What can you learn from working in a Restaurant?
By: Lorenzo Gonzales
Tags: Careers, Restaurant, Food, Personal Development, Leadership

I’m very biased because I’ve had a peculiar and varied series of work experiences leading up to and specifically, while working through a massive career change (Personal Trainer to Commercial Real Estate Finance). That being said, I still stand behind the following statement; Working as a Personal Trainer, Server, Bartender, Hairstylist or other customer centric service role will teach you a lot about yourself, people and ways to successfully navigate your environment. Now, I obviously intent to discuss Restaurant work in particular because a case could be made, with very little thought, that it is work to be dismissed as simple, easy or subpar compared to other professions or only for those less educated or skilled. Is that true in some instances? Perhaps, but I aim to highlight what I view as incredibly noble work done by experienced, dedicated and highly educated Food & Beverage Professionals who care deeply about curating memorable experiences and who take absolute delight in sharing their passion for Food and Drink with enthusiastic and adventurous participants.

These professionals are no less important than your Accountant or the local Plumber. You rely on the fact that these trained and committed individuals know things you don’t and do something you can’t, won't or don’t do so that your life can be rendered easier, safer, more enjoyable or some combination of the three. So, in giving credit and respect where it is most certainly due, let us dive in. And for a personal take on the magic of experiences created by care in the Food & Beverage world, be sure to check out Episode #5 of the Denver Deep Dive Podcast featuring Kyle Duce.

1. Pay attention

This might sound pessimistic and negative but you cannot hope to be successful in a restaurant if you don’t practice paying attention to everything going on around you. Who has recently sat down? How much food does a table have left? What body language or facial expressions are on each person’s face? Is one table deep in conversation and not likely to want to be interrupted yet? Is anyone restless or growing impatient? Who seems to be enjoying themselves? Are your coworkers stressed or swamped? Are you in a position to help them? The list goes on and on. Mistakes and errors are made evident very quickly and the feedback loop for not paying attention is very fast, almost unforgivingly so sometimes. Am I trying to subtly suggest that you must be awake and vigilant to your surroundings with a manic intensity all of the time? Of course not. We aren’t robots. However, it is safe to say that we’d likely all benefit from an increased capacity to periodically hone our attention when the stakes are high or when the possibility for error is increased.

Being rational and reasonable is great, but being able to make snap judgments and build an accurate intuition for how to navigate situations as they unfold in real time can be indispensible. Most of the time, you have no prior relationship with the customers at a table and the ability to quickly create rapport, establish trust, prove adequate credibility, lead with enthusiasm and operate with the desire to create a memorable sequence of moments are paramount. For those whose income depends on relationships to any extent, this is a critical skill to continually develop. You won’t always be able to stop and think for 5 minutes or 5 days and if you can’t think on your feet and do it gracefully and geniunely while maintaining positive forward momentum, it will bite you eventually. Unless you avoid situations where this is likely to happen. And at that point, you are essentially avoiding living.

2. Do the best you can with what is around you

You’ve just cleared the first course off of a table. You already had second course silverware prepared and organized by seat number to be dropped. You clear the plates and take them to where they are to be placed. While you are putting them away, you notice some trash on the floor and an empty cocktail glass that was mistakenly left behind. You throw the trash away and take the glass back to the bar. When you give the glass to the bartender you notice a drink ticket up with a completed beverage for another table that isn’t yours but whose server is swamped. You grab the drink, drop it off, top off water and let the other server know what you’ve done. You move purposefully and look for things to do everywhere you happen to be that will improve the state of things. I’m sure it seems that none of what I’ve just described sounds glamorous or unbelievably thrilling but that is the point. None of those things you did while walking around needed to be done by you. They might not have been “your job” but you did them because you want to improve things wherever you go and make the environment more pleasant and easily navigable for those with whom you share it. With practice you learn how to successfully move around in a manner that lets you effortlessly keep things clean and organized as you go. You never leave an area empty handed if it can be avoided.

You may not be in the exact spot you wish you were right now, but I guarantee you that there is something meaningful you can do with what is in your immediate vicinity. Prove that incorrect at your own peril. If you wait for an opportunity to do some grand gesture, or to clean everything all at once, you fail to take advantage of all the little moments here and there where you could have done something seemingly insignificant that cascades and adds up with time. Whether it’s building a new skill, growing your network or creating a new, healthier habit, it’s not likely that it will happen all at once. In our conversation with Kyle, we loved noticing how patience and enthusiasm are common themes with the successful Servers, Bartenders and Sommeliers we have all known. Ask anyone who truly has a passion for their work here and you’re likely to hear some variant of how meaningful and noble they find it to be able to contribute in some way to other people having a dining experience that is truly remarkable. When you are the person constantly doing the best you can with what you currently have, you’re likely to attract others around you who wish to operate in similar ways or who would like to give you additional and ever more important things to be responsible for.

