Utilizing Lean Hours

Your employees' whole 8 or 9 hours are not always involved in busy service. Exemptions would be staff on split shift. But even those shifts can get an 6 to 7 peak hours.

So how do you maximize their work hours?

There are a lot of things you can ask or instruct your staff to do while they are not busy with service. Kitchen staff can do semi-spring cleaning. Ask them to do thorough cleaning on a certain equipment or part of the kitchen at a time. It could also be a good opportunity to steam flatware or wash exhaust fans. It is also a good time to do surprise inventory or thorough checking of orderliness of stockrooms and equipment. One of the not so physical things that can be done is a review of food costs and ingredient prices. On a daily basis, sinks, stoves, refrigerators, freezers and lighting fixtures can be cleaned.

Restaurant service staff can also do thorough cleaning of dining utensils and dining area itself. Plates, spoons, forks, glasses and other dinnerware can be wiped to a gleam. Table napkins can be folded. Linen cabinets can be rearranged. Orderslips, receipts and requesition forms can be organized. Tables can be checked for dirt and chairs can be checked if they are wiggling or stable.

On the administrative side, it is also a fine time to conduct sales calls or fax campaigns. Creating and updating customer database is always put off so this is a great time to get it started. Computation of guest checks and beverage inventory, if this is assigned to waiters, can be done as well. Downtimes are also great for meetings and trainings.

Whatever the popularity of your restaurant, there will always be times when your staff are not preoccupied all the tme. Use these hours or minutes, no matter how few, for more worthwhile activities.