Saturday, March 31, 2007

To a lot of people, running a restaurant or any business in a chaotic state—one where you’re constantly fire-fighting, struggling and most importantly—not growing, is completely normal. How did it get to be like this?

Because a lot of us saw our parents and grandparents struggling and struggling. So, we grew up learning that this is the normal way of life and the normal way to run a business. We knew nothing else. So, how does get out of this state and grow? The first thing needed is a plan.

Why Do We Spend More Time Planning Our Vacation, Than We Do Planning Our Business?

It’s true! We spend more time making our vacations plans than we do on planning the success of our restaurant. Follow me on this scenario—Your wife asks you if you’ve planned the family vacation yet. You say no! So, you end up taking your family vacation, with no plans. You don’t know where you’re going, so you end up going anywhere just to get away. Sound familiar?

And you drive to Orlando’s DisneyWorld, only to find out that every hotel is booked. You can’t get a room because you didn’t plan ahead to make reservations. Your wife gets on you. Multiply this by a few more times and your vacation ends up being a disaster.

On the flip side of the coin, what if you did plan your vacation—and you’re wife made sure you did? You would then end up with a plan on paper—an itinerary. You would know where you were going and how to get there. On your vacation, everything would go smoothly and trip and quality time spent with your family would be a success. Isn’t that the way you would want it?

How did this successful journey happen? Here’s the answer—You made a plan on paper and you had someone hold you accountable for doing it. You knew when you were starting and where you were ending up. And the events in between—the “getting there” was all planned ahead of time. There were no roadblocks.

Planning & Accountability: You Can’t Have One Without The Other

It’s easy to run a promotion. It’s easy to write a plan. But without someone holding your feet to the fire and making sure you keep your focus, you’ll get distracted and you’ll fall back into the normal state of chaos. Yes, chaos is comfortable. Chaos leads to being average. Is being average what you want?

Posted by jcohen in • Restaurant Marketing
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