TRAINING IS NOT SHOWING THEM WHERE THE FORKS GO

You own a restaurant, then you hire a new employee. What is your plan for training? Every restaurant should have a solid training program, regardless of size. Training is the best ingredient for ALL restaurants.

Local Eats are the Best Eats!

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:01

Good morning. It's June the 21st, 2026. And from the Highland Cabinet Studio, this is the Mad Food Critic Podcast. And today we're going to be talking about a subject that I'm quite sure there are going to be some let's call it tossing of items. Hopefully, not in my direction. But this subject has to be said. But more importantly, I need you to hear the words behind the message. And what is the message? Well, the title of today's show is Training is Not Showing Someone Where the Forks Are. So many times in my years of food service industry, I witnessed firsthand so many owners, managers, general managers, whatever the case may be, they kind of had an endorsement in their own mind that training was showing someone where the forks are, where the napkins are. That's not training. Let's take a look, let's take a deeper dive into this. So restaurant owners, managers, supervisors, we just need to have an honest conversation here. Because somewhere along the way, we convinced ourselves that training means showing a new employee where we keep the forks. There's the ice machine. Hey, over there's the ketchup. Oh, and clock in over there. Oh, and lastly, uh, good luck. No. And then we wonder why turnover is so high in the food service industry. Guest complaints are increasing, food costs are out of control, and employees quit after two weeks. Well, that isn't training, that's orientation. And there's a huge difference. The costly lie. Here's the biggest lie in the restaurant industry. It's this right here. We don't have time to train. Now, hear me when I say I understand that statement better than you think I do. Sometimes it's difficult just to fill a spot. And you get to the point sometimes, and I've been there, where you really just your main focus is just finding someone with a pulse. And if they have a pulse of a heartbeat, then great, you're hired, you meet the criteria. And that that has we have to get away from that. And the biggest lie we tell ourselves is that we don't have time to train. And then some days it really feels like that we don't. Because somehow you have to have time to make the food, you have to have time to count meals, you have to have time to answer guest complaints, you have to have time to hire replacements every month, you have to have time to fix mistakes, but you don't have time to prevent them. Understand this. Training is not expensive. I'm gonna say that again. Training is not expensive. You don't want to know what's expensive? Poor training or lack of training altogether. Let's talk about front of the house. FOH. Too many restaurants throw a new server onto the floor and hope for the best. I've seen it over and over and over again. Oh, here's your apron, uh, there's your section, get busy. Too many restaurants do this. I watch it. But do they ask the questions? Can they greet a table properly? Can they read body language? Can they anticipate guest needs? Can they suggestively sell? Can they handle a complaint without making it worse? Here's one of my favorites. Can they explain menu items with confidence? There's a difference. Yeah, that's a burger and French fries. Okay, what kind of burger? Where'd the burger come from? Did you make it in-house or is it one of those food service pre-stamp specials? Can they describe ingredients? This has uh we have truffle fries. What are truffles? Do you know? Can they answer allergy questions? There are more allergies in today's times than there's ever been. That's an important one. Can they create an experience instead of simply taking an order? I'm gonna repeat that one. Can they create an experience instead of just simply taking an order? Because a server who knows the menu sells more. A server who understands hospitality earns bigger tips every single time. A server who is trained creates returning guests. Oh, where's the value? What's the value placed on that? Take a look around your dining room at during lunch or dinner service or breakfast service. Talk about back of the house for a minute. Oh lordy, back of the house. And before somebody says it's just making food. No, no, it isn't. And if that's what if that's your line of thinking, then in the words of the mad food critics, stop it. Because back of the house training is consistency, it's portion control, it's food safety, it's cross-contamination, it's proper temperatures, it's waste reduction, it's recipe execution. Are you seeing kind of a need for training now? Timing, organization, having pride in what you're doing, having pride in every single plate, every single portion on that plate that's going out to that guest. Listen to me and listen to this. When every cook makes the same dish the same way every single time, that's not luck. That is training. Here's what I hear a lot, and I've heard this so many times. And if I had a dollar for every time I've heard this statement, I could probably go build and open a restaurant from scratch. Well, we're a small restaurant. Okay. And well, guests don't expect us to be a well-trained machine. You better hear me on this one. Guests don't lower their expectations just because you're a small restaurant. The customer doesn't say, well, this burger was terrible, but they're a small operation, so it's okay. No, I don't care whether you have five employees or five hundred employees, the guest expects professionalism. How do you know that, Will? How can you possibly say that? Well, I don't know. Let's see. I owned a restaurant that we had well over a hundred employees, and I've also owned a restaurant where I had six employees. And let me tell you something, the guest expectation was exactly the same. One hundred percent of the time. So, what does real training look like? Let's think about this. Real training means having standards, written standards, demonstrated standards, repeatable, consistently repeatable standards. It means explaining not only what to do, but why it matters. Put the plate here. Tell them why. You will see the difference, I promise. Don't tell someone, wash your hands, tell them why. Don't tell someone to check a temperature. Explain why. Because when you're explaining, guess what you're doing? You're teaching, and when you're teaching, you're training. All right, let's talk about this one. This is I'm I'm I may make some people mad here, and it'll be okay. At the end of the day, I promise it will be okay. Leadership failure. And here's the part that nobody likes hearing. When employees fail repeatedly, sometimes it's not an employee problem. Sometimes it's a leadership problem. And I know that one hurt. Think about this. If three people make the same mistake, that's training. If five people make the same mistake, that's training. If ten people make the same mistake, that's definitely training. At some point, we have to stop blaming employees for not knowing things that nobody ever taught them.

SPEAKER_00 11:10

I'm gonna close with this.

SPEAKER_01 11:13

I've spent over 40 years in food service industry. I've worked with independent restaurants, chains, owners, managers, servers, cook, dishwashers. You know what? One thing never ever changed. People want to do a good job. Most employees don't show up hoping to fail. They show up hoping to succeed. And when we invest in training, here's what we're really investing in. We create better employees, we create better experiences, better food, better culture, and ultimately better restaurants. So the next time someone says, We train them, ask one simple question. Did you train them or did you just show them where the forks go? This has been the Mad Food Critic. We're gonna get into some more deeper subjects in the next few weeks. I hope to see you again right here in this same location next week. I appreciate each and every one of you listening. Have a great day and go find a local restaurant and have some food. I'll see you next week. Thank you.