How to motivate, Rules for restaurants, Retaurant critics, Blogs for teaching, 20 Minute training, Branding, Whistles, vCards...

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How to motivate
Claire Belilos of EasyTraining reports in her latest newsletter:

According to my website's statistics, about half the visitors who reach www.easytraining.com are professionals searching for tips and material connected to 'employee motivation'. In addition, more than one-fifth of my visitors search for 'how to motivate' and another fifth search for 'cross training'.

The hard stuff. Or is it really the easy stuff?

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Rules for Restaurants (and patrons too)

This could be useful for discussion: Patrick Kellogg's Rules for Restaurants. He's also tried to balance the scorecard with Rules for Patrons.

Rule #7 for Patrons: You've got to be better than your kids - make sure the number of adults is greater than the number of kids. OK.

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You be the restaurant critic

This works - spend a few dollars and send staff to eat somewhere else, then have them review it. Food quality, flavour, speed of service, atmosphere, accurate account etc. Get them scoring. The inevitable comparison with home will raise some interesting points. Hopefully the discussion of 'how things could be improved' will not just decide to sack all the staff!

Share information on the Life of a Restaurant Critic and the list of essentials at How to Write a Restaurant Review.

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Using Blogs as teaching tools
Teachers are an articulate bunch, so it's no surprise that there's a growing number of articles (and even blogs) on the use of Blogging in teaching and training. Prototype is one of the best, with wide-ranging references, and E-Portfolio refers to dozens of teaching examples. A detailed list of Blog and Wiki resources at TLT.

First steps? Start a blog with the free Blogger (tell nobody yet) and experiment. Unveil your clever idea when you're ready to guide students through the process. Skills needed: some keyboard, basic spelling and (optional) use of a digital camera, resizing of photos and uploading photos. Foolproof instructions in the Blogger help pages.

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20 Minute Training

At this week's Kitchen Profit & Efficiency Workshop, each table of 6 was asked to design a twenty-minute training session for floor staff on one aspect of food.

One table was given dark and milk chocolate, one was given some tomatoes, another a bunch of herbs and the last one brown and white sugar. They jumped into it with enthusiasm and came up with a heap of ideas - the sugar people listed 11 different types of sugar to show (and taste). A lot of interactivity was being used, and the essential role of the chef as food educator emphasised.

Not happy with how the waiters sell your food? Do something!

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Brand You

As a trainer, what makes you distinctive, appealing and memorable? There's no escaping the impact of your personal 'brand', so acknowledging this and taking control makes a lot of sense.

This classic article on Brand You covers it from all angles, including the 'user experience'...!?!

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A whistle
I just bought a whistle - for a training class, not the football field.

I saw Bill Marvin bring 200 people back to attention with one toot and knew I needed one. But only use it once - then it's amusing, not bossy.

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Your vCard - make it easy for everyone to save your contact info

So what is a vCard?

vCard is the standard for exchanging electronic business cards (technically personal data interchange or PDI). vCards are supported by many cell phones, personal digital assistants (PDAs) and most email software.

GetvCard is a free service that lets you have your vCard available online for people to download and add to their email or PDA address book. See how I've done mine here. When you set it up this way, the information is added the way you want it to be, not in the shorthand of others.