To motivate your employees to work better, reward your employees with incentives they care about the most.
Seems like common sense, right?
But, sadly, many restaurant owners get this wrong.
Instead of asking their employees what will motivate them to work harder and better, they assume they know it and land up creating an employee incentive program that doesn’t excite the employee nor motivates the employee to do anything more than they are already doing.
So instead of assuming…ask your employees what matters most to them and find a way of rewarding them with just that.
You may be surprised with what you hear…I know I did.
After listening to them, one of the incentives they could earn upon meeting their revenue targets was – they could bring their friends and family for dinner (up to 6 people) to the restaurant.
I never thought an incentive like this mattered so much to them. I never knew how important it was for my employees to feel a sense of pride about being able to do this for family and friends.
You’ll never know what will motivate your employees to work above and beyond your expectations unless you ask them.
And don’t be afraid of asking them because you know they’re going to say, ‘pay us more.’
They will suggest you reward them with more money, and you should have monetary rewards as part of your employee incentives, but you should also know this…the rewards that actually matter most to them are:
(1) a feeling of appreciation for what they do
(2) acknowledgment for they have done
(3) feeling involved in your business like what they say matters to you
(4) and feeling valued as human beings.
If you create incentives that reward them with any of the above four feelings, they will work harder, better, and get you results, whether that’s being loyal to you, or referring other employees to join your restaurant, or taking better care of each customer and enticing them to come back more often or working hard to increase average guest checks.
To get the results you want, motivate your employees by offering them incentives they actually care about.
F and B Business School
An online school to share, inspire and teach the restaurant industry’s best business practices to owners who are committed to improving their business and life.
We teach proven systems and techniques to help you get more out of your hard work and time and help you create a scalable and profitable business that makes your customers, your employees and you happy.
Share and Like this article to help other restaurant and food business owners have a more profitable business and a happier life too.
