Ms. T's

Secret Menu

This is one self-paced module from a 12 unit training series designed to prepare this fine dining restaurant's servers to become bartenders. This specific module covered an aspect of bar service unique from the standardized expectations of service in the rest of the restaurant. The proprietary information (such as actual recipes and drink photos) has been removed from the training.

Audience: Experienced servers in the restaurant training to work behind the bar

Responsibilities: Needs assessment, photography, storyboarding, web design

Tools: Canva, Adobe Creative Suite, Canon EOS, Microsoft Dynamics 365, Wordpress, H5P

AI Integrations: Interview transcription, adjusting content reading level, animation homogenization

Goal: To prepare servers transition away from tableside service in the dining room of a fine dining concept restaurant into bartop service. The change allows employees greater agency in handing customer needs and building a personal brand as a relational agent, so the training needed to cover necessary skills and knowledge without being proscriptive in how employees handle guests and situations.

Launch Point: The restaurant management team approached me to update their server and bartender training materials, which were originally created in 1998 as a DVD series and cut-out flashcard packet. The content had been left unchanged for more than 25 years as part of an effort to conserve the restaurants unique culture and service approach, part of its enduring appeal and success. I was tasked with creating 12 modules each for the two training series, intended to support hands-on training throughout a shift as well as during trainees independent study.

Journey: The primary needs raised by the managers were: modern language and format, accessible reading level, printable pages (staff are not allowed phones or tablets visible to guests), and secure storage while allowing regular study.

The informal needs assessment began with interviews of existing bartenders and managers to identify pain points with the current training. The most obvious, of course, was that a dvd-based training could not be easily referenced throughout a training shift in a busy bar, and the existing flashcards presented a risk of recipe loss to competitors. However, not allowing employees to take home flashcards encouraged either sneakiness (to study at home) or extended training times (to learn in the building). We also found that the lack of updated imagery prevented trainees from learning the new content as quickly.

Based on this needs assessment, we planned a multi-part approach that centered training around a recipe book already kept securely at the bar, fresh asset creation through on-site photography and graphics design, and a short pre-shift deck that converted readily to print where necessary.

I started by creating a deck template with new graphics for the management team's approval, including custom graphics for special training sessions like this one, which covers a secret menu of drinks primarily ordered by long-time regulars. Once approved, we began planning a session to photograph the drinks on this menu, which gave rise to a unique opportunity to use the training as a marketing event for the restaurant.

The restaurant relied only on word-of-mouth for guest attraction and retention, and enjoyed a large number of regular patrons with familial relationships with bar staff and other guests. As Ms. T's menu was originally created by a long-time  regular who had recently passed away, we decided to plan an invite-only event for regulars to come and bring print photos of Ms. T with her beverages and have a small celebration of her life. During this event, we also had contests for regulars to blind taste drinks and see if they could properly identify them, and for bartenders to make the best version of each recipe. We photographed these with a modern polaroid-style camera and kept some of these photos behind the bar, while adding others to the training deck and new recipe book.

Finally, we used H5P to create recipe and ingredient quizzes for all of the bar drinks and menu items, which were then hosted on a password protected page of the restaurant's website and guarded by a screenshot blocker. While not a perfect solution to the risk of recipe loss, it satisfied the managent team's desire to make review accessible for trainees while increasing protection of the data.

Results: While the needs assessment was informal and did not allow for clear success metrics, in this situation, the relational approach with all involved parties created an intimate and meaningful product that fit with the relationship-based business model of the restaurant. The decks could be easily shared on a locked webpage or printed in a high-contrast format for review during downtime on training shifts, while a modern approach to the flashcard style learning the bartenders and servers unilaterally wished to preserve satisfied the needs of both learners and management.