Training Flip Cards
Intro
Improving your abilities with hosting meetings, administrative tasks and other responsibilities outside of the bar is of significance for any Bar Manager. Although what is important to realize for a Bar Manager, is that where you spend most of your time working is in fact with the team BTC.
Let’s say all other Bar Manager responsibilities outside of the bar, take up maybe 10% of your total working hours. Does this mean that the remaining 90% of your time should be spent simply making products as a Juicer? Of course not. In fact, because this is where you are working most of your time, it is also the place you can have the biggest impact in your role overall. It is during these BTC hours where you have the chance to really lead and direct your team. Above all, the core characteristics of 4-WALL LEADERSHIP are defined by how you lead the team while working BTC.
So, the Bar Manager needs to understand that they have a very important BTC role to fulfill. The role is to lead the team throughout the different periods of the day, regardless of whether it is during a lunch rush or when there is a slow period in the store. A Bar Manager’s ability to verbally lead, direct, and activate the team when working BTC is such a vital skill for optimizing the store performance.
The concept of Activating-on the-Go is how you actively squeeze every drop of potential out of each moment of the day. This type of leadership skill can be very challenging to master because it requires full focus and commitment to continuously execute well in the quest for excellence in the store. Once mastered, you will see a significant change in how your team reacts to you as a leader but more importantly, your natural sense of leadership will develop within you as a Bar Manager. Subsequently, making you a true leader.
Case Study
Why is Activating-on-the-Go such an important BTC leadership skill to master? Over the years, there have been a lot of successful Bar Managers in JOE & THE JUICE but there have also been many who struggled with the position. When reflecting on those who did not succeed, there has always been one clear tendency.
The level of success has always been determined through how the Bar Manager leads the team on shift. The most successful Bar Managers have a strong sense of verbal leadership through their constant on-the-fly adjustments with the team BTC. Of course, counts, deliveries, and shiftplan structures are still the backbone of any performing store – but this is not what makes a store perform.
Why is Activating-on-the-Go such a key factor for success? The reason is based on our brand’s core foundation, which is the experience we create for our guests when they visit our stores. The guest experience will not necessarily be great just because we have all the goods in stock and an optimal shiftplan. Rather the experience will be determined by how the team is led by a Bar Manager, a leader who actively directs the team to achieve the best possible performance at that moment. The Bar Manager’s ability to activate a team is what can truly drive a store’s performance.
Even to this day, many Bar Managers still believe that they are performing in their role simply by counting the stock, taking deliveries, and making the shiftplan – but this is just what needs to be done. It is the same as suggesting that you do a good job at work just because you showed up for your shift which is a big misconception! For a Bar Manager, the performance starts when you have become the true leader of the team. A true leader is defined by you repeatedly leading the team throughout each day.
Conclusively, a Bar Manager can execute extremely well with the administrative tasks (Shiftplan, Delivery & Count) and still not perform in their role. Everyone can be taught to do well in these tasks over time but it takes BTC leadership to truly perform well and succeed in the role. Activating-on-the-Go is the tool to master for developing your BTC leadership skills and to progress overall as a coherent leader.
Activate-on-the-Go
What does it mean to Activate-on-the-Go? It is about balancing out the different areas of the store while handling the guests simultaneously. In the same way that we perform our fundamental structure of ‘Cleaning-on-the-Go’ to keep the product making stations clean throughout the rush, ‘Activating-on-the-Go’ is a similar tool which the Bar Manager verbally activates through the team to keep the store in balance throughout the day.
To explain more practically, the Bar Manager should use different operational structures to constantly adjust the team to suit different situations throughout the day, especially when busy. Such operational structures could be ‘XonShift’, ‘XonTill’, Shiftchange, Cleaning-on-the-Go, or any Team Positioning Systems. It is the directing of the team which keeps the Juicers confident in you as the leader because they know that their Bar Manager is in control and takes charge of the situation they are in.
In order to use Activating-on-the-Go proficiently, you must first understand the different areas of the store, which must be balanced at all times. A store can be split into 3 key performance parameters.
The 3 Performance Parameters
1) TILL SPEED
Taking orders from the guests to ‘Kill the Queue’ and create more opportunities for other guests to come in. Operational Structures to use: XonTill & XonShift.
