How to Get Out of the Weeds

The trick isn't keeping your restaurant from occasionally veering off into the weeds, because you won't be able to do it. The trick is getting back out of them again, during service.

"Before you can get out of the weeds you have to know that you're in them," says Angela Phelan, senior vice president of the Kingston, New Hampshire-based Clarion Group consulting firm. "Whether you're running a four-star restaurant or the smallest sandwich shop, the same lesson applies: Training is everything."

"First of all, in order to get yourself out of the weeds you're going to have to put the right people in the right positions," says Craig Pendleton, president of National Foodservice Consulting Inc. (NFC) in Surprise, Arizona. "A lot of times you will be cross-training or something during a busy shift when you shouldn't be. I can always tell the difference between a former back-of-the-house and front-of-the-house manager when it all hits the fan; the manager is either going to head to the dining room floor or to the pass shelf."