Chapter 14 - How to Control and Manage Individuals

Human relation in Management | Motivating employees to do their work effectively | How to gain respect of employees | How not to gain their resentment

The title of this chapter is purposefully worded to emphasize the fact that the employees of any organization are individuals. The title also suggests that effective personnel management is based on tech­niques and methods used to control individuals within a group rather than the group as a whole.

It is true that as a group employees have several common needs such as the need for shelter, recognition, food and water and economic security. We can also agree with those who feel that because of these basic necessities, employees can be motivated so that they become more productive for themselves and for the food service operation that employs them.

However too many operations adopt group management techniques as the easiest and perhaps the only tool to control human behavior. The point emphasized here is that although the use of certain prin­ciples of group behavior are important, nothing can or will take the place of an employee-management relation based on a sincere and an honest effort to respond to the fundamental needs of the individual employees. In fact without this approach to personnel management there can be no permanently satisfactory group response or motivation.

Unfortunately, after establishing a long pattern of management thinking in terms of employee groups, a few managers begin to con­sider the individual employee as a time card number—if they consider him as an individual at all! Expressions such as: "The dishwashing man is doing a good job," or "Sales have been dropping recently. You have 14 men in your department. Drop two." are common in the field.

The reason for this attitude is a forgetfulness that each employee is significantly different from his fellow worker. For example, each employee has considerable differences in one or more factors such as: dependability, loyalty, industry, perseverance, honesty, physical capac­ity, mechanical ability, social awareness, interests, temperament, and desires. The list of possible differences can continue indefinitely.

Is this awareness of employee differences important to owners or managers of a restaurant? Many of the leading operators say that suc­cess in the restaurant field may very well depend on the degree with which each manager understands and uses his knowledge of these basic differences in his daily task of managing personnel.

Is there any justification for this belief? There is, if consideration is given to the concept of increased sales and profits as a measure of success. There are only two known methods that can be used to increase or create profits: either increase sales or reduce costs. Good or poor personnel management cannot help but significantly influence both sales and costs.

Consider also, that employees are people and a business is people. Business is not a store front, a building, or a series of doors. It isn't the mirrors, the seating capacity, or a detailed knowledge of cost accounting—it's people. And in no industry on earth is success or failure so dependent upon people as it is in the restaurant industry.

The relation of the restaurant manager to his employees, his cus­tomers, his purveyors, his competition, his community is a vital factor in his ultimate success or bankruptcy. The employees, for example, not only receive, store, prepare, and process the food product, but deliver the food directly to the customers. They not only see to it that the floors are clean, the atmosphere is attractive, but also that the silver, china, and glassware is sparkling, the cash is rung up at the register and the books are properly kept. What they do and how effectively they do their job determines if the owner of the restaurant will remain in business.

Are there any rules that will effectively trigger the right reaction and assure success in the control and management of individuals? Not only do these rules exist but more to the point most of us know them instinctively. However, human nature being what it is, we look for the dramatic and the spectacular. Most of us cannot conceive that a great truth can be contained in a basic uncomplicated statement. In our search for self-satisfaction for happiness, how many are unaware of the commandment, "thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." Yet, how many realize that this simple statement, briefly comprehended, is the essence—the only basis with which an eternal life filled with happiness can be built.

In the same manner, the rules that can guarantee success in human relations are simple and commonplace. They have been noted cen­turies past, rediscovered in the present, and perhaps will be lost and recovered in the future. Briefly the rules are as follows:

1.  Search out methods and principles to use in creating a desire on the part of employees to work with you instead of for you or worse, against you.

Some of these principles are:

(a) Create an atmosphere in which the individual employee obtains a large measure of satisfaction in his environment.

(b) Take a personal interest in each employee—treat him as an individual.

(c) Make him feel important. When he is doing well, give him recognition. Praise him publicly, censor him privately. Pass along guest compliments.

(d) Demonstrate confidence in him—asking for suggestions and advice—this builds self confidence.

(e) Give him security—be fair, don't take sides or play favorites. Train him to do a job right. Plan and organize work in advance so he knows what is expected of him—what to do, when to do, how to do. Develop standards of work and take prompt action at the time standards are not met—not a day or week later.

(f)  Build teamwork. Show him by your actions that you con­sider each position vital to the success of the restaurant. Demonstrate the principle of "pitching in." Give concrete examples of how this principle lessens the total work load on all employees, assures better service, increases wages and tips, creates a pleasant working atmosphere. Set aside regular time for employee meetings on a friendly personal basis.

(g) Expect him to fail occasionally. If you expect too much, set too high performance standards without relating the standards to the individual, or do not train the employees properly they cannot help but fail.

(h) Control employees through their individual needs and desires. Show them how they can obtain self fulfillment in their work.

2.  Determine your objective in initiating an action before, not after you act.

3.  Concentrate your attention on the best procedure to use in attaining your objective.

4.  Follow through.

The first rule regarding use of methods and principles so that employees are working with you instead of for you or against you is fundamental. Each of us has different problems, different needs, different goals. Man does not live by bread alone. In study after study results have shown that wages do not rank as high in the list of causes for dissatisfaction as one would believe.

After employees gain a living wage, there are many other considera­tions that would tend to make them happy or unhappy, productive or unproductive. An employee wants job and income security. He also needs to feel that he "belongs" in the organization, that the community respects the employer and the employee for the work they are doing, that he is provided with leadership, that he finishes the day with a feeling of creative satisfaction and personal achievement from his work. He wants to be given work that he can do well so there will be no initial frustration, in a working environment acceptable to his par­ticular standards, and with an opportunity to develop if he so desires.

