Points of Profit NewsÓ

Points of Profit News-the newsletter that promotes service excellence, leadership building and enhanced profits in the restaurant and hospitality industry. This monthly resource provides quick tips, tools and solutions you can use right away to instill a passion for service in your business, build real and lasting profits and help develop your managers into leaders. 

March 31, 2002

Issue 23

Ron Yudd, Editor, www.ronyudd.com

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Welcome to all our new subscribers. Thanks for joining us in our restaurant and foodservice adventure. A special hello and thank you goes out to the Virginia Chapter of CMAA for having me down to Charlottesville for a Leadership and Mentoring program. Thanks for all the positive feedback and your contributions to a great learning experience. Also, a worldwide hello and thank you to those that attended the U.S. Army Branded Theme Manager’s Conference earlier this month. You should feel very good about all your hard work in the classroom on service standards. Brick by brick you are building excellence into your operations. Congratulations!

Thought of the Month. A little more on last month’s thought about what you can do to retain staff. We were talking about making your associates feel good about their contributions to the team. It turns out that when a person feels good about what they are doing and feel they are making a real contribution to the team they end up sticking around. Seek out the special talents that each one of your crewmembers has and draw it out. Showcase it, nurture it and watch what happens to their productivity and level of participation. Retention and motivational tools can’t be found in some new super software package. Retaining good staff requires good old-fashioned mentoring and one-on-one teaching. It requires the recognition that each member of your team contributes in his or her own unique way.

For those of you that are just joining us-previous issues of the Points of Profit NewsÓ can be found on our website on the resources page at www.ronyudd.com.

“50 Points of Profit Audio Album”

The Fifty Steps to Build Lasting Profitability in Your Business

An audio album that explores 25 Points of Profit in the Back of the House and 25 Points of Profit in the Front of the House and gives you the tools to enhance your profitability. Keep in mind that the sales from all our professional growth audio tools goes to support our Leadership Cares Foundation’s initiatives. Go to www.leadershipcares.org and see the two press releases about our recent activities.

Learn about our full line of audio tools by clicking on www.ronyudd.com/products.php

On the Front Lines of Service

We’ve been exploring the Five C’s of customer service over the last several months. We agreed that these five things had to be in place as the foundation for any successful business. The five C’s of customer service are:

Comfort-Consistency-Confidence-Convenience-Courtesy

This month’s focus is confidence. Confidence is the end product of consistency. If we are consistent in the delivery of food and service the guest begins to feel confident about future experiences. I often hear customers that have been coming to the same place for years say that they wouldn’t consider having a birthday or anniversary celebration anywhere else because so and so always takes good care of them. Do you ever wonder why certain caterers are more successful than others? They understand the value of having a client that has confidence in them and their catering firm. If your guest has confidence in you and your operation—you’ll be around for a long, long time.

Next month we’ll take a look at convenience, the “have it your way concept” of customer service.

Building Leadership Skills

We explored Hands on Leadership last month. We talked about the value of getting involved and jumping in to help the staff during prime time. We observed that going “hands on” created an atmosphere where teamwork could take hold and flourish.

This month we’ll take a deeper look at hands on leadership. One aspect of being a “hands on” leader is being prepared. Being prepared simply means that you’ve got your stuff together. You are organized. You have your day all mapped out. You have a “Things to Do List” and work to get things accomplished. You aggressively attack the job at hand rather than let things happen on their own. Veteran chefs and managers will tell you if you simply let things happen rather than go after them—things deteriorate very quickly. Over the next month check on your “Being Prepared” skills by asking yourself if you are ready for the day or week at hand. Do you have a plan of attack; do you have specific things you want to accomplish? Take little steps at the beginning-each day write down one thing you really what to accomplish and then go from there.

There is much more to this concept of “hands on leadership”---follow through, problem solving, and learning to prioritize are just a few examples of “hands on” leadership. We’ll explore the rest of this list in the coming issues.

