Keep close to employees
Standing where customers stood was only half of Kramp’s discovery process. He also had to consider 5,500 employees and franchisees.
After just a few weeks in his new role, he held a “GM Get-To-Know-You” meeting with all the general managers. He wanted to hear what they thought of the company so he could start painting a picture of their side of the story.
Then, when he first met with the national franchise advisory group, they questioned him for a positioning paper on what they thought Sizzler should consider.
Kramp was stunned.
“I said, ‘I don’t understand. Why are we putting a positioning paper together? Let’s just talk about it. What’s on your mind?’” he asked.
As with customers, the key to getting employee feedback is getting on their level, not just relying on formalities.
“There’s absolutely a place for consumer surveys and formal methods of getting information — those are the ends of the spectrum,” Kramp says. “But I don’t know of any good decision that was ever made out of a boardroom that wasn’t better made in the dining room or in the kitchen of a restaurant.
“Leaders have to be directly engaged in the business to the point where they can really understand that the decisions they make are affecting the business — the employees, the profitability as well as the guests. You can’t lead from a corner office. You’ve got to lead from being out there where the business is actually done.”
So Kramp ventured to the kitchen to see whether cooks had access to all of the ingredients that they needed as they prepared meals. He noticed they had trouble keeping up with orders from such a diverse menu. Then, he observed how dishwashers handled the flow of dirtied dinnerware. He noticed cups piling up because servers delivered fresh refills after guests took a few sips of the first drink.
“It was really just finding out, ‘Do you have the tools? Do you have the understanding? Do you have the know-how, the training?’” Kramp says. “Is there a way to make their life better?”
Gauging what employees need to do their jobs should be ongoing and continually balanced with customer feedback. Kramp regularly tours stores to ask whether employees have tools to connect with customers, based on their own perceptions of what they think patrons want.
Kramp also engaged employees with daily food bars, where all employees gather around the salad bar before ope
ni
ng to go over the selections, discussing how it’s made and why.
“All of a sudden, whether you’re the cashier, the dishwasher or the server, you knew the food,” he says. “You knew what ingredients were in it, you knew why we did what we did. If you know that the ladle’s supposed to be upright and it’s not, you stop and make sure that the ladle’s upright. The employees began to take real ownership of the way that things were done.”
You start to empower employees by simply requesting their input and — regardless of their contact with customers — giving them an understanding of what your company offers customers and why. Once they’re empowered, they’ll be more committed participants in moving the company forward.
