One of the most useful tools that you can create for your staff is a restaurant training manual. While it may seem like an incredibly simple thing, a restaurant manual holds a great deal of utility for employees at every stage of experience. They can help instill specific guidelines in your staff, help to clarify pain points in consistency, and ensure that things run smoothly. In this blog we’ll walk through how to create a restaurant training manual for your restaurant.
What is a Restaurant Training Manual?
Put simply, a restaurant training manual is a written guide to everything that you need to know to keep your restaurant running. It should encompass everything from plating and recipes to ordering guides, par lists, and standards for every other aspect of service.
Why Your Restaurant Should Use a Training Manual
A restaurant training manual can be a quick and easy reference for new employees and, importantly, can help longstanding employees to keep things consistent.
Answering Questions When Management is Gone
When management is gone, whether it’s sick, on vacation, or just not in when needed, a restaurant manual can be a lifesaver. This is because your restaurant manual should be able to answer any and all questions that your employees may have.
Reducing Onboarding Time for New Employees
As mentioned above, a restaurant manual is an incredibly handy resource for new employees. While training should teach new employees the basics, having a physical resource for them to check out when they have questions is extremely useful. After all, not everyone learns the same; having a written resource can cut out some of the pain of trying to teach more complicated tasks.
Improving Consistency in Service
Your restaurant manual should have clear guidelines to plating, recipes, and service — the reason? Consistency. If you’re able to keep a clear guide to each task in your restaurant, ideally with pictures and clear steps provided, you’ll find that things will become more consistent over time. Even longstanding employees may find that the clarification provided by your restaurant manual can be useful for building consistent habits for service.
Key Elements to Include in Your Restaurant Training Manual
We’ve discussed why restaurant training manuals are so handy, so now it’s time to talk about the practical side of the manual and what you should include in your restaurant manual. Here are some key elements below.
Company Mission, Values, and Culture
One of the first things you should include in a restaurant training manual is your company’s mission and values. Describe what makes your restaurant yours (using your mission statement) and define the values that you hold most important. This can allow employees a clear guide on how to handle problems, what to focus on during slow times, and how to interact with guests. More importantly, though, it can provide a guide to new and old employees on how to work toward furthering your restaurant’s end goal.
Job Descriptions and Responsibilities
Clearly defining job descriptions and responsibilities in your restaurant training manual is essential for ensuring that all team members understand their roles. Each position, from servers and bartenders to kitchen staff and management, should have a detailed description of the key duties, required skills, and expectations. This helps to create accountability, streamline operations, and avoid role confusion.
Additionally, outlining responsibilities promotes efficiency and provides a reference for employees to understand how their role fits within the broader team, ensuring smoother day-to-day operations. Be sure to update these descriptions regularly to reflect any changes in procedures or expectations.
Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) for Daily Tasks
Every good restaurant training manual will clearly define your Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) for daily service. Whether this comes in the form of a list or an “if X happens, do Y” guide, make a guide for SOP in your restaurant.
Not only is this a great resource for new employees, but it can be incredibly useful when something inevitably goes wrong. Whether it’s failed equipment, problem customers, or something else, it’s best to have a guide established before it’s needed.
Health and Safety Guidelines
Health and safety are two of the most important aspects of any restaurant job. As such, they should be highlighted prominently in your restaurant manual. Build a guide for all of the daily cleaning and safety tasks that need to happen and make it easily accessible. In turn, you’ll find that your kitchen’s cleanliness will improve.
Customer Service Standards and Best Practices
Establishing clear customer service standards and best practices in your restaurant training manual ensures that all staff members provide a consistent and high-quality experience. Outline the essential elements of customer service, including greeting guests warmly, handling complaints professionally, and maintaining a friendly, attentive demeanor throughout their dining experience.
Additionally, provide specific examples of how to handle different scenarios, such as resolving conflicts or accommodating special requests. By offering guidelines and practical tips, you empower your team to deliver exceptional service, which is key to fostering customer loyalty and positive reviews.
Emergency Procedures and Crisis Management
When something goes wrong, rather than panic and frantically try to find a solution, being able to turn to a manual with clear guidelines on who to call, what to do, and how can be super important during times of crisis. So, build out a guide of how to handle specific instances and, importantly, include contact information for both management and any vendors or services that will be needed.
How to Structure and Format Your Restaurant Training Manual
Now let’s talk about how to actually create your restaurant training manual.
Organizing by Departments or Job Roles
Generally, it’s best to organize your restaurant manual by the type of job you’re discussing. For example you could organize your manuals by Front of House (FOH), Back of House (BOH), and management. This makes it easier to quickly navigate and can easily be broken down further by position (line cook, sous chef, executive chef, etc.), ensuring it’s quick to reference.
Using Clear Language and Step-by-Step Instructions
Your restaurant training manual should be written to be easy to understand. In many forms of writing, the general rule is to write for roughly a fifth-grade reading level — this stands for your training manual, too. Use simple language that’s clear and to-the-point, as not every member of your staff may be able to understand otherwise.
Beyond the language that you use, be sure to make use of lists and graphs whenever possible. Break down instructions into clear steps, define ideas clearly, and highlight important information.
Incorporating Visual Aids, Checklists, and Templates
Visual aids are a necessary part of any quality restaurant training manual. From plating pictures to graphs on ordering and cleaning checklists, you should have nearly a 1:1 ratio of written to visual information.
How to Implement Your Restaurant Training Manual
Onboarding New Hires with Structured Training Sessions
When you hire new staff, make a point of showing them the training manual and either providing them a copy or explaining precisely where they should be able to find the restaurant manual should they need it. From there, go over major tasks using the restaurant manual and its provided steps. This allows you to hammer home that all of the information they may need is in the manual and, importantly, allows an easy guide to training new staff.
Conducting Regular Refresher Trainings with Current Staff
Just because your staff has been around the block doesn’t mean they should be done with training. In fact, training is something that should regularly take place for new and old employees alike. People can forget things, make mistakes, and use differing methods for the same task — by providing refreshers to staff using your restaurant manual, that can change.
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