You’ve set up your F&B budget for the year based on expected inflows and outflows for operating your dining establishment at the hotel in a profitable mode. However, you relied on economic trends from previous years (lean and getting leaner) and forgot to include one of your most important expenses:  marketing your operation. Marketing doesn’t have to be a hard cost expense; it can be in the form of upgrading how your staff (and personnel, overall) contribute to the image you are presenting to your end-users (guests, visitors). Read more of this >>

In today’s business climate, employee rewards and recognition have become more important than ever for several reasons:

• Managers have fewer ways to influence employees and shape their behavior.
• Employees are increasingly being asked to do more and do it more autonomously.
• To support looser controls, managers are challenged to create work environments that are both positive and reinforcing.
• In present times, rewards and recognition provide an effective and low cost way of encouraging higher levels of performance from employees. Read more of this >>

Last month, I visited Potawatomi Bingo Casino in Milwaukee to get out on the front lines. I’d been sitting behind a computer so much, I felt the need to get out in the real world. A key advantage for Potawatomi is its top-down organization and planning. As a business manager, it taught me some lessons on the value of having a good plan and how it impacts employees. Read more of this >>

“Take what you can; give nothing back!” — a pirate toast

I was thinking of this quote over a beer in our lounge.

A few months back, San Diego did remarkably well in the World Beer Cup with several medals and one brewery taking the prize as small brewery of the year. Given the explosion of great quality, local beers I thought it was important that my little hotel get out in front of this swelling wave and we brought in brewers for tastings, eventually moving all our tap heads to the locals.

As we were tasting, I thought, “Wow, it might be fun to invite a bunch of these breweries and a bunch of chefs here to throw a beer and food shindig out in our garden area.” Just a simple thought, but that thought was enough to weaken my anti-pleasant immune system, and I found I had come down with a moderate case of philanthropy. Read more of this >>

Recently I attended a large conference at a New York City hotel. The breakfasts, breaks, and lunches were not noteworthy in any culinary sense. Budget was an apparently significant issue in the service, not surprisingly. On the second day, we were served a family-style lunch consisting of two varieties of half-sandwiches, a large bowl of pasta salad, and a platter of antipasto, plus a bag of chips at each plate. Not only was it tasty, but I enjoyed the experience of passing dishes and striking up conversations. Read more of this >>

Throughout history there have been individuals who have exemplified certain core attributes, branding them forevermore as great leaders. Whether real or fictional, each shared a unique ability: the ability to motivate the people around them, or “rally the troops.”

So where does this ability come from? Why have men and women laid down their lives, the lives of their children, and untold wealth at the request of these leaders? Why is it that when they spoke others listened intently? One word: respect.

Read more of this >>

Especially during the last couple of years, companies are increasingly asking their employees to do more with less. Yet countless studies warn that disengaged employees won’t deliver peak performance. Understanding what engagement is all about—and why it matters—is a good place to start.

Employee engagement by definition is a combination of commitment (the motivation employees have to help the organization succeed) and line of sight (the focus and direction employees need) to make the organization successful. A vast majority of employees say they are disengaged, creating an unproductive—or worse—a toxic work environment. Read more of this >>

I have spent my entire career between golf clubs and hotels. Everything I have become and the basis for all of my kitchens derive from my first ever hotel executive chef management job more than 10 years ago. I would like to spend a couple of posts talking about that hotel, because my fondest memories come from that tiny little place. Read more of this >>