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Happy Holidays!
You haven’t heard from me in over a year. Whoops, sorry about that!
From here on, we will attempt to discipline ourselves to develop at least
6 good Success Hints & Tips per year.
In August, I had the privilege of presenting at the 2004 HFM Conference in
Florida. I put countless hours in fine-tuning my speech entitled, “What
Healthcare Food Service Management Teams Need To Do To Reach Their Full
Potential”. I came to the conclusions presented in my speech after working
one-on-one with healthcare teams all over the country for the last 15
years.
Below is a copy of my speech. If you would like to be more successful than
you already are, simply print out and review with your management team
immediately. It contains very powerful information. Pay close attention to
6b – Accountability Laws 1 and 2.
Make it a great 2005. Until next time,
Coach Don
LEADERSHIP
What Healthcare Food Service
Management Teams Need To Do
To Reach Their Full Potential
By
Don Miller and Associates
Food Service Consultants
Member – HFM Consultants Assistance Program
The question is: “What do Healthcare Food Service
Directors and their teams need to do to reach the highest level of
performance?” Over the last 20 years Healthcare Food Service Director’s
have improved their operations by leaps and bounds. There are many major
accomplishments to be proud of. However, with a few exceptions, most
healthcare facilities have not yet achieved their full potential. After
working one-on-one with hundreds of Food Service Directors and their
teams, we have compiled a list of action steps that need to be taken in
order to overcome the most common obstacles to peak performance:
1. Root-out Negativity in Yourself. Overcome
personal self-limiting traits such as excessive ego, fear and self-doubt.
Always be open-minded and in search of new
concepts and new ways of approaching things. No one knows it all – even
the head coach. Don't fall into thinking that the need for innovation in
your operation means you've been "doing it wrong". You can't have growth
without change! If you keep on doing what you’ve always done, you will
keep on getting what you’ve always gotten.
2. Develop a Clear Vision. You must visualize
what the department would look like at its full potential. This is no easy
task for operators who are so buried in the day-to-day activities,
including “fire fighting”, that they are too close to the forest to see
the trees.
3. Believe In Yourself and Your teams’ abilities
to reach higher levels of excellence with existing resources.
Winners always seem to find a way to win regardless
of the barriers. The winning process starts with you believing in
yourself and that it is possible for your team to win with the right
leadership from you.
4. Beware of a “Hands-off” Style. Increase your
awareness of what’s really going on in the trenches and then gain control
of it. Our observations indicate that a fully
engaged style is more effective during a transformation process. In
a worse case scenario the inmates are running the asylum and the FSD
spends most of his/her time in the office, or at meetings.
5. Adopt a Winning Management/Leadership Style
that is both effective and compliments your personality. Since, “It’s all
about YOU”, it is necessary for you to audit your management style
to insure that it is as effective as possible.
6. Never lose focus of “the Basics”. Get back to
basics and make sure the foundation is solid before implementing “new
tricks” or the “solution of the day”. Positive change, well thought out
and implemented for the right reasons is good. Change for the sake of
change is not!
“The Basics”
a. Keep your priorities straight.
Work smarter not harder, concentrating on
doing the “right things right”. Spend your time on things that provide
significant return on your time investment. For example, two weeks ago I
witnessed a production team that was very stressed with a heavy workload.
Yet, they were shelling hard-boiled eggs, slicing onions and bell peppers
by hand and in general working very hard but not smart. This was the
choice of management. Interestingly, Sodexho was on the verge of taking
over. We really need to be doing the right things right.
b. Maintain Clear Standards. Make sure that your
standards for quality, appearance and performance are very clearly defined
and understood by all. For example, make sure your task lists (which
indicate what a position does throughout the day and at what time) are
very detailed and up to date.
c. Dress Your Team For Success. Make sure the entire team looks
sharp and professional. Selecting the right uniform is very tricky
business. Food service needs to look different than nursing. In our
opinion, scrubs and disposable surgical bonnets are not attractive.
d. Hold Your Team Members Accountable.
Clearly communicate standards to staff and consistently hold team
members accountable for following the standards to create a fair work
environment. This is a major stumbling block in the
U.S. Remember the following:
-
Accountability Law # 1
Whatever you accept or put up with from your least effective team
member
becomes the minimum standard for the entire department.
-
Accountability Law # 2
Failure to hold team members accountable for doing their jobs
in accordance with the established standards creates an unfair work
environment.
An unfair work environment leads to a hostile work environment.
A hostile work environment leads to poor food and service
and possibly, union activity.
e. More Communication. Expand and improve
communication and use it to inspire the team. The typical once-a-month
department meeting to update the team is not enough communication to build
and maintain a high performance team. We recommend as much day-to-day
communication as possible followed by a formal weekly meeting within each
section. The department wide monthly meeting is still good for general
updates.
f. Benchmark and Toot Your Own Horn. Increase benchmarking with HFM
and “toot your own horn” in a professional manner. Contractors spend
millions advertising how they can do it better.
g. Maintain a Winning Attitude in Yourself and
Your Team. Double-check your own attitude first. Then create
and maintain a team culture with a winning attitude. The focus on some
teams is to continuously complain about everything creating a culture of
chronic, “Stinkn Thinkn”. Be aware that your behavior is modeled by
others, so be careful about expressing your own negative opinions.
h. Continually Inspect What You Expect.
Consistently audit everything such as food quality to eliminate such
things as hockey-puck meat, pale chicken, mushy pasta, etc. Another
example; make sure the early supervisors check to make sure that the PM
shift did all their work 100%. This is a good place to start at the
beginning of the day. Food service is all about thousands of details and
paying attention to these details consistently.
7. Partner with Human Resources in Your Vision. Make sure that HR and Food
Service have the same philosophy with regard to holding people
accountable. Spend some time explaining to HR what you must do and why.
8. Partner with Administration in Your Vision. Strengthen the
relationship with Administration. Become a valued member of the management
team and fight for what’s best for the department.
9. When in doubt – get help. Don’t delay – the contractors are
circling your building.
Remember, the person responsible for all of the above is you!
Winning: It All Starts With You!
Don Miller, R.D., C.E.C.
Nancy Yezzi, R.D., L.D.
Bill Klein, C.I.C.
Success Coaches
Don Miller and Associates
346 Crestview Drive
Bonita, CA 91902
(619) 656-2100 PST
(619) 656-1321 fax
chefdon@cox.net
http://www.chefdon.com
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