3. Act like you’re on a team. Because you are.

No one does anything by themselves. If you live in the United States, you live in a wonderful (relatively decentralized) market economy where the individual contributes to overall social and economic function. There aren’t a small handful of people dictating all of societies functions. Things are far too complex, you cannot be good at everything or do everything required to maintain your existence and no single entity can possess all of the knowledge required to make such decisions repeatedly with success. You are a mother, father, sister, brother, friend, boyfriend, girlfriend, husband, wife, employee, employer, etc. As referred to above, when walking around a restaurant during the course of your shift, you don’t have to help anyone but yourself. You can focus exclusively on your tables, your section, your side work. But I can tell you, those that operate this way seldom are the favorable or preferred co-workers to work with. And this goes for other professions as well. We can always say “That’s not my job”. Again, I am not advocating that you try to do everything all the time everywhere you go. We also have to understand what our objectives are, what we are going after and what represents a good use of our time. However, that still leaves a great deal of room to help others.

I selfishly want to do less work at the end of the night. I can go after that self-interest if I keep things clean as I move around, assist everyone else to the degree that I reasonably can, communicate openly and frequently, and generally help everyone operate more efficiently and maybe even do the same. This all leads to less pile up of side work at the end of the night (me getting what I wanted). Sometimes slowing down can actually speed things up, though not in the way you might think. I can hurry around, consumed with what I need or want to do and ignore everything else. But, I am sharing my environment with others and in making that environment more pleasant for others, I make it more pleasant for myself. Chances are most of what you are engaging in on a regular basis is a team sport. Assuming that it is, there’s little real downside to pulling your weight and chipping in. Perhaps just the occasional jolt to your pride and a temporary feeling of inconvenience. But we all get over that.

4. You can’t fake real caring

“People don’t care how much you know, until they know how much you care”. Now if you’re rolling your eyes over the fact that I just said that, think about it seriously. Would you want to be in a relationship with someone who factually knows about your goals, interests, habits, and preferences in a detached, clinical manner and doesn’t actually care? I wouldn’t want to be (and my girlfriend wouldn’t either!). When I dine out, I can’t know for sure but I can usually get a read on whether the server really enjoys what they are doing or if they are just submitting to a temporary role that satisfies their needs. I can, without a doubt, say that some of the most passionate, deeply enthusiastic people that I know are Chefs, Servers and Sommeliers. The long hours, the education, the trial and error, the humbling workload. You don’t stick with that, or anything else for that matter, unless you really give a shit.

You might not even care about the profession as much as what doing that profession means for your social standing, your influence, your financial position, your pride, your family, or whatever else it a high priority for you. The point is, you must be getting something out of the work to continue doing it. Unless you merely like making yourself miserable. Whenever I am graced with the opportunity to interact with someone that really cares about what they do or what they are talking about, I leave the interaction with a renewed feeling of purpose and excitement. Be the person that helps induce that experience for others and people will want to have you around, or at least they won’t be annoyed or put off by your presence.

5. Learning opportunities always exist

Someone with an aversion to growth, education and learning probably won’t survive and thrive for very long in the Restaurant and Food & Beverage industry. This is what I admire most about the dedicated people I’ve met and worked with. They love learning. Even the most knowledgeable Chef or Somm knows that there is always more for them to discover and they relish in this fact. Now, will you want to have days where you check out? It’s very likely. In fact, damn near certain. However, in any moment of your life, there is something of value for you to extract and learn from. Every single night of working in a restaurant, you can learn something you didn’t know before. You get a little bit better. You pace yourself just a bit more effectively. You manage your tables more elegantly. You feel more comfortable with off the cuff conversations. You gain a little bit more patience and control over your emotional and mental states in times of stress. You’re made more aware of how you carry yourself. All things that are immediately and very readily applicable to other circumstances.

Now, it is very likely that I think about things far too much and how I might derive maximal benefit but I’d be lying if I said that I didn’t love the energy, pressure, excitement, social ambience and passion filled air of the right Restaurant. I have found that it keeps my edge sharp and my attention honed. When I have the opportunity to take advantage of participation in the right work environment, I take it because it brings all of these lessons home for me in a very visceral, real time way and lets me see evermore clearly how to bring these understandings to the other dimensions of my life that benefit from these types of progressive improvements. And, I get to surround myself with people who know how to work hard, take pride in what they do and operate with a sense of passionate purpose. If that rubs off on me, I’m not upset.

We had the pleasure of hearing from Kyle Duce in our 5th Episode of the Denver Deep Dive Podcast what he thinks, what he enjoys and how he has acted as a leader in this space. My Podcast Partner and friend Charlie Cummings and I are firm believers in perpetual growth and aim to share the insights of those Denver Professionals who share this belief with us. If I did anything with this article, I hope that I spurred some new ways of thinking of those that share their Food & Beverage expertise with you when you choose to go out. It may not be your cup of tea (or booze) but what you do probably isn’t someone else’s idea of fun. I’m sure that doesn't make it any less meaningful for you however. Appreciation of the skills that others earn for themselves is something I hope to keep building and furthering for myself and we invite you to check out the Podcast if you feel that this speaks to you as well!