It's Not My Fault

Suddenly there is the sound of a loud crash coming from the dining room. We rush to the restaurant and see that two servers have collided near the entrance to the kitchen. One server dropped their tray with a guest's entree on it.

CALL TO ACTION

We immediately assign employees to clean up the debris. Then we calmly inform the kitchen to prepare another entree for our guest as quickly as possible. After apologizing to our guests for the delay of their food, we continue to manage the process until our guest is satisfied with their entree. After the meal period we discuss the incident with the two servers. Each one claims it was the other server's fault. Who's fault is it anyway and does it matter?

In a successful restaurant with GREAT service accidents do happen. Our goal is to prevent them from recurring. To this end we discuss with our servers the reasons for the accident and ways to prevent it from happening again. We don't blame, shout or threaten. Above all we assure our servers we understand it wasn't intentional and our guest was served beyond their expectations.

The aforementioned incident's purpose was to illustrate a VERY important aspect of successful service. Our focus should always be on exceeding guest service expectations. We shouldn't spend valuable time pointing fingers and blaming others for restaurant service challenges. We should develop a culture of constant service improvement and professional accountability.