As I was stuffing myself into my seat on a flight home last week, I introduced myself to the poor bastard in the middle seat. It turns out that he had heard me speak at a tradeshow this year and he was keen to give me some feedback. I exchanged my book for my note pad.

He explained that he was an assistant manager at a busy restaurant in Chicago. “How busy?” I asked. “We do 3 or 4 million a year,” he replied. I asked which it was, 3 or 4 million? “I’m not exactly sure,” he said.

I asked him if he and his team had achieved their goals for September. Again, he was not really sure!

I find this very puzzling. This is a bright guy, passionate about the industry, EAGER to succeed in the world of business, yet his superiors have him driving a business with ZERO visibility. This is much like driving a car across the country without any gauges on the dashboard.

I encouraged him to ask his superiors for the following:

1. Monthly $ target for food/beverage – how much do we plan on selling next month? (ideally broken down by category)
2. Historical Data – how much did we sell LAST October and the one before?
3. Key Segment Opportunity – what shift/segment has the most room for improvement? Why?
4. Critical Key Performance Indicator – which number is MOST TELLING? (revenue, appetizers v. mains, $/head, etc.)

When I was managing restaurants, I can’t tell you how great it felt to WIN! And when I missed my numbers, I wanted to work smarter, not bury my head in the sand.

Is this info posted for your team?

Shouldn’t it be?

There has already been a lot said and written about the death of Steve Jobs this week.

Perhaps nothing is more compelling than hearing him in his own words not so long ago.

I LOVED this time of the year when I was running restaurants!! The coming 12 weeks were like “the playoffs.” Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Hanukkah, they were all knock out games leading to our Super Bowl: New Year’s Eve.

Thousands of new customers were exposed to our offer (we focused on winning EACH ONE of them over), we made bucket loads of money (shareholders and staff) and we all had a blast doing it!

Yet, so many seem taken off guard by this season! They struggle through every shift and damage their brand by disappointing regular customers and prospects alike!

Here are the questions we asked ourselves this time of year:

1. Have we nominated a “Holiday Captain” (should NOT be your GM) and assembled a special holiday operations team (including servers, bartenders, line cooks, etc) for each holiday?
2. Have we had our HOLIDAY REVIEW meeting? Learn from the past: what worked last year? What didn’t? (order a pizza and get the staff who worked last year involved)
3. Have we posted our Special Team’s meeting schedule? Posted our To-Do lists? Have our printing ready?
4. Do we have our KEY DATES, RESPONSIBILITES AND TANGIBLE TARGETS posted for each holiday for our entire team to see? (Do we have our HR strategy worked out for each holiday?)
5. Have we taught all members of our team to convert all new customers into returning guests?(Trained our staff on how to offer REMARKABLE SERVICE while our venue runs at capacity? Taught them how to build our database?)

Take a minute to add YOUR BEST PRACTICE in the comment section below for capitalizing on this crucial time of year!

Season’s greetings!