Introducing a New Era of “Contextual” Labor Management
Deterministics Labor System Flexes Staffing Targets to Accommodate Guest Preferences
In a restaurant world heaving with marketing promotions and guests demanding customized experiences, labor staffing targets must flex with differing guest preferences and company marketing programs. The Deterministics Labor System (DLS) now affords a way of personalizing a store's labor targets based on guest needs and marketing programs outside the restaurant managers' control. Our labor management system brings labor standards to life by putting them “in context” for the manager while making fixed, picture-in-time labor standards obsolete. You can reference our White Paper Research to see how labor percent of sales and productivity metrics are unreliable measures of performance.
We are the first to coin the term "contextual labor management” because the dynamics of labor targets will change depending on who is in the store and how they wish to use the experience. Labor requirements expand and contract depending on differing seating arrival rates, party sizes, service requests, table turn durations, marketing promotions, menu item choices and bar sales mixes. Everyday managers must adjust their staffing deployment in real time based on customer decisions about how they want to use the experience, in other words, in the context of meeting their needs. The Deterministics Labor System offers operators credible labor guidelines that they can believe in and adhere to because they are based on a brand's standards and flex with the needs of each guest experience.
The Contextual Labor Management (CLM) Solution
Work Content and Work Context: Bringing Labor Standards to Life
Accurate labor management requires a combination of time studied work tasks and technology configured for each restaurant's operating environment. The value of our CLM system comes from the accuracy of recipe based labor standards that can account for guest purchases (content) and guest behaviors (context). It also accounts for the complex interrelationships of a food manufacturing facility with layers of shared sub recipe prep work that supports final menu item execution in each cook station. For example, DLS can report the correct staffing of Host, Server, Cooks, Bus and Bartender accommodating the following scenarios.
Table 26
- Party of five seated at 11:45am
- Ordered one round of alcoholic drinks
- Ordered three appetizers to share
- Ordered entrees after appetizers consumed
- Ordered second round of alcoholic drinks
- Two desserts ordered after entrees consumed
- Paid bill via credit card
- Departed 1:14 for a table turn time of 89 minutes
- Sales: $162.80 Server Hours: 1.5 Sales Per Labor Hour: $109
Table 31
- Party of two seated at 12:23pm
- Ordered one round of non-alcoholic drinks and entrées in one Server trip
- Paid bill with cash left on table
- Departed 1:08 for a table turn time of 45 minutes
- Sales: $33.00 Server Hours: .75 Sales Per Labor Hour: $44
The Labor Recipe™ Difference
For the same reason that all operators appreciate the importance of standardized food recipes, Deterministics has developed a Labor Recipe methodology that defines labor requirements based on a time study analysis of all activities that consume labor in a restaurant. Whether it's guests arriving at the restaurant, which triggers the need for service staff, or menu item demand at the Saute station, Labor Recipes are used to first calculate the workload for each restaurant position by minute of the day, and then translate this work time into staffing positions for creating labor schedules with a new level of precision and accuracy.
How Labor Recipes work with Deterministics Labor System
A series of time studies performed by our engineering team at multiple locations determines the precise amount of work seconds built into the Labor Recipes. The results of the time studies are loaded into the Deterministics Labor System software, which then uses transaction data exported from the restaurants point-of-sale system to produce daily Opportunity Analysis reports, provide accurate data into the Forecasting and Scheduling Modules, and provide Modeling and Analytics to better foresee impacts of menu and process changes across the chain.
Labor Recipe Development Services
- Provides continuous support for creating and maintaining Labor Recipes.
- Accommodates changes in Labor Recipe standards with an easy to use, web-based toolset.
Opportunity Analysis
- Compares actual staffing to ideal staffing by time of day and position.
- Clearly identifies periods where staffing was not sufficient to cover demand resulting in an opportunity to improve customer service and periods where staffing exceeded demand resulting in wasted labor.
- Reports non-productive time resulting from company policies such as minimum staffing requirements.
- Reports Opportunity Analysis results to all levels of management in easy to understand formats including exception, comparative and historical versions.
Workload Forecasts
- Accurately forecasts workload by quarter hour and position.
- Tracks sales-impacting events such as holidays and severe weather with searchable event log entries.
Menu and Recipe Modeling/Analytics
- Evaluates the impact of anticipated process changes on total work time, throughput time and workstation load.
- Evaluates the impact of planned promotions and limited time offers.
- Predicts impact of planned recipe, menu and process changes on labor needs.
- Evaluates outcome of Labor Recipe changes at the ingredient level (e.g. changing from pre-washed and packaged lettuce to cut and wash in-house).
- Create “0” based financial budgets based on Deterministics’ projections.
Scheduling System Integration
- Evaluate current staffing standards.
- Deterministics Labor System can generate high precision labor requirements for in-house or third party labor scheduling systems.
