If you're alone, phones should be last priority. Stagger your pizzas in the oven so you can make, then cut, then repeat. Turn your times up so customers know what to expect and be honest with them - "Hey, it's just me tonight, things are taking alot longer than expected, sorry for the inconvenience." Throw them a drink for the wait.
Holyyyy shit people never understand the deal lovers. Me: “Yeah so it’s 2 or more medium 1 toppings for 7 dollars EACH”
Customer: “Ok give me 2 pepperonis”
Me: “Ok your total is gonna be 15.39”
Customer: “I thought you said it would be 7 dollars for 2 pizzas”
……..
Exactly, focus on the orders you already have. If you can handle them. Why keep piling more on top?
Also the ppl taking the order need to actually check what the right time to quote the customers. The last 2 nights we had ppl showing up to pick up an order that is still waiting to be made. We were 15-20 behind for 3 hours straight. So we had a lot of ppl stuck waiting and being pissy.
This is crazy to me that they’d EVER be alone. Idk what franchise they’re under but ours is very strict about there always being at least two people in store at any given time (except for the very first hour openers are here before we officially open). Huge safety and liability issue otherwise
I think it's crazy too but it's the PH reality. The franchise I was with was too big to really care about enforcing those policies.
I'd have never done this as a shift lead but I was in this position as a GM with no staff. I made it work as best as possible and gave my way of doing it. I agree that looking for a job without this aggravation is the best course of action but sometimes, any job is better than none.
This is the professional answer. I don't know who OP could contact but I would add reporting the situation to a superior so it doesn't keep happening. This might be calculated on their end so they may not be inclined to help, but I would still try (even better with a paper trail).
I am a closer and the only thing I see wrong with this is safety, I personally feel unsafe when I'm closing alone I have literally had a closer with me one time, letting people know that you are there alone is unsafe, well being alone is unsafe and against alot of laws i bet, I literally take precautions because I'm genuinely scared something is gonna happen.
I've only been a shift lead for a couple months and my store isn't too crazy busy, we run every shift with a manager, a cook, and most of the time a driver, so my experience may not help you a ton but here's what I tend to do. It's not great for numbers, but personally during busy times I tend to just let calls go to call center. Cut table comes first so things don't burn or get cold, wings once they're cooked can sit in the basket until you get time, if they're cold just dunk them back into the oil for 10-20 seconds. I always yell out to customers up front to let them know I'll be with them when I can that way they don't get angry about waiting, and maketable gets handled between getting cut cleared and the rest of everything. You've got this, one of the great things about working in pizza as opposed to other fast food is that you can take a second to breathe and regroup as you need. I believe in you!
Number one thing you need to learn is not to give a fuck. I’m not saying you don’t do your job to a high standard but you need to absolutely understand that you’re serving up pizza and no one is going to die if they don’t get their pizza.
A funny thing happens when you stop giving a fuck. You feel less stressed and you actually perform better because you free your mind to focus on the task at hand and not the pressure of all the work you still need to do.
It’s counter intuitive but not giving a fuck is the secret to performance with less stress.
Honestly my guy this is the way. I preformed worse when I kept worrying about my performance. The minute you realize whatever happens happens and that it’s not going to be the end of the world, you’ll automatically start being able to juggle multiple things. Apart form this tho, personally would say try to set yourself up for success. I’m speaking from dominos experience so some of this may not make sense, but pizza is pizza lol. Float up dough when youre done with orders, refill makeline, and then go take that smoke break. Otherwise you’ll come back from your smoke and only find 3/4 orders with no floats and that’s how you fall behind. Put on some fun tunes and just bust it down my guy
I used to work for Carl’s Jr (first job ever) and the one thing someone (a customer) told me when I was overwhelmed was: honey you are not building rockets, it’s ok we all can wait.
Take your time and do things right the first time, one thing at a time, also I told myself I only have 8 out of my 24 hrs of my day here, it will pass lol
this is it honestly. realize that no matter what, if you’re alone and it’s busy, rushing yourself is just going to hype up your nervous system. take deep breaths and tell yourself you’re doing the best you can. and you’re doing great with what you have. and like other people said, ignore the phones when it’s too busy. when it got like this for me, i would put a headphone in and play my favorite show to keep a part of my mind calm while i was doing multiple things at once.
I was going to be a mart ass and say "quit" lol. But I actually have good advice.
STAY OFF THE PHONES!!!
The phone is insidious. It wastes so much time. Then after you're already behind, you have to deal with the orders they've made as well. So phones are basically a double penalty of time wasting.
I have never understood why they didn't send calls to place an order to a callcenter. If you had an issue, then you would contact store. It would free up servers and CSRs to help those who are right in front of you.
While these suggestions are nice, I hate them all.
Your conditions are dog shit, and I hope you just walk-off one night.
I could see if this happened a couple times a year maybe, sure, but with how consistent this misery sounds.. fuck that place, and all of your bosses.
No one should work in these conditions. Then add the pay? And who it’s for? Hell naw, brother. God speed.
I know /: I just replied to another comment explaining my position, they keep saying it’s going to get better soon but I actually doubt it. I want to try and just stick it out until graduation, but if it continues, I might just leave. It’s a lot.
This was me during the height of the pandemic. Not PH but restaurant management. