an account today and you can finish an order in as little as 5 minutes!
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