Engaging and Empowering: Tools and Techniques for Restaurant Staff Training

Training restaurant staff can be challenging, no matter whether your employees have prior experience or not. This is because no two restaurants are the same, so you may find that you will need to spend some time training employees who have worked in other restaurants before. Therefore, it makes sense that you would want to deliver the most effective training sessions, that will teach employees all the important skills that they need to master. Most of the time, it’s all about finding the right training methods, which work for your business. Today we will focus on a few key things, that you will need to consider when it comes to training your restaurant staff.

Help Them Develop Soft Skills

It’s crucial not to underestimate the importance of developing strong soft skills in the restaurant industry. While technical skills are also key, nothing beats customer service, politeness, and friendliness. This means that incorporating training exercises or personality tests could be beneficial, helping to identify and understand the diverse qualities of a qualified staff member. For example, you may want to present different situations to your team and ask them how they would handle each of them. This will also enable employees to interact effectively with each other, which will lead to a more positive working environment.

Deliver Food Hygiene Training

As your restaurant staff will be involved in a variety of tasks, such as food preparation, they will need to know how to manage food safety and ensure personal hygiene at all times. Therefore, it’s advisable to provide high-quality food hygiene courses, that they can take part in. Thanks to iHasco, you can find the perfect training opportunities for your employees so that they can get crucial information on a range of topics, including cross-contamination, allergen care, and food hygiene. These animated courses are engaging and fun, ensuring that they can hold your employees’ attention. This will also make it easier to work towards compliance with UK legislation.

Set Short-Term And Long-Term Training Goals

Also, consider setting both short-term and long-term training goals, as this will help guide you towards what you want to achieve. For instance, it can be useful to think about what you would want a new employee to know before they begin work. You may want to prepare a few courses that you would like them to take before their first day. Next, it can be beneficial to set goals for the first month of employment, as well as the next three months, six months, a year, and more. This will help you keep track of your employees’ progress and address skills gaps.

Use A Variety Of Tools

One of the best ways to keep your employees engaged is to make use of a variety of tools when delivering your training. Everybody learns in a different way, so this will make it easier to address each team member’s needs. For example, instead of always relying on texts and documents to present new information, you can use videos, which focus on different topics. If you want to ensure that employees have access to everything they need to know in one convenient place, you can create an employee handbook.