The Benefits of Restaurant Systems

Hey there restaurant pros, it’s David Scott Peters and welcome to episode 102 from season one of the Restaurant Prosperity Formula. I’ve been coaching restaurant owners since 2003 and the Restaurant Prosperity Formula is based on what the most successful restaurant owners I’ve worked with do on a daily basis to achieve their success. The basic premise of the formula centers around achieving prosperity, freedom for your restaurant, the financial freedom you deserve. To achieve prosperity, you have to follow a very specific formula made-up of leadership, systems, training, accountability, and taking action.

The next few episodes are going to be a compilation of a few of the best tips from the last 100 episodes in areas such as food cost, systems, leadership, and labor cost.

Today’s episode is going to focus on systems and why they’re so important. We’ll be diving into what we mean when we say systems, why systems are so important and how you can use them to safeguard your restaurant, even in your kitchen when you don’t have a culinary background. We’ll also talk about how systems impact your restaurant and how they ultimately impact your life.

The last segment you’re going to listen to in this podcast is from an interview with a restaurant employee, Brandon Anderson, who helped his owner implement the systems. which helped the restaurant, the owner, and Brandon. It’s a must listen. Whether you’re new to my podcast or a longtime listener, this is an episode you will not want to miss. Let’s get started.

Let’s talk restaurant management systems. Life without systems looks like this. You having to be there all the time because you are the superhero. You’re the only one who can order or schedule. You’re the only one who can make sure the restaurant runs properly. Heck, you’re the only one who knows where the plunger is.

Life without systems looks like if you have managers at all, they do is babysit. They don’t accomplish anything. They don’t get things done for you. get frustrated and you wonder why you pay them. All they can do is make sure the cash drawers make it out, that the restaurant opens, you serve your guests, you order food and you close properly and the money makes it to the bank. But nothing really gets accomplished.

Life without systems means you miss your financial goals if you have any. Right? All you do is look at your P&L and go, look what I made or lost and go, oh ****. There’s no proactive planning. There’s no targets to shoot for. And if there are, there are probably national averages, which aren’t your restaurant because you ain’t average.

Life without systems mean running a restaurant becomes more difficult day by day.

What are systems? Well, to start off with, there’s a system, a process, a way to doing anything and everything in your business your way. That’s what systems are. Whether it’s counting out a bar drawer every single time the same way, or it’s something as advanced as dollars per labor hour worked, there’s your system, your process, your way.

That way as I train people on these systems, there’s only one way to do things, my way. That when somebody leaves me, I don’t lose all that knowledge. Instead it’s my system and I keep training the replacements. The younger managers learn that bar drawer the same way. Even if it takes 20 minutes longer, it’s my way. I’m not worried about, oh my gosh, I fired a manager and all that knowledge left.

Systems are the core to your training systems. See, with a system, there’s a system or process away, which means there’s a step-by-step process to get that done. By documenting that system, by training that system, I have a training system. Now I don’t need some fancy manuals from somewhere else. I have everything at my fingertips.

Systems allow you to impose your will without being there because we can implement things like checklists. The way we want things done every single day with managers making sure those checklists are being followed and all of a sudden things are getting done my way even when, but especially when I’m not in the building.

Systems allow you to hold your management team accountable because I train them what their job is, how to do it, how well it should be done, more importantly by when, taking accountability from a negative to a positive.

See, when I’ve trained you what your job is, how to do it, how well it should be done, more importantly by when, you demonstrate you can do it. That means what your job is. You make a decision every day to do your job or not, and the resulting consequences you’re ready for, positive or negative, because it was all about you, not me, the big bad owner or manager.

What are the benefits of having systems in place in the 1st place, right? Okay, we got these systems down. Why do I want them? You’re going to have clear expectations on what you want done, how well and by when. Managers are going to get things done to your standards.

Owners are going to be able to work on their business side. Instead of flipping a burger, you’re working on budgets, marketing, developing your team, holding them accountable, leading your business forward.

Life with systems means you have freedom to come and go as you please, actually go see your kids’ sporting event, go on a date with your significant other, take time away to go fishing, bowling, you name it, whatever makes you happy.

Having systems in place means higher profits and stronger cash flows. Instead of worrying about where your next dollar is coming from, can I pay my bills, actually see your bank account rise because you have a plan for success.

Having systems in place allows you to impose your will because again, people know exactly what their job is, how to do it, how well it should be done, more importantly by when, which means you have managers in place ensuring those things are getting done to your standard.

You have the ability to hold your managers accountable because they were trained on what their job is, how to do it, how well it should be done, by when.

Last but not least, you get to experience what you’ve always wanted, and that’s restaurant joy. To still have passion for the business, for great hospitality. Yes, you have to be persistent because there are challenges all the time, but your mindset changes from a fixed to a growth mindset. You now look at everything. Every challenge is an opportunity to learn, something you can overcome, and your restaurant becomes easier to run every single day, giving you the life you always imagined and the financial future you always imagined.

