Once you have hired and trained your staff, you will want to keep them happy and motivated so that they continue to work for you and continue to provide excellent work for you. There are a number of ways to provide incentives for your employees to work for you:
Accept staff as well as customer suggestions. Many bars have customer suggestion boxes or at least take customer opinions very seriously. Few have similar ways to deal with staff suggestions, even though employees often have an excellent understanding of the drawbacks and advantages of an establishment. Offering a suggestion box for employees—where suggestions can be made anonymously—or encouraging employees to tell you how things are going at meetings or in between shifts can help ensure that you have the information you need to keep employees happy.
Provide adequate time off—and adequate hours. Staff want to work enough to meet their financial goals, but not so hard that their health suffers. Always ask how much someone wants to work in the upcoming week or month, and schedule shifts accordingly.
Offer incentives. Cash bonuses and incentives are best, but free food and drink, passes to parks, or entertainments are good too. Prizes for jobs well done will make employees feel appreciated and will ensure that all staff work hard.
Develop a team. Your staff will work better if they get along.
Occasionally organizing group outings, seminars, or workshops for the staff is one way to foster a sense of team spirit around the bar.
Get to know your staff. It is inappropriate to ask your staff personal
questions (some personal questions may even be illegal), but asking your staff general questions such as “What’s new with you?” or “What has been going on lately?” allow you to get to know staff gradually.
Showing genuine interest and noting new things in your own life encourages a good working relationship.
Make sure that you provide a good place of employment. Staff should have breaks, manageable work loads, an employee area for rest, clean washrooms to use, and whatever else is necessary. If you are not sure if you are providing everything you need to provide for your staff, ask them whether there is anything at work that they need to make their jobs easier or more pleasant.
Pass on compliments. If a customer notes a very good drink or positive experience with a server, be sure to pass the compliment on.
Even general compliments about the bar should be passed on to employees—after all, it is the staff that help make the establishment what it is.
Be kind about problems. While compliments should be shared, you want to be more subtle about problems you are having with an employee, especially if you are not sure what is at the root of the problem. You should never criticize an employee in front of customers or other staff, and you should never discuss problems you are having with an employee with other staff members. Instead, take the one employee aside and privately and calmly try to understand the problem.
Try to keep your temper and attempt to work with the employee to find a mutual solution.
If you need additional ideas on how to motivate or reward your employees, check out 365 Ways to Motivate and Reward Your Employees Every Day—With Little or No Money. This book is packed with hundreds of simple and
inexpensive ways to motivate, challenge, and reward your employees. You will find real-life, proven examples from actual companies. Use this book daily to boost morale, productivity, and profits. This is your opportunity to build an organization that people love to work at with these quick, effective, humorous, innovative, and simply fun solutions to employee work challenges. Make your business a happy place to work and reap the benefits. To order, call 1-800-814- 1132 or visit www.atlantic-pub.com (Item # 365-01, $24.95).
Staff Problems
No matter how much you try to choose your staff carefully and no matter how hard you try to keep your staff happy, employee problems may arise. Issues with work performance can often be worked out with more training and some frank discussion. A more awkward problem—and unfortunately one that is all too common—is the problem of the dishonest employee.
Some employees will routinely under-pour or over-pour, causing problems.
Some will claim broken glasses when in fact the contents of the glass was offered for free to a friend or drunk on the job. Some bar employees will pocket money made from liquor they bring in on their own or will pocket the money from several short pours. In any case, these sorts of employees will cost your bar a lot of business and money.
There are many reasons why staff are dishonest. Some may see their actions as harmless. Some staff may need the money, be acting out of boredom, or may be seeking revenge on the bar for a perceived slight. Whatever the reasons, one of your best defenses against staff dishonesty is to let staff know the rules at your bar—and the results of breaking those rules. Note the importance of carefully accounting for each drink poured and dollar earned, and note the importance of honesty and quality in building the bar’s reputation.
Your best bet in avoiding staff problems is to keep close control of the bar. Ask for full reports to be filled out at the end of each shift that detail any problems, any spilled drinks, any problems at all. Invest in good cash registers that cannot easily be skimmed, and make sure that all bar patrons have to fill out a claims form in order to get money back that they lost in the vending machines and pay phones. Check register receipts and inventory carefully, and occasionally show up unexpectedly to see how the bar is getting on when you are not supposed to be there. Make sure that amounts rung on the register can’t be voided without the approval of a supervisor. If you suspect that theft is taking place, there are
several security firms that will investigate for you at a small cost. The only real way to avoid this sort of dishonesty is to keep your eyes open and hire carefully.
Table of Contents
Chapter 3 Inventory
Inventory consists of those things that you will be buying in order to sell drinks at your bar. Well before you open, you will need to find sources for inventory and will need to arrange the financing to pay for your inventory.