Incentives are an excellent tool that restaurant managers and owners can utilize to motivate and reward their crew members. Because employees are the most important asset in any operation, implementing an incentive can help promote a positive and collaborative work environment that runs smoothly and offers exceptional service. They can also help turn a problematic or complacent staff to one that is excited about their jobs and highly productive.
In this article we are going to list our top three incentive recommendations that are perfect for motivating any restaurant staff. As you read, you will learn which options work best in certain situations and with different types of employees. Additionally, we’ll discuss how using these incentives can help you alter staff behavior and overcome debilitating issues, such as infrequent attendance and lack of initiative, and provide tips to ensure the incentive doesn’t unintentionally cause more problems.
Create an Ongoing Achievement-Based Incentive
A common misconception people have about incentives is that they think it is a one-time occasion where you give your employees a short-term goal with the prospect of a reward, such as a party or gift card.
While these types of incentives certainly have their place and can be effective from time to time, a brilliant way to inspire optimal performance from your restaurant staff long-term is through an ongoing, achievement-based incentive that has rewards along the way.
The biggest takeaway with these types of incentives is that they help give your staff goals to achieve over multiple days or throughout their career. Long-term objectives such as these can be crucial for breaking up daily monotony and keeping members motivated during their shift and energized for the next one rather than adapting a “just get through the next hour” or “just do the bare minimum” mentality.
What Goals Can An On-Going Incentive Help You Achieve?
A significant benefit of these incentives is that they can be tailored to help you achieve several goals or overcome staff-related obstacles.
For example, if your restaurant has a promotion system that highly encourages employees to move up the career ladder to more demanding but fulfilling positions (ex. team leaders, chefs vs. cooks, managers), an effective incentive might help motivate them to pursue these promotions rather than being content with their current position that requires minimal effort.
Simple rewards like raises, discounts on restaurant foods/products, and regular performance-based bonuses are often enough to entice employees to reconsider their minimum or below minimum-wage position.
Another option you can adapt is rewarding employees for punctuality, perfect attendance, or picking up extra shifts. Not only will this demonstrate how much you appreciate and value these behaviors in your employees, but it will give them a little more drive to show up on time or be a team player and take shifts to ensure the restaurant isn’t understaffed.
Some common ideas for this are to:
- Provide an annual cash bonus or prizes (ex. lottery cards, off-site trip, high-value item/gift) to employees with perfect attendance all year
- Provide an annual salary increase to employees with perfect attendance or who took a designated amount of extra shifts
- Allow employees who arrived on time to have an extra 5-10 minutes on their break or provide them an additional, brief break
- Grant a free paid day for employees with perfect attendance over a designated period
Of course, it is also important to keep in mind that your employee’s health is more important than their attendance. While these incentives are exceptional for reducing flakiness or lateness in your staff, it can easily go to the extreme where members try to work while ill because they don’t want to jeopardize their perfect attendance or streak, so make sure you set up your incentive in a way that guarantees health or family emergencies aren’t penalized.
Let Them Choose a Shift or Position
Most employees benefit from the security that structure provides, and this often entails them working the same position every day because it is where they are either most needed or the most skilled. Although there is certainly comfort in routine, you’d be surprised how far providing your staff with a little extra power can go regarding their motivation and overall workplace happiness.
A simple but effect incentive that gives your employees an extra dose of power is to give them opportunities to choose their preferred position or shift. This is a highly sought-after perk for restaurant employees how are trained on more than one position (ex. fast-food restaurants) but are often placed in the same position every day despite their skill, training, and preference for another.
As we stated previously, routine can be comforting but it can also be boring for employees. In the worst cases, it can even be detrimental to their mental health as well as their performance to be working certain positions for several hours a day, every day (ex. cooking can be too fast-paced or customer service can be too emotionally draining).
If you have a diverse staff and/or notice some staff members often complain about always working a particular position or shift, try giving them the opportunity to work where and when they want, and see how this affects their mood, motivation, and willingness to cooperate.
Do so carefully though; allowing every staff member to choose their position or shift at the same time could severely reduce productivity or lead to understaffing. It is best to rotate granting this incentive to individuals or small groups to prevent this.
Use Monetary Rewards
While many employees might enjoy more creative incentive rewards, like dictating the dress-code for a shift, earing new electronics, or receiving paid attendance to an event, the one reward most genuinely want above all else is money. Afterall, they might enjoy their job and co-workers, but their ultimately there to earn a paycheck.
One of the most effective ways to incentivize and reward a restaurant staff is through money, and this can be done in nearly infinite ways.
We’ve already mentioned several monetary rewards in our previous incentives, such as increasing an employee’s salary or providing a cash bonus, and while these can be effective, most require time since they are associated with on-going incentives that likely occur quarterly if not annually. That’s far too long for most employees, which is why having short-term incentives are just as crucial.
Ensuring Incentives Suit Staff Positions
Our preferred recommendation for a monetary incentive is to give your waiters/waitresses a little friendly competition and proclaim that you will match the winner’s tips.
Some competition ideas would be to reward whoever upsells the most of a single item on the menu within their shift, such as a desert, a new menu item, or even an item your restaurant is trying to get rid of.
This will help your business achieve a goal while energizing your staff and rewarding them for their extra effort. Just make sure it’s done fairly in a way that all members have an equal shot at selling the item or do this frequently enough (maybe monthly) that they’re reassured they’ll have another shot at it next time.
Culinary staff can be a bit trickier to reward this way, since it is more ideal for them to work together than compete against one another. In these instances, you could provide them a bonus for a service where no orders were returned from avoidable complaints, or a bonus could be provided for exceptionally busy and profitable services that earned more than is commonly projected.
Final Thoughts
This is far from a comprehensive list of incentive ideas you can use for your restaurant staff, but they are a decent place to start. Another way you can determine which incentives would be most effective is to ask your employees themselves.
See what motivates them and what type of reward they’d prefer, and then tailor your incentive to match the majority but keep their individual preferences in mind in case you ever need to motivate a specific employee.
Sources:
- https://www.posist.com/restaurant-times/restro-gyaan/restaurant-staff-incentive-ideas.html
- https://www.vulcanequipment.com/blog/six-restaurant-employee-incentives-keep-your-staff-happy
- https://www.buzztime.com/business/blog/creative-ways-reward-restaurant-staff/
- https://www.restaurantbusinessonline.com/advice-guy/how-motivate-your-culinary-staff
- https://www.insperity.com/blog/52-epic-ways-to-reward-your-employees/
