Panelists say better training leads to bigger sales, profits

By Alan J. Liddle

LAS VEGAS - Profits will be easier to come by if your company fully comprehends its corporate culture and aligns training materials with that culture as well as with business goals. Having a chief executive who not only lives by the company's core values but also constantly communicates those standards and attitudes to others is also beneficial.

Those were among the conclusions reached by members of a COEX 2002 panel titled "Training: Your Link to Profitability." The coordinator of the panel was the Council of Hotel and Restaurant Trainers, and comprised Tami Kaiser of Red Lobster, Joy Macon of Kahunaville Management, Jennifer Percival of Buca di Beppo, Kathleen Taylor-Gadsby of Carlson Restaurants Worldwide and Michelle Zaino of P.F. Chang's China Bistro.

Throughout the session Taylor-Gadsby, the panel moderator, cited findings from a CHART Year 2000 survey of training and used those findings to form questions for the panel. The survey generated responses form 60 of the 300 CHART members. Among the major findings of that survey were that training has a positive impact on profitability, employee retention and recruitment and that technology need to be more effectively integrated into an overall training program if the full benefit of the technology is to be realized.

Discussions about enhancing or measuring return on investment in training were part of the presentation, and Kahunaville's Macon marveled at how some companies can try to quantify ROI when they are engaged in "seagull training." Macon, the company's vide president of "cast" resources, characterized "seagull training" as a strategy involving "random people, at random times, swooping in and dropping random information that's perceived as 'BS' onto isolated departments and groups within the organization."

P.F. Chang's director of training and development Zaino credited her department's effectiveness to the fact that is reports to the chairman of the company, not the human resources department.

"Our training department supports a unique partnership program that allows us to truly view operations as a client so that our department looks, internally, more like a consultant," Zaino remarked. "We consult out to our partners in the field, and that allows us to be able to take a view sometimes from 5,000 feet and get a bigger picture and be a little more honest with results."

Kaiser, Red Lobster's senior director of people development, reported that "the one thing we have done that has probably had the greatest impact on (manager) retention is kind of an overhaul of how we bring new mangers in.

"We pretty much started from scratch and redesigned our program to make sure we were giving our new managers everything they needed but no more than that," Kaiser said. "We redesigned the program so they do 13 weeks in the restaurant and one week in Orlando (at headquarters), and, at that point in time, they have just what they need to run a ship."

Kaiser further explained that her chain delivers additional, specialized training to new managers gradually over the course of a year and has found it beneficial to start those management candidates in certified training restaurants where best practices are likely to be followed. "These things together have dropped our management turnover significantly," she said.

Buca di Bepp's Percival addressed the question of why training budgets seem to be easy targets for corporate cost cutters despite the industry's relatively high rate of employee turnover. She stated, "I think in cases where training gets shorted, the leadership in the training department has something to do with that, (and) I can point the finger back at myself."

Percival, whose title is senior vice president of "family" resources, added: "If you don't have a training department that sees itself as an active participant in the business objectives, then why not cut training? Training is a very puffy-cloud arena, and it is an intangible. It's tough to put your finger on why it is important unless you really start to dig for some financials. If leadership in training demonstrates that training is a powerful force, then I don't think training would get cut as often as it does."

Percival indicated that learning to better track turnover and report on its related costs has given her more leverage when she seeks training funds and the operation group's support. She said the company lost 17 manager candidates in the year before it developed and implemented a comprehensive training program for that position, "and I was able to put (together) hard data on that (cost).

"We saved over $600,000 for the company by putting in that (manager) training program, and we reduced our turnover by 6 percent the following year," Pecival added.

Taylor-Gadsby is Carlson Restaurants' vide president of human resources for the international and e-brands groups. She said her company is developing "modular" training materials to better deal with the varying skill levels it sees among manager trainees and veteran mangers looking to join the company.

"We're (now) saying, 'You (managers) are going to get this chunk (of training) - everyone gets this chunk - then, depending on your background ….. we'll take different pieces and say, 'Let's match this to where your skills are,' " she explained. "We are currently developing (modular training pieces) that will go all the way up the organization to directors who want to develop into vide presidents."

On the issue of the role of technology in training, Kaiser and Taylor-Gadsby voiced concerns that the use of computer and Internet devises and software be "balanced" or "blended" with one-on-one training involving live trainers.

"It is very attractive to think about e-learning because it is consistent, it is available, you can change it instantly from the home office, you don't need as much labor, potentially, to do it. I think it has a lot of face validity, but the reality is that it is just like anything else in that is has to be really, really good to work," Kaiser noted.

"We've started to use technology to do a lot of testing and tracking and surveys and things like that, and we've also started using Web-based training for training on some of our (computer) systems," she continued. "But it usually takes (human) interaction and personality to create and build skill and some level of wisdom to go with that knowledge."

Macon of Kahunaville said her company embraces training assistance form suppliers ranging in scope from cleaning chemical manufacturers to liquor vendors to point-of-sale system makers. However, Zaino of P.F. Chang's described her company's culture as "guarded" and not one that readily welcomes outsides at the unit level.

"We feel, obviously like a lot of other companies, that you can't possibly understand our concept because it is so intricate," Zaino quipped before moving onto the heart of her message to suppliers. "If you can become more open to using the words that we use and really align the way you talk about your products to our mangers, and if you could absorb those phrases, paradigms and stories (we use), it would make us feel more comfortable about your speaking in front of our staff."

Citing an example of how her company has begun dealing with "inconsistencies" in training as it grows, Macon talked about "Scenes from a Kahunaville Restaurant," the chain's branded, Internet-distributed material for role playing and positive reinforcement of standard operating procedures. Dispatched weekly, the scenes are "a compilation of five-to-15-minute programs that can be done in the unit by the manager" for "preshift (meetings) or smaller groups," she said.