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Training videos are a cost-effective and time-efficient way for restaurants to train their staff. These videos can be used in conjunction with a manual or as a replacement for the manual, depending on the restaurant’s needs.

A training video is an excellent resource to train employees on food safety, customer service tips, daily briefing or any other food & beverage training. It can also be used as an effective retention tool because it is something that they can refer back to when they need help remembering what they learned during training.

Video is an excellent medium for training, as it’s engaging and can be used to show how things are done more interactively than just reading.

a manager preparing a productive training session

How do you train restaurant staff

1. Train restaurant staff effectively

A well-trained restaurant staff increases the organization’s profit and reputation with the excellent customer experience and guest service. To train staff effectively, there are processes that you need to plan out, which include staff orientation, training strategy materials, performance reviews and records of observations. It’s also recommended to have professional trainers or experienced employees to help you manage and create the best training process for your restaurant staff. Implement an effective training strategy for your restaurant staff; ask yourself what you want to achieve with the training and how long it is expected to last. If you want employees to become more customer-focused, then be prepared with a training plan that includes communication skills, table service, food safety, and customer service.

2. Use actionable feedback that drives results

Employee feedback is essential for driving productivity and strengthening working relationships with positive results for the organization. Actionable feedback should describe employees’ success and shortfalls and an agreed solution. This is proven to improve employees’ performance and boost the company’s culture and reputation.

3. Offer the right incentives

You need to offer the right incentives to keep your employees engaged and motivated. Rewards and recognition are some of the perks that employees are looking forward to, inspiring them to go the extra mile and master the skills needed for their job. Engaged and motivated employees mean less retention, revenue increase, and the likelihood of business expansion. Fail to motivate your employees, and you will see the reverse.

4. Use suitable training methods

A good start will be to identify the learning styles of your restaurant staff and provide training methods that suit them. Suppose you want to give them a complete training course, you need to identify their learning styles and offer training methods that serve them. Suitable training methods will enhance the knowledge and skills of the job, creating more productive and efficient employees.

What are the main 4 types of learners?

  •  Visual learners need to be shown an example to understand through visual cues. They have a solid ability to recognise patterns and details, but they may not remember what they’ve learned because of a lack of focus.
  •  Auditory learners need to hear an explanation simultaneously that it’s given. They have an average ability to remember what they’ve learned, but their attention and focus may wane with too much information.
  • Kinesthetic learners need to feel the ideas by doing them and have a solid ability to memorise what they’ve learned as long as it is reinforcing and hands-on.
  • tactile learners, meaning they must do the learning with their hands. They have an average ability to remember what they’ve learned, but they may not retain new information because all of their focus is on the task at hand.

Why is training important in restaurants

1. Training helps keep your employees happy

Two factors that keep employees happy in your organization are learning new skills and feeling like they belong within the team.

A well-structured employee training program will help the restaurant staff with both of them

2. Training helps maintain consistency

A structured training plan will ensure all employees get consistent training across all locations and times.

3. Training helps lower new employee turnover

Employees sometimes leave the company because they are not provided with career growth or new skills. Training matters, as it can boost their confidence and keep them devoted to their jobs.

4. Training helps maintain quality standards

Training provides a better understanding of the importance of following food industry quality standards. Maintaining quality standards of restaurant staff training helps the organisation meet its required customer experience and deliver the promise of excellent service.

 

employees learning from computer

How to convert traditional restaurant training manuals into video content

  1. Clean up – to ensure that our training content is up-to-date and relevant. We need to clean up existing materials and filter out outdated or irrelevant materials. This process will help ensure that our training is practical and covers all the topics our employees need to know. This will keep all critical content organized and time-saving for your presentation to the employees. 
  2. Have a plan – deciding which content will be converted into video and which will remain as is when creating a training plan is essential. This will help ensure the plan is structured most effectively for the learner. Prepare all necessary scripts and materials needed for video creation, practice, and record, then watch your own presentation to ensure that it is clear and comprehensible for the learners.
  3. Research – check the available tools that best match your needs and budgetary requirements.
  4. Involve your team – Don’t forget to consult with your frontline managers and veteran staff. They will be up to date with new trends at work and adequately equipped with knowledge and skills that they can pass on to learners or new employees. It will also make them feel meaningful and appreciated.
  5. Budget – video training doesn’t have to be expensive. You can use free, easy-to-use tools without purchasing costly tools or outsourcing vendors. It’s easier than ever to create training content without spending much money. You can choose from several video templates, software, and apps without too much expense. These applications and software have exceptional creative features that you can utilise by developing strategy and learning basic editing skills to enhance your video presentation.
  6. The importance of a script – the script is the backbone of any successful film, television show, or video game. An effective and well-structured script is still necessary to ensure the quality of the content, regardless of the length of your video presentation, whether it’s short or long. Scripts will create a visual concept on paper and help you plan what scenes to shoot step by step.
  7. Train the trainer – an onboarding plan for the management and the restaurant training team, if it exists, to introduce the new video training program and how to use it efficiently, as they will be the ones leading the training processes – you must have them on board. Having your trainers and skilled employees involved in the process is crucial for effective implementation of the new video training program.

read more about onboarding process meaning for a new employee

Do’s and don’t in creating training videos.

 

DO

  • Keep your videos short – keeping them short will likely catch the viewer’s attention.
  • Use individual video segments to create an easily understandable outline of the topics presented.
  • Animation is a must – It helps learners communicate their ideas quickly and reduces complexity, providing better understanding.
  • Keep it simple – Keep it clear and easy to understand.
  • Use simple language – Avoid using difficult words or phrases that employees will have difficulty understanding. Use simple words or sentences to avoid misunderstanding.
  • Make it engaging and fun. – it must be interactive and exciting for employees and help them retain the knowledge they get from the video.
  • Make sure you know what you’re doing. – be adequately prepared and knowledgeable. Show confidence in the skills presented and discussed.

Don’ts:

  • Don’t just read out loud – you might sound monotonous and discourage your employees from participating.
  • Don’t be stiff – good posture and hand gestures are important to look confident.
  • Don’t forget to smile – You must show enthusiasm and lighten the mood by sharing a few relatable stories or experiences.
  • Don’t use complicated words – You need to be well prepared and use simple words that are easy to understand. You can also use metaphors to relate one topic to another.
  • Don’t use too many characters, and don’t make the video too long – This will only create confusion and drive disinterest for your learners; make it short but interesting.
  • Don’t use a large focus background – Make sure your video presentation looks professional. Make it simple but pleasing to the learner’s eyes.

Here are some of the restaurant training video examples

Bites has a wide range of restaurant training video examples, as you can see here:

More examples of restaurant training videos can be found on the Bites app – sign up to see more and create engaging restaurant training videos and playlists.

Restaurant training videos are a powerful and effective tool for training new restaurant employees. That makes it easy to show new employees what to do quickly, and because they are so short, you can get through the whole training course in just a few hours! So, start creating your training video content. To learn about our free demo, please visit https://mybites.io/.

 

 

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