Mark Clark: a newcomer to Highlands Ranch, Colo., but an old hand at sales and staffing success

Nation's Restaurant News, Jan 26, 2004 by Dina Berta

But hating it hasn't stopped him. When he came to Highlands Ranch, he replaced more than one-tenth of the 105-member staff.

"If people don't want to be here, I don't want them," Clark says. "A lot of times they will make the choice on their own as they see the culture starting to change. It makes them uncomfortable, and they realize it's not a place for them."

Clark manages differently from previous managers at the restaurant, says Donna Wilson, a server, trainer and part-time bookkeeper who has been at the Highlands Ranch store for four years.

Previous managers, it seemed to Wilson, were more interested in being friends with the staff--someone to go out for a drink with after work.

"Everything is straightforward with Mark, but in a good way," she says. "He treats everyone around here the same. If he needs an opinion about something, he will ask. He's very open, and if you need to talk, he'll sit and talk. But he has standards, and he'll let you know what they are. I respect him a whole lot."

Clark admits it is not his desire to get chummy with the staff, but he always is ready to listen to them when they need to talk. Most conversations, though, are about work.

"The communication is usually brief, and it's specific; that way they understand exactly where they stand," Clark says. "You want to create an environment where each team member feels as if they are part of something bigger than themselves. For my team every time I see them doing something right, I thank them. I'm very religious about that. If you do that, then when you have to counsel them on something they didn't do well, they will sit and listen to you and know that you are being fair."

Clark works 10 hours a day, five days a week; he's off on Sunday and Thursday.

It's an ideal schedule, with one day off to spend with his children and wife, and another day off to spend just with his wife while the children are in school, he says.

And when he's off, he's off--no calling the restaurant to check on the way things are going.

"Mark is one of those guys who goes to bed on a Saturday night and does not worry about what's going on in the restaurant," operations vice president Merullo says. "I know the restaurant will be run the same, whether or not Mark is in the building. He's representative of the group of managers who are able to do that at Red Robin. That's why we're so successful. We have the best GMs in the country."

After the restaurant opens for business at 11 a.m., Clark usually can be found in what he calls the "pass-through" area, where the food comes out of the kitchen and servers pick up orders. It's the epicenter, where the back-of-the-house and the front-of-the-house converge.

The kitchen is the engine that makes a restaurant operate, Clark says. He monitors the process to make sure the food quality is good and the ticket times--from the moment a customer places an order until the food is delivered to the table--are short. They strive for ticket times of 10 minutes or less.

Clark spends most of his days out on the floor and rarely spends time in the management office. Thanks to computers, he spends little time on paperwork.