Here’s the January 2005 edition of the Sullivision  
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7 Things to Remember in 2005
By Jim Sullivan, CEO Sullivision.com

1. The customer is not always right.
If you truly believe that, it means that in every situation, your employees are always wrong. And you know that ain’t right. Owners, managers, yo, lighten up and lose the right vs. wrong thing. Be advocates, not adversaries, for both your internal customers (employees) and external customers (guests). The way I see it, the customer is always the customer and it’s alright for the customer to be wrong.

2. Service starts with the Home Team.
Are happy customers the result of happy employees, or are happy employees the result of happy customers? The answer, my Zen friend, is simply “yes”. Your employees are your first market, and the way you treat them will determine how they treat your guests. Make the customer happy: a happy customer buys more. Make the team member happy: a happy one stays longer.

3. Your back bar is not a display case for the bartender’s personal items.
It blows my mind to visit beautifully designed million-dollar restaurants with incredible attention to detail in the kitchen, menu, and dining room, and then they allow a back bar to be used as a display case for dirty bar towels, the bartender’s purse contents, bank bag, personal beverage or ashtray. Fix this. Your most profitable customers should not be staring at anything but polished wood, clean glass, and an attractive display of beverage options on the back bar. It’s more fun to eat at a bar than it is to drink in a restaurant, so tidy up the view, Lou.

4. Make the food great and the service memorable.
Key word here is memorable. Good service can save a bad meal, but a great meal cannot save bad service. Good service makes a meal taste better. Care and concern shows in quality, taste, uniforms and consistency. This may sound simple, but simple is hard and just as one man’s ceiling is another man’s floor, remember that one man’s simple is another man’s “huh”?

5. Everyone lives by selling something. And a smiling, service-oriented salesperson enhances the Service experience much more than an indifferent “order-taker”. The business proposition of a foodservice operation is quite simple: the kitchen must agree to make all that the servers can sell and the servers must agree to sell all that the kitchen can make. You are what you charge for. Class dismissed.

6. Ideas are easy, execution is hard.
The fundamental skills of management aren’t hard to understand, they’re just hard to do. Remember that the goal is progress, not “perfection.” Try to be 1% better in a 100 different ways.

7. Get it done now.
Procrastination is the devil’s chloroform. If you don’t take a chance you don’t stand a chance.

• Invite the employee to sit.         
• Get right to the point.         
• Explain the actions taken and the reasons.         
• Listen to the employee and wait for a response.         
• Restate the message if necessary.         
• Use your prepared notes/guidelines.         
• Give an overview of the separation package.         
• Explain the logistics for leaving the company.         
• Close the meeting within 15 minutes.         
• Escort the employee to the next appointment.

Don’t:

• Say “Good morning, “ “Good to see you,” or “How are you?”         
• Engage in small talk.         
• Use humor.         
• Be apologetic.         
• Defend, justify or argue.         
• Threaten.         
• Discuss other employees.         
• Try to minimize the situation.         
• Make promises.         
• Use platitudes like “I know how you feel,” or, “You will be just fine.”

SOURCE:  USA Today December 5, 2004