Chapter 11. How to Train for success. When a hospitality property is small or independent, what is the best way to train new staff and keep them passionate about their work? This is a good question to ask yourself. There is always something new to learn. The day you stop learning is the day you stop living.
We should all pick up new skills, ideas, viewpoints and ways of working every day. This is not a rule for your work, but a rule for your life. The first goal of any property is simply to survive. And to do this, you need a business model that works and you always need to prove that your business model works. In chapter nine, how to hire winners, I shared tactics to help you find excellent people excellent people who believe in your company and share your goals. To keep these excellent employees.
It's your duty to help them continue to learn and improve their skills. This isn't an option If your people aren't growing their careers as your business grows and develops, they will quickly lose enthusiasm for their work and your property. Before you know it, you'll have unhappy employees as well as unhappy customers. When you have excellent employees, most often, they will have a desire to learn, which gives you and your business a competitive advantage over other companies. Small properties have an opportunity to attract people who are eager to try fresh approaches and have great ideas how to do things differently rather than employees who are working towards attaining a specific post or title. As in all topics in your operations manual, your training has to be step by step have everything in writing.
Your operations manual has to have a written training manual that contains specific instructions and reference information. This will be an incredible resource for any new employee and will quick in their success. It is the trainer's responsibility to Create a safe, non threatening environment for learning. For this to work, it is extremely important that a trainer has great people skills. They have to remember that new employees are people. So it's important to take the time to get to know new members establish a relationship and treat them like they would like to be treated.
A trainer has to plan to be patient and set a reasonable pace when teaching new tasks. It's a good idea to have them think back to when they were learning something new for the first time. A hectic pace and a busy environment will only lead to problems. Provide notebooks and pens to new employees and include in the notebook a complete description of the new employees job has scheduled the training process and the list of the most common questions with answers. This will help put new tasks they are learning in context before a trainer begins, have them go through the training process themselves. A good trainer will know what is expected Have the employee in the new position but they don't always know if those expectations come through in the training process.
The trainer going through the program and looking at it from the new employees perspective can help. Here it's a good idea to get feedback from senior employees and make sure the common questions or concerns are covered. From the very beginning of the training, watch the employees and ask questions to make sure things are clear. This is very important. Don't ever demean or talk down to a new employee. Actually, this is important for all employees.
If employees are having problems understanding any aspect of the training, use relative experiences or an example to explain or to make things clear. When you see things starting to click, challenge them. Add on other responsibilities that you know are achievable. Give them scenarios that you know can happen and see how they respond. in all aspects of training, make sure you enforce that customer service is a top priority, be there to guide them? Use your expertise, steering them away from indecision or bad behaviors before they become a bad habit.
A trainer should use current staff as experts showing how specific procedures actually work in the day to day operation. give praise when deserved. Yes, in a perfect world excellence would be a matter of course, but not showing appreciation might make an employee wonder if they are living up to your expectations. You don't have to go overboard just a good job or well done will work. Even a smile will go a long way. Also, criticism is important to correct bad behavior before it becomes a habit.
Make sure it's constructive and with an alternative solution. Again, I can't stress enough the importance of a step by step procedure for all aspects of your business. With the accurate step by step process, owners, trainers and new staff will know Not be second guessing. segment your training. acquiring the knowledge to do one task at a time will will help your employees gain confidence. And as the confidence grows, so will the desire to master another segment.
Avoid the temptation to over talk and to micromanage. Both of these tactics send a signal that you lack confidence in your employees abilities. Quite often these tactics are enough to have good potential employees quit. These are guidelines we recommend when training new employees. But this is just the beginning. Here's some specifics that should be covered in the initial training.
Initial training ideas, a clear job description outlining the responsibilities and the importance of their role in the bigger picture. Clarify basic standards of dress, staff behavior, break allowance and meals. Health and Safety specific products available at your property. more about this in the upselling chapter. Specify you're establishing standards for welcoming and greeting customers dealing with their questions, dealing with difficult situations, customer complaints, awkward customers, support and teamwork. Make sure the organizational structure is clear and they know the line of reporting and who to golden for for help and guidance when needed.
Contact numbers established procedures for sickness reporting. Your goal is not only to have employees who can follow the step by step procedures for all their tasks, but also to be able to think on their feet and this means all employees in your property when a rule exists, that absolutely has to be followed give the reasons so it is clear, for example, safety regulations or specific laws. Otherwise, encourage your employees to think outside the box. Especially when it comes to customer service. It has to be okay for an employee to Step away from their tasks to help a customer with directions, or to give advice on an attraction or even a little small talk. Giving them the freedom to do things with your customers can actually enhance your customer state.
You'll have happy employees who know how to do their job, follow rules and bend them when necessary. When getting to know new employees, ask them about their hobbies, their interests, and any special skills they may have. You may have hired a housekeeper and found out that you have a blogging expert and your employee who may have hired a maintenance person and found you have an amateur historian working with you. You might find employees with ambition and talent to help you take your business to the next level. encourage new employees in fact, all employees to look for ideas to make their jobs easier or to enhance your property. Have them be on the lookout for new technology opportunities that you and your employees can explore even if you're not sure how they can be immediately applied to your business.
Who knows, you could be on to the next big thing and gain more of an advantage over your competition. Here's some other training techniques to consider job shadowing. This allows an employee to learn about and benefit from the expertise of senior employees. Employee interests. If an employee is interested or has an expertise in a subject or attends an external training session or conference that can be beneficial to your property, have them hold an in house training session for all employees. If there are costs involved, you could offer to cost share or pay the entire amount.
This is an effective employee development because it introduces new ideas to the organization hold brown bag lunches. These are informal talks about subjects over lunch. Whether it will work or work life topics brown bag lunches can provide employees with the information they need for a better work environment and create great lives. How can this not be good for an employer training from external source If a company wants to sell you a new interactive computer and television system, have their sales representative come in and meet with you and your housekeeping team as your frontline team in the rooms, they will probably be the first asked about how it works. making time for employee development on a regular basis allows you to plan and bring in consultants or internal providers who know your goals, language, culture and workplace norms. These job training sessions also build the team and help employees develop conversations about improvement, growth and change.
The first six weeks is essential to any new employee. It's during this time that they decide whether or not the job's right for them might be a surprise for you to hear. But 33% of hospitality businesses don't do any training. If this is the case, how on earth do people know what to expect from them on a day to day basis? level? on how they can contribute to the business or develop their career.
Training your staff on the basics of your property puts them in a better position to contribute to cost control and possibly generate income. If people understand how the business makes money, they are then in a position to contribute to this and put forward their own ideas. You can hedge your bet with a well thought out step by step training process and chisel the new employee into that creative ambitious worker you deserve