Beware the Creep!

Hey, Donald Burns, the restaurant coach and author of your restaurant sucks. Embrace the suck. Unleash your restaurant. Become outstanding. Now this private session is called beware of the creep. No, I'm not talking about that weird neighbor living down the street from you. What I'm talking about here is known as mediocrity creep. Let me share with you an example of an abandoned building, perhaps maybe in your neighborhood or something like that. You have a business building that you've seen that's maybe been closed for a while and you didn't notice it at first. Then some kids, you know, spray paint some graffiti on the back of the building and then maybe they start tagging the sides of the building. And then soon a window in the front gets broken and then it seems to start attracting stray shopping carts and trash. Now a once thriving business center is a broken down dump. People drive by every bay every day and they just basically ignore. See, it's easy to turn your heads away from things that don't appeal to us. It's easy to look the other way. Easy is the path of least resistance. Now maybe, maybe there are some standards in your restaurant that you've turned your head away from. You see someone doing something that you know isn't 100% right, and yet you say nothing. You turn your head away enough, and now your brand is just kind of like that building. Put broken down, the carpet or the chairs need repair, the lights on the sign need to be replaced. You probably notice a dozen things each day that should be attended to that you turn your head away. Stop accepting anything less than what the standard is. Stop telling yourself that it's not that bad. Or it could be worse. Yeah, it could be. But it could also be better if you stop stalling and start taking action to raise your standards. The biggest mistake restaurants make is allowing mediocrity creep to enter their brand. See, it's hard to get rid of once it's invited in. It's kind of like a vampire. It slowly sucks the culture out of your business until you kind of have a team of zombies walking around. They just got to go through the motions for the paycheck looking for the tip. See, hospitality has definitely left the building. So how do you prevent mediocrity creep? First thing, get clear on your standards and expectations. Oh, and you have to communicate them every damn day. You want to kind of be like Joel Osteen standing up there and delivering the good word from the book called your vision. Plenty of sinners in your business that need to see the light and steer away from mediocrity. Preach like your brand depends on it because it actually does. You are preaching for the soul of your culture. What you say and do will feed that culture to become a living thing. So put some real passion behind it. Preach accountability by understanding compliance versus commitment. The compliant are lost children who kind of wander around your restaurant aimless and unfocused. You know, they change their minds and they change their allegiances faster than on an episode of Game of Thrones. And these people are only loyal to themselves and they will turn on you fast. You know, they do things out of fear and that's a dangerous place to be because fear makes people do stupid shit. The other thing and the other ones that you want, you want others that are committed to your brand and your cause. Because these people will fight for you. They will fight to uphold the standards. Now they are the warriors that deep down took an oath to protect your brand. When you see mediocrity creeping around your brand, you want to take a stake out. Kind of like you know your standards and you want to kill it. The business of restaurants is dog eat dog. It's not. It's actually best standard versus better standards. Good enough won't cut it in today's market. The restaurant with the highest standard always wins. You must become outstanding. Now if you're serious about maximizing your leadership and restaurants potential and take a look at my restaurant masterminds. Famous leaders like Benjamin Franklin, Henry Ford were both part of mastermind groups. It's easy to get stuck in a ruck. And in a mastermind group, we're going to keep things moving forward and get you the goals that you set. This is for, this is a kind of a group for people who really want it all and are looking for, you know, to be with a bunch of high achievers that are going to hold them accountable and bounce ideas off. Now, fair warning, this is not a group for whiners and complainers. This mastermind group is really for those that want results. So head over to my website and check it out. And if you meet the qualifications apply, you can also check out my restaurant coach podcast, available on itunes and Stitcher Radio.