Most of all, the individual employee may want to work in order to express his own ego. Some of the employees may have an unhappy, frustrating home life, others handicapped with a lack of friends may live alone existing from day to day. For all employees work represents most of their daily life. If they can find an opportunity to express them­selves, to obtain recognition for a job well done, security, and friends, in the organization; if they can work toward common goals, together as a team for an employer they can respect, and who respects them, these employees will never leave.

The second rule of effective human relations is equally fundamental. Most of us act impulsively without thinking of the possible effect an action may have on the employee and the organization.

The objective of personnel management is to get the job done effec­tively, on time, through our employees. This objective limits and directs our actions in the following manner: it states that an employee will do the job, not you, and that the job must be done according to pre­determined performance standards set by you, not the employee.

Specifically, the objective commands if something is not done right —an employee forgets to shut off the water faucet—do not correct the fault yourself. Call the employee and have him shut off the water. If you disregard this command, you will eventually find yourself run­ning around completing every task in the restaurant.

If you like to remove the luncheon menu from the window because it is now six o'clock and someone forgot to replace it with a dinner menu, if you like to turn the outside lights on because its dark outside, if you like to run back to the kitchen and obtain hors d'oeuvres for the cocktail lounge because someone forgot to put these out at 4:00 o'clock, if you like to cover your terraza customer traffic aisle with a non-skid protective pad because your employees can't see the relationship of heavy rain or snow with accidents in the dining room; if you like to do all these things, you should pay yourself a bus boy's or a porter's salary. This is their job, not yours.

The objective commands that you not only work through your employees but also see to it that they perform their assignment accord­ing to the methods you outlined, within the time limits, quantity and quality that you set. This objective is based on the legal definition of an employer. A man is not an employee unless he is given a job to do and is asked to do it in a prescribed manner. To qualify as an employee the man must do both. If a man can select his work for the day or do it in the way he believe it should be done, the man is not an employee—he is a consultant. Consultants are very very costly, espe­cially when most of the labor force is composed of consultants.

With the objective firmly fixed in one's mind, any manager can gradually limit or eliminate the mistakes that are commonly made and build a stable productive labor force. To illustrate this concept con­sider the following situation:

You, as a manager, are seated in the dining room talking with a guest. Suddenly there is a loud crash in the kitchen. What can you do?

1.  You can hurriedly excuse yourself, rush to the kitchen, find out who broke the dishes, point a finger at the employee and yell, "You're fired. You . .. you ... get your things together and draw your pay."

2.  You can also storm, rave, and sputter. "Dammit, why can't you be careful. Don't you know this cost money? The costs are going to be deducted from your pay."

If the objective is to see that a job is done effectively through people, the first action is obviously irrational. Firing the employee does not get the job done effectively: in fact it does not get the job done at all! Moreover, you will now have to spend much of your valuable time recruiting, selecting, and training a new employee to acquire the skills of the former dishwasher.

In the second case; losing control of emotions, storming and raving will only fluster the employee. If he is proud or sensitive, he will quit because he has lost face when you demonstrated in front of his friends that he was a crude, bumbling, stupid, idiot. If on the other hand he needs his job very much and remains, the net result of your loss of control is that he will resent you, his work, and will do his job ineffectively.

In both instances the intelligent manager realizes that the objective is not to fire the employee or to create resentment, friction, and in­efficiency, but to get the job done effectively. If this is the objective then the actions of the manager should be directed and controlled to achieve this goal.

The immediate objective is to eliminate dish breakage. This goal and other goals can be achieved in the following manner:

1.  Do nothing until all emotions are controlled.

2.  Get the facts. In the above example we do not even know who broke the dishes. If the dishwasher broke the dishes, was he bumped? Is it his fault? Did it result from a poor layout, insufficient space for stacking? Was it caused because of water spillage on the floor—why did the accident happen?

3.  Plan your actions to gain your objective and to do something so that this incident will not happen again. Don't correct the employee. Concentrate on the factors that created the accident. If the work area is not enclosed, enclose it so he will no longer be bumped. If there is not enough space in the dirty dish or clearance table, correct the layout so there is enough space to handle the dishes during the rush hours. If the employee is using wrong methods of stacking, transporting, retrain him so that he can do his job effectively.

The point to all this is—how can anyone react to something unless he knows what it's all about? The accident may be your fault—the result of poor management and poor planning. In this instance like every other case of misadventure in the restaurant, the objective is not to release irritation, blow off steam, fire employees. The objective is simply to get the job done effectively through your employees.

The fourth principle regarding the creation of an effective, satisfying program of management control is simple: follow through! There are no magic formulas or short cuts to effective personnel management and human relations. More and more books will be written on person­nel management; many will provide the reader with a great deal more detail; most may be better written or perhaps more stimulating; all will contain the basic principles outlined here.

Success in personnel management and human relations can be ob­tained through the use of these principles. The rules will work for you as they have for others. Our effectiveness in this field can be measured in direct proportion to the degree we manage ourselves, our under­standing of our aims, and of the people who work with us to achieve those goals.

If we know our objective, direct and control our energy in terms of the objective, have a deep understanding of the individuals who are working with us, and persist in our efforts to do a better job in a better way, we will succeed in increasing our effectiveness in managing others and ourselves.

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