Qualities and key skills of a Restaurant Manager

Becoming a Restaurant Manager can be a studious task, and not every individual is suited for this. Even if you get a degree in hospitality management, it alone will not ensure that you will succeed in this field. Restaurant Managers must have a set of qualities that not everyone possesses, but they can be learnt.

Here are the most important skills and qualities of a restaurant manager that can get you a job.

Patience

One of the most chaotic workplaces, working in Restaurants can be very unnerving. A high level of patience is needed for the manager to supervise the numerous tasks being performed.

Efficiency

A manager must use his time efficiently, as inefficiency causes losses in time and profits. Creating schedules, procedures, and assigning duties, help maintain efficiency, and are therefore good restaurant manager skills.

As a manager, your main concern is to keep customers entering your business and to generate revenue from them.

Multi-Tasking

An efficient manager needs to be amazing at multitasking, as he is responsible for handling several situations, simultaneously. He needs to answer calls, mingles with customers, and supervises the staff, among a great many tasks. Hence, a business can only run smoothly if the manager can perfect these multi-tasking skills.

Communication Skills

Dealing with different people daily is one of the most important skills of a good restaurant manager. The manager must have an authoritative and pleasing voice that can calm the staff and make them pay attention.

As managers often interact with the customers, their body language and personality should be pleasing. Having strong communication skills leads to the smooth running of a restaurant.

Creativity

Creativity is one of the most important restaurant manager skills. As a Restaurant Manager, you need to keep attracting customers. This requires creative tactics on the manager’s part; which may include, creative menu changes, marketing plans, and restaurant décor. A little creativity makes sure that the restaurant stays open for business, and is an important skill of a restaurant manager.

Profitable Thinking

Making calculated decisions based on prospective outcomes is an important restaurant manager skill. The skill to weigh the importance of how business decisions affect the business, in the long run, makes sure that the restaurant doesn’t lose revenue.

Record Keeping

An important business tactic and restaurant manager skill; record-keeping makes sure that financial records are detailed and organized, budgetary habits are addressed, reviewable material is filed for re-evaluation of business tactics.

Team Oriented

A good restaurant manager skill is to trust your team or staff, to do their duties well. It is important not to try to do everything yourselves, but to dedicate and assign work, to perform the tasks efficiently. The communication between the rest of the team needs to be effective as well!

Courage

Being courageous is one of the duties and skills of a restaurant manager. To make a decision, one needs to have the courage to stand firm against those who oppose it. For instance, a manager would require courage to dismiss a poor performing employee. When a manager does not possess self-confidence and courage, employees tend not to follow directions or accept their decisions!

Fairness

An effective skill of a restaurant manager is to be just and fair to their employees. It is important not to play favoritism, and to treat all employees equally, but fairly. This will ensure that your staff respect you, not only in good times but also in tough times.

Empathy

Being empathetic is a key restaurant manager skill. Having empathy for your staff is important for any manager to keep the work going smoothly. Understanding the people that work with you, their issues, and even helping them through it; can help build respect for you, within them.

Responsibility

The most important quality and skill of a restaurant manager is to be responsible. A restaurant manager is responsible for what happens in the restaurant and needs to share the success with his team, but accept any errors or shortcomings, as his own. As a leader, he needs to know how to prevent those shortcomings, and turn them into successes. “With great power, comes great responsibility!”