Best Practices for Logbook Templates
Your management log can be extremely helpful in guiding management to make thoughtful business decisions. The more robust and complete your logbook is, the more impact it can bring to your establishment. Here are some ways other hospitality teams are utilizing their Avero logbook!
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Maintenance Tracking
Use Case: To document completed or ongoing maintenance. This includes recurring issues, upcoming scheduled maintenance, costs as well as the impact on business and labor.
Example: The downstairs ice machine has continued to break. This is impacting the bar service by requiring the bar to send a bar back to the store to purchase ice, which takes at least 30 minutes. Moreover, each service call costs $250. Utilizing the logbook search you can easily determine the number of times this has occurred and the accumulated costs associated with both the repairs as well as lost labor.
Staffing Notes
Use Case: To document staff issues for performance evaluation and record
Example: Greg is continuously late to his shift, is caught on his phone during service, and frequently calls in sick. Management is scheduling a discussion to determine why he is disengaged and determine the next steps. Having a fully documented list of verbal and written write-ups and dates to bring to the meeting provides a clear summary of performance issues. Hopefully, it is a scheduling misunderstanding or another resolvable situation.
Compliments & Success
Use Case: To document positive behavior and guest compliments. Rewarding staff for positive performance is necessary to provide motivation and a healthy work environment.
Example: Bob has received 3 guest compliments and a positive review this week. Management should mention the great performance in the daily stand-up as well as give Bob a $15 gift card.
86 and Low-stock Items - Track & Follow Up
Use Case: To document items not available for service or running low going into the next service
Example: After 2 weeks of having a new crab cakes appetizer, it was noticed that we were regularly running out during the dinner shift. We were able to determine that we should run an item sales report in Avero to see how many were sold each night so our prep team can ensure there are enough.
Customer Feedback
Use Case: To document both positive and negative feedback to address continued issues and praise staff for constructive behavior
Example: A new featured martini was added to the happy hour menu. Guests were asked about the drink and many suggested it was too sweet. The bar manager was able to manipulate the recipe and feedback improved resulting in the check average increasing during happy hour due to boosted beverage sales.
Events, Private Dining, and Parties
Use Case: To document large events from overall delivery to guest feedback
Example: 30 people booked private dining room 1 for a retirement party. Plating and Delivery of dinner were slower than preferred taking approximately 25 minutes from the first plate to the last. This also attributed to long wait times for dining room guests who were waiting upwards of 45-minute ticket times. In the future, we would suggest using a limited menu for this amount of guests to prevent delays.
VIP Customers, Visiting Corporate Team Members
Use Case: To document important guest visits and track reoccurring visits.
Example: The city's mayor has visited 3 times this month and has brought in large groups and praised our food and staff. Management should encourage future visits by sending a thank you card and gift card.