2) PRODUCT SPEED
Making orders (Juice, Sandwich & Coffee) to execute the list.
Operational Structures to use: Team Positioning Systems.
3) KEEPING TIDY
AREAS Taking care of the Customer Area, toilets, tables & trash cans to prepare for more guests. Operational Structures to use: Cleaning-on-the-Go, Re-fresh Customer Area & Shiftchange.
Imagine that these 3 parameters are visualized in a bar-graph diagram. The higher the bar-graph is, the better the condition for that specific area. The lower it is, the worse the condition for that area. Each bar-graph is affected by how the Bar Manager directs the team’s focus towards that area and activates the operational tools. During the day, it would be impossible to maintain all areas at the perfect level because every time a guest enters the store, the 3 parameters will be affected while handling the guest’s order.
So, what does this look like in action, during a typical store situation?
Sum up
To position yourself as the leader of the team, you as a Bar Manager need to actively demonstrate your 4-Wall Leadership by directing your team throughout the day. Being an active leader is an essential tool for any Bar Manager because subconsciously it strengthens the team’s sense of having a strong leader. This is important to strive for because it is what separates the regular Bar Managers from the true leaders, who can take their team to the highest performance possible.
Activating-on-the-Go is therefore an essential BTC leadership skill, which all Bar Managers should practice daily. It requires 100% focus at all times to be on point. However, as soon as the skill has been mastered, the performance of your store will dramatically increase. Use this skill to reinforce your leadership and pursue the best possible experience for your guests.
BTC Leadership Skill
Choose your bar type
4-WALL Leadership is a term used to empower the Bar Manager’s sense of responsibility for their store. Meaning that regardless of who (RM, TM, OM, CM) is in the store, it is still the Bar Manager’s responsibility to secure the performance within their 4 walls (Customer Area, Stockroom, Toilet, bar). All responsibility is directed through the appointed Bar Manager to further empower their position as the leader. A 4-Wall Leader is a Bar Manager who takes ownership and care of the entire performance within the 4 walls (store) on a daily basis.
In JOE, “Behind the Counter” is one of our core values which transcends throughout the entire organisation from top to bottom. It characterises our continuous strong belief that this company was created by the personalities from behind the counter of the stores and that JOE should continue to grow this way.
Within this core value lies our greatest strength, the will but also the ability to be able to step behind the bar no matter what your position might be. Everyone, from our CEO to our HR Department has worked behind the bar and earned their way to the position they have today. This is testimony to our ground belief that in order to grow the right way in this company, you start as a Juicer and move up from there. On the road, you will develop great work ethics, discipline and cultural understanding of our company.
On a day-to-day basis, BTC means that the true value is not behind the computer but rather behind the bar. Meaning that we do not believe that any leader can create much value for their team outside the bar. The value praises people who are hands-on and willing to lead by example and inspire for Operational Excellence.
The Shiftplan is the tool we use to tactically plan out how we intend to maximize the best performance from our team. It is the framework for aligning the entire team’s efforts through structured Team Positioning. Each shift has designated tasks & responsibilities assigned to it for the Juicer.
- Creating the most optimal shiftplan every day by considering Juicer experience and key times of day when deciding who works which specific shift.
- Optimising the team on shift by assigning the best-suited Juicers to each station based on their abilities and strengths BTC during a rush period.
“Kill the Queue” is a state of mind for everyone to always have behind the bar. It is a value that has been with us from the start, that began first as a competition between the stores but then quickly developed to become a core value for how we run a high performing operation. The mindset to have with this value is a constant drive that pushes us to handle the queue as fast as possible because we understand that the till is our most important station in the bar.
On a day-to-day basis, KTQ means that we handle the queue as fast as possible using our tools (XonShift & XonTill), regardless of how many Juicers are working. Within the KTQ mind-set lies the secret to how we are able to continuously create and handle an extensive flow of guests in our stores every day. Meaning whenever there is no queue, more guests are attracted to order at the store because ‘Kill the Queue’ ensures we don’t lose potential guests. Without KTQ, JOE & THE JUICE would not be able to compete with other food & beverage competitors.
A Digital List which connects to the POS System and displays the orders in an organized manner. The List shows all orders that need to be made, while also displaying details about the order such as:
– The order is To-Go
– The Sandwich is without Tomato
– The order is for a Guest named “Christian”
– And much more…