Ten commitments of effective foodservice incentives

Nation's Restaurant News, March 9, 1992 by Jim Sullivan

I've been in more hotel rooms than the Gideon Bible.

In the last year I presented 137 live service and sales seminars to 20,000 foodservice employees in 43 states and five countries. If there's one area that my audiences continually face challenges with, and want to know more about, it's how to implement effective contests, incentives and rewards for their employees and managers.

We implemented employee incentives 10 years ago in our six Denver restaurants and bars. Through trial and error we've designed successful program for servers, kitchen crew, host staff and managers. We've since developed more than thirty other contests and reward systems for foodservice and retail clients nationwide. Most of my fellow operators, trainers and managers feel like the proverbial mosquito in a nudist camp when it comes to employee incentives; they knew exactly what to do, but where do you start? Here's how. I'd like to suggest some basic guidelines relative to implementing effective foodservice incentives, contests and rewards in your operation:

(1) Understand that you cannot "motivate" anyone. You can, however, create an environment in which your employees are self-motivated. To do what? Improve performance, profits and productivity. Effective incentives are a key factor to help create a self-motivated wait staff and kitchen crew.

(2) Remember that people will do more to avoid pain than to gain pleasure. That means your contest must be perceived as being reasonably attainable and should encourage your employees to work smarter, not necessarily harder. If, for instance, a sales contest goal is to raise guest checks an average of $2 per person, many servers may feel they have to be too pushy and therefore risk the perceived "pain" of more resistance and rejection from their customers.

The higher tips or color TV prize a month away may not offset the daily frustration. Instead, set your sights lower to one dollar per person. Point out that this equals selling only one beverage or four people splitting a $3.95 appetizer. That goal is less painful, more pleasurable. Gradually raise the hurdle. Crawl, walk, run.

(3) Keep it short and simple. Our experience has shown that contests for hourly workers get the best results when they are held, measured and rewarded within a 30-day period. People lost interest after a month. If you want to use the same contest format again because you're pleased with the results, reintroduce it the very next month with new rewards after 30 days.

(4) With incentives, as with medicine, prescription before diagnosis is malpractice. Don't put the cart before the horses. Make certain that the behavioral pattern you're trying to change can be resolved with an incentive program or contest. It could be that it is actually a training problem. Before people can exceed performance, they first have to be thoroughly trained to perform. The result of poor training is confusion; confused people will not act. Training is the nail; incentives are the hammer.

(5) Don't just stare up the steps; you must step up the stairs. Determine your goals. Create incentives to help achieve them, evaluate your progress weekly and encourage your staff daily. The vision must be followed by the venture.

You can't steal second or third base from the batter's box or with a foot planted on first. Check the progress with every staff member weekly. You get what you inspect, not what you expect.

(6) Break your sales or service goals into the lowest common denominators. If, for example, you want to increase appetizer sales by 10 percent this month, present the goal to your staff in terms of 1,200 more appetizers per month, or 40 per day, 20 per shift, or only two per server per section. Sounds a lot more doable than "1,200 appetizers" or "10 percent," doesn't it? Inspire the staff to see the goal in terms of how they can help achieve it daily.

(7) Selling is a team effort. Involve every department when you set up sales contests or incentives. Using the appetizer incentive and goal above, be certain that you identify everyone involved in the process of merchandising appetizers to your guests. The list would include hostesses, servers, bartenders, cooks, prep cooks and managers.

We'll assume that the contest format you've chosen will result in an increase in appetizer sales. So what's in it for the prep cooks to make more appetizers? What's in it for the cooks to get the appetizers out quickly? (Granted, one could answer that "they go to keep their jobs.") But if you're creating incentives and prizes for the wait staff to sell more, remember that your kitchen staff is thinking, "Nobody appreciates what I do until I don't do it."

Prep cooks can be rewarded for zero mistakes, kitchen crew for getting the appetizers out under five minutes and servers for number of appetizers sold.

(8) The way to get employees past a problem is to get them involved in the solution. If you have a problem with poor service, high costs or low sales, gather your staff together. Present the challenges to them, break them into teams and ask smart questions like "What can we change to improve our service," "What can we do to lower our costs or increase our sales?" or "What are some of the reasons we're experiencing these problems now?"