You’re a Human Resource Manager for a major restaurant chain.  You have a lot of experience working in corporate environments and have had your share of both star employees and “troubled” employees.  Both have been quite easy to recognize:  the stars shine through and their manager takes notice; the more inefficient troubled staff struggles to complete their work satisfactorily and their manager takes notice.  One set of employees is up for promotion, the other set; well let’s just say it’s another posting on a major online job board to find someone better suited for the position. 

The sound of the phone ringing brings you back to reality.  You have a lengthy conversation with the Director of Operations for your region and she’s upset - revenue is down 35%.  Ok, so the economy isn’t great right now.  Of that 35%, your organization attributes about 5% to the poorer economy.  Don’t we wish the entire 35% can be attributed to the economy???  That would make our lives much easier.  But it’s not and we have a 30% decline that we can’t account for.  We’ve already account for spillage and food waste in our revenue calculations along with a number of other miscellaneous charges typical of a restaurant.

Your mind wanders back to your star and troubled employees.  Maybe we have a customer service issue with our employees.  How can that be?  We offer a wide variety of feedback avenues:

·     paper based surveys at the location but no one wants to take the time to organize the very few we receive;

·     online surveys where the customer can win cash or other assorted prizes but they’re rarely completed;

·     “secret shoppers” but they don’t capture the entire experience. 

You’re faced with a big dilemma:  identify the reason for the decline in revenue, or post your resume on one of those online job boards!  You can’t watch your entire customer facing staff all the time.  How do we identify the stars vs. the inefficient troublers?

With Rewarding Feedback (RF) the process is simple.  We offer a cost efficient service that measures every customer interaction with every member of your front line staff.  And it goes beyond that.  With our unique survey offering, you can measure not only the quality of the service provided but also the ambiance of each location, the quality of food served and almost any other item you wanted surveyed by your customer.  And it’s all done anonymously.

How does this simple process work?  Prior to providing the bill, your staff will take the portable survey unit to the table and ask the customer to provide their feedback on any number of the items mentioned above.  Once complete, the customer selects a reward for providing feedback, such as a coupon for a future visit.  The data is uploaded real time for measurement by you, the client.  You can identify, by employee, how many good or bad customer service experiences they’ve had with clients.  This is a definite benefit to you, the HR Manager.  This gives you the necessary information to not only reward employees for excellent work but also provides you with the opportunity to re-train staff that may need further assistance and make decisions on staff that are performing poorly. 

With today’s market flooded with employees, you want to be sure you have the best available.  Let Rewarding Feedback help make your decisions easier!

You know the scene. You’ve let the boss “see” you working hard all day, the traffic was atrocious, you couldn’t find a parking spot, but finally you got into the restaurant only to find a long wait. The staff was rude, the food was cold, your order was wrong or the place wasn’t clean. So… the money you earned today is down the tubes on a nasty experience that you and your therapist will discuss for weeks.

THAT SUCKS!!!

So, you mention it to your server, who looks at you with a glossy vampire-like fog on her face. She suggests you speak to the manager. The manager. Hmmm…. Good thought, but you don’t want the embarrassment of a “scene”. You just want customer revenge! So, you fill in one of those paper surveys, figuring someone will take your concerns to heart.  But then there’s a fear that pops up in the back of your mind – “they’ll have my personal info – my email address, my phone #! Oh no!! They’ll even have my name!!!”

“If I fill this thing out, I’m sure to be banned from every restaurant in the world, have my picture on a Wanted Dead or Alive poster on the wall at the post office or ten years from now, when I win the Oscar or become President of a country, these survey details are sure to be leaked to the press and ruin my dreams.” So… do you decide against it, pay the bill and slink out of the restaurant with your tail between your legs and a bitter tale to tell you great grand children 50 years from now or do you take the chance, roll the dice and fill it in?

You rebel! You reach deep within your aching soul, borrow a pen from the little old couple in the booth next to you and bare your thoughts, thankful that you wore your superhero underwear today to give you courage!

You pay the bill, begrudgingly tipping the waitress and leave the survey for the establishment. Good for you! This is where your personal knowledge of the story ends, and ultimately, you will survive with the belief that you’ve saved another customer from the same experience. Dreamer!!!

Here’s what we know, that you don’t:

That survey that you labored over is now put to one or more of the following uses:

1)     At the end of the shift your survey will be lovingly processed into art – folded repeatedly in origami fashion – to make paper planes, birds, hats and even boats.

2)     If you’re the 10^th person to have complained that your table wobbled more than a drunk on stilts, your survey will be folded 4 times – to just the right depth to fix the wobble. Not bad news. At least it served some purpose and was actually read!!!

3)     Your survey has been tucked away in a nice manila folder for senior management to see during an audit. After all, yours is one of the few without swear words and without comments about the manager’s “mama”, so it’s a keeper.

4)     Your survey is reused at a local wedding. The restaurant industry is struggling in these economic times, so everyone has a “side business”. Confetti production is profitable.

THIS SUCKS!

Oh wait… maybe you’re one of those individuals who takes the receipt home because there’s a website survey option noted at the bottom.

Good thinking! You’re already angry, so it’s best that you stew over it and fill in the survey later. So, you get home, get into your jammies, feed the cat, load up the computer and complete the survey. Damn… where did you put that receipt? Let the hunt begin. Oh good. By some miracle you found it in the same pocket as the mints your server gave you for dessert.

But there are the voices again… “Why am I bothering?” “I know I’m never going to step foot in that place again.” “Oh wait, it says that I can win $1,000 or an IPod.” “I wonder if anyone other than family of the staff ever wins these things.” “Have I ever heard of anyone winning?” AH! Stop the voices!!!

THIS SUCKS!!!

It’s time to STOP THE SUCKAGE!!!