Writen by T.J. Schier
When employees are paid the same hourly wage whether the restaurant is slow or busy, many simply hope it is slow - because it's less work for the same amount of money. To follow the logic then, the business owner has a frontline of employees who really want the opposite of what the owner does.
What would prevent you from looking at your sales data and putting the cashiers or entire front-line sales team (if you have a production line for subs or burritos) on a commission or incentive program?
For example, if a cashier sells $1,000 worth of product over three hours at $7 per hour, they earn $21, but wish they only had to sell $800. Put an incentive program in where the cashier can earn 2.5 percent of everything they sell. Make sure the percentage ensures they earn above minimum wage. Now, they are motivated to sell more --- whether it's moving more customers thru the line or improving the check average. It's all about total sales.
Imagine the next shift where employees work harder and sell $1,200 worth of product. They earn $30 (2.5 percent x $1,200) instead of $21 by giving you $200 in extra sales. That's a financial win for you and the employees. An additional $9 per shift for them over the course of 200 shifts in a year is a $1,800 raise and, more importantly, gives them a common focus with the business owner --- to make more money!
In the back of the house, take more of a bonus approach. Set a food-cost hurdle near the ideal cost you should be running and offer a 10-20 cent per hour bonus for the week to the team if they achieve the goal. It promotes teamwork (everyone focused on lowering costs) and individual efforts (the more hours you work, the more money you make).
Additionally, you could run the shift short one employee and offer everyone a $1 per hour bonus for the shift. It's amazing how the kitchen can run even better with 5 employees instead of 6 and you save labor dollars.
Today's generation wants to succeed. You just have to design the right system to get them motivated to have the same goals you do!
T.J. Schier is service professional, consultant and speaker with over 20 years experience in operations and training. Founder and president of Incentivize Solutions and podTraining, T.J. has helped numerous clients enhance their service and training programs and spoken to tens of thousands of managers, franchisees and operators in various fields. Visit http://IncentivizeSolutions.com/ for more info motivating today's employees, training today's generation and delivering outstanding guest service; or http://podTraining.us/, a unique new system and the foundation of 'i-learning' - using the device of today's generation, the iPod - to train your workforce. |
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