In other words, systems are critical in the executing of Restaurant 101. Systems like checklists to ensure your standards are met and the guests notice nothing.

Systems in your kitchen to ensure the guest gets the same product every time, such as line checks, solid prep, ordering, inventory, and food safety systems.

Systems for the front of house such as a great point of sale system, seating charts, steps of service, the idea of no empty hands in or out of the kitchen, great supervision, and much, much more.

Consistency is the inspiration that guides the guest experience, ensuring that each visit weaves seamlessly into the next. It’s in this unwavering quality of service steps, the steadfast cleanliness that whispers of care, and the readiness for each shift that ensures we are always a beacon of hospitality. Checklists, portion controls, plating guides, and recipe costing cards among a laundry list of systems.

For many restaurant owners out there, the kitchen often feels, well, a little bit foreign. Sure, you know what you want your kitchen to create for your guests. You know how fast you like tickets to come out. You have a pretty good idea of where you want your food and labor costs to be. But unless you have a strong culinary background, you might be mistakenly betting on one person to handle all that for you and that could spell trouble because why you feel uncomfortable.

Let me start off with sharing with you why I can relate to this so much. I was the person. I was this person, the person I just talked about being fearful when I was a manager. I didn’t have a strong culinary background. Sure, I grew up my family’s restaurant and catering business back in Lynwood, New Jersey where I worked for the toughest manager I know, my mother. If you ever worked for your mom, you know what I’m talking about. But the closest thing I got to becoming a kitchen pro, if you will, was being a dishwasher and a prep cook when I was 13 to 16 years old.

So I’ve never really worked the line Not as a full-time job. I really didn’t order, not as a full-time job. I didn’t have knife skills. I didn’t have all the things and experience I need to have coloring knowledge to understand the workings of selling tickets on a day-to-day basis and prepping food and so on. Yeah, I grew up in the business, but that wasn’t my strength. I was front of house. Right? That was my primary busser, server, bartender, manager as my career went on. I never spent a lot of time in that kitchen.

So when I was a restaurant manager, the kitchen felt foreign to me. So what did that mean? It meant I would rely on the kitchen manager or chef way too much. It meant we as a restaurant from time to time felt we had to keep this kitchen pro on even if they weren’t a culture fit for us anymore. Maybe they weren’t even hitting their numbers, but we had to keep them on. Why? Because if we fired them, nobody knew how to order. Nobody knew the recipes, the prep systems and more.

As a restaurant coach, I see this play itself out over and over and over again. Because I talk to restaurant owners on a daily basis, many of them who do not have culinary backgrounds, at least strong ones.

Now let me be clear. By implementing systems in your kitchen, it doesn’t matter that you don’t have a well-rounded culinary background. Heck, you can have no culinary background. With the right systems in place, none. Why? Because with these systems in place, You’ll always be in a position that your kitchen isn’t dependent on a single person, but rather of a group of systems, thereby putting you in a position to not worry about if and when your kitchen leader moves on for good or bad reasons.

Let’s take a look at what I mean and start with labor. Well, when your restaurant has job descriptions, a training program, and that’s for each and every position, evaluations, performance reviews, Even your front of house managers, well, they’re going to be trained in each one of those positions and they could do those jobs. Maybe not as well as the trained pros, the real kitchen guys, but the truth of the matter is they could do it. I could do it.

When using scheduling software such as maybe 7 shifts, which most of my members use, you’ll know basically all your kitchen people, what their availability is, how many shifts they wish to work, when they can and cannot work, You’ll have the ability to build, well, scheduling templates. So that any point in time you want to say, hey, it’s a $30,000 a week, a $50,000 a week, $100,000 a week. You know the perfect schedule and you can just drag and drop people into those slots. You’ll be able to track and control your labor costs and stay within budget and add to that a labor budgeting system that I teach my members called the Restaurant Payroll Guardian. You’ll be able to basically control your labor costs because you’re scheduling not only for dollars but hours, giving your management team the ability to know exactly what people should be working.

How about food? When you use food and beverage management software such as MarginEdge, again, another piece of software that I highly recommend that my members use. You’ll be able to take inventory for ordering and calculating food cost. You’ll be able to maintain recipe cost cards with ease by simply taking pictures of invoice, sending up to the magic cloud and boom, your next order’s up to date, your next inventory’s up to date, your recipe costing cards are up to date like magic. You’ll be able to sign prep. You’ll be able to find out where you’re bleeding money and ultimately control your kitchen.

Add to that, a budgeting system that I teach my members called the Restaurant Checkbook Guardian, you’ll be able to give up ordering without giving up your checkbook.