Profitability Plus

This month’s Point of Profit involves a discussion on selecting a purveyor or vendor. We’ve talked in the past about taking weekly bids, checking quality and looking at delivery schedules. All of these remain critical items on your checklist, but there are many other issues to consider as you review your current relationships or look for new ones. The key word here is relationships. Today our success as operators is really linked to the alliances and partnerships we form with our purveyors and vendors. Five things that you should really consider in this process are:

1. One Stop Shop Opportunity-Can the purveyor meet most of your needs-from dry goods to paper supplies? This often saves you time and energy in the ordering and receiving process. It also is gentle on the accounting process.

2. Real Quality and Value-Check the consistency of products over time –don’t decide based on a one time “low ball” price.

3. Knowledge-This is huge! What expertise does the purveyor bring to the relationship-for example-can they give you marketing and merchandising advice and assistance? Do they partner with you to enhance your menus or presentations?

4. Emergency Response-this is really about the one on one relationship you have with your DSR. Is he/she there for you?

5. Timeliness of Information-how fast do they respond to your questions? Are you important to them?

Take a look at how your current relationships stack up against our list. We’ll explore some other things to consider as you go through this process in the next several issues. Keep in mind that there are purveyors out there right now that meet and even exceed the above criteria. Be a good consumer and happy shopping!

Do you have a Coach? Take a look at our One-on-One Success Coaching Programs. Increase the chances that you will reach your personal and professional goals. Check out this popular way to stay on course for building personal and professional success. Click on www.ronyudd.com/1on1.php. We have three levels of personal coaching services available. Email for information and to schedule a free ½ hour tele-coaching session that will help you get to the next level in your career and improve your effectiveness in your business. coach@ronyudd.com.

Take Home Idea of the Month

Have you decided on your community involvement project for this calendar year yet? Keep in mind operators that are actively involved in community programs report that they not only receive the satisfaction of helping others but also find their bottom lines in pretty healthy shape. The neighborhood “goodwill” they have created comes back in the form of regular customers. Get involved and enjoy the results—personally and professionally. Of course, if anyone interested in helping out the Leadership Cares Foundation www.leadershipcares.org as his or her community project this year—just give us a ring. You didn’t think I would pass up an opportunity to pitch the things we’re doing in Leadership Cares did you?

One “take home idea” as a reminder----let us know what your doing on our mentoring challenge. This is the year of mentoring a young person on your staff with the goal of sharing your wisdom and experience. Remember young people are not our future---we are their future.

Web Site of the Month-This month’s site is another one from our good friend George Cook. He’s done it again! George is one of my web heroes. He is helping our industry by using the world-wide-web to it’s fullest. It’s about bringing people together and George is one of the very best at doing this. Take a look at www.chefjobsnetwork.com. This is the site for finding the right person for the right job and for others to seek the job that’s right for them. Check out their testimonials and career bookstore pages. I hope George will let me use his career bookstore page on my site—it’s a great resource for job seekers in our industry to get started.

Points of Profit Leadership Inc. helps companies develop their managers into leaders. We are a “one stop shop” for resources and tools for enhancing customer service levels, increasing profitability and developing leadership within your operation.

Points of Profit News is an online means of sharing information of interest to the restaurant and hospitality community. You are encouraged to send questions, make observations and share items of interest. E-mail your ideas, thoughts and contributions along with your name, address and phone number to: ron@ronyudd.com

Ron Yudd is a recognized expert on developing profit strategies and customer service solutions. Ron provides his clients with the tools for their success. He accomplishes this through keynotes, seminars, workshops, facilitation, consulting and personal coaching. His keynotes and seminars- Leadership Legacy, Leadership for the Bottom Line, No One Escapes Customer Service and Mentoring Today for Leaders Tomorrow have helped business operators focus in on building leadership skills, improve customer service and enhance the profitability of their operations. He combines a motivating style with practical “take home” ideas. You can reach him at www.ronyudd.com or email him at ron@ronyudd.com. His office number is 301-540-5791. Copyright 2002 by Ron Yudd.