What about cleanliness and sanitation standards? With 2 software modules from a company called Jolt, J-O-L-T, which I actually purchase the checklist system for my members when they start with me, you’ll be able to ensure that everything is up to your standards from opening, closing side work checklists, And they’ve got other modules, things like food safety, having a label printer to make sure that when you prepped it, when it’s going to expire, to temperature monitoring that you don’t have to do a damn thing and you’re going to know that cooler is on its way out.

Worried about knowing how many people to bring in and how much food to order or prep because you’re not sure what your sales trends are? I’ll tell you, might want to look into another software program called 5out.io, the number 5 OUT.io. This was brought to be one of my members and like magic, it ties your POS data. And with a little bit of AI, we all know of the power of AI now, it predicts your sales within just margin, a small margin of error, which will not only tell you what you need to staff to stay within your budget, how much money you can spend, if you will, when we talk about the restaurant Chuck Bogardian, because you know what your sales are going to be and what you need to spend, but it also ties in and because it sees your item by item sales mix, it can tell you what you need to prep to be able to handle those sales. It’s amazing.

You see, with these systems in place, you’re in control of your restaurant. If someone leaves for good or even bad reasons, your systems are in place. Multiple people in management and line employees know how to use those systems. Your restaurant will continue to operate your way no matter who’s running the kitchen, no matter what kind of culinary skill you possess, because it’s your system, your process, your way, and it’s always there. The next trained replacement is trained on it.

With the right systems in place, even I could run your kitchen because I would have training. Opening, closing side work checklist. I’d be able to schedule on budget, ensure that, well, we have the right people and the right number of people working each shift. And I’d be able to order, set up prep, take inventory, know the recipes, and hit my food and beverage and labor costs with ease.

Take control of your restaurant. Ensure you’re running on systems versus one person’s knowledge. And your kitchen will be easy to run, even if you don’t have a strong culinary background.

With some of the first changes that you put in place and what the results you saw, like when did it start to click and you go, man, this **** works.

So the first one that we implemented was Jolt. And I hit my staff and my other management team with an absolute sledgehammer because I was like, hey, I just got my hands on the system starting tomorrow. We’re doing it. Like there was no dipping your toe into it. We jumped right in, which that’s probably why I got a little bit of pushback from my staff is because they were like, whoa, what the hell is this? Like we’ve never done this before. What’s going on? But we went into it running with Jolt.

The one thing that I noticed right off the bat was the store was cleaner, things were getting done. I didn’t have to remind people to do specific things.

And the way that I did Jolt was I did it the opposite. So I know a lot of people, especially on the coaching call, they do like the check marks first. And then if you’re not doing the check marks, then they start adding the photos. And if you’re not doing the photos, then they start adding the QR codes.

I did the opposite. I was like, prove to me that you can do these, take your photos, scan your QR codes, and then I’ll start reducing it to just check marks because I know that you’re going to do it. But I’m going to go gung-ho on it first and you’re going to prove to me that you can actually do it.

And it worked. We got a health inspection, ended up scoring a 100 out of 100 on it, which was awesome. But the store is clean. Eric, who is our direct supervisor over in New Braunfels, he comes in and he hardly has to tell us like, hey, why aren’t they scrubbing the front porches? Why aren’t they doing this? Why aren’t they doing that? And it’s like, well, it’s already done. It’s on their checklist. They should be doing it automatically.

And that’s one of the things that I’m trying to get implemented in some of the other stores. So that way they can start seeing like, okay, this works. Oh, okay, this is good.

So what’s the benefit to you? Let’s say it’s all clean and whatever, but what does it mean to you and your managers that this is all getting done?

Well, it’s less, I don’t have to babysit. It’s getting done. Like I don’t have to go around and hold somebody’s hand. I can sit there and talk to a vendor on the phone. I can go over there and make sure that everything came in on my Cisco order. I don’t have to sit there and listen to one of the owners ***** and complain because something didn’t get done. And I know that it’s getting done.

And guess what? If it didn’t get done, I know who I can hold accountable for it.

And that’s probably our biggest thing is like, hey, if you’re not doing this, we know who’s not doing it. We can see. We’re not stupid. Like I know who’s doing the checklists. I know who’s not doing the checklist, so if you’re not doing it, guess what? You’re going to be having a conversation with me at some point.

Hey, that was an awesome episode. I want to thank you for taking the time to take action on building a better, more prosperous restaurant. Before you go, I want to give you these three thoughts.

One, by combining leadership and taking action with systems and training being checked by accountability, you are on your way to creating prosperity for you and your restaurant.

Two, I have something I need from you. Please leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you happen to listen to podcasts. By leaving us a review, other restaurant pros seeking out this information are able to find it. I read the reviews, and hearing how this information has benefited you does wonders for me.

And 3, if you find any of the discussions helpful, share them. The more restaurant pros who have access to them, the better we become as an industry.

For more restaurant resources or to get in contact with me, connect with me at DavidScottPeters.com. Be passionate about what you’re doing. Be persistent. But more importantly, become better and help everyone around you become better. And your restaurant is going to kick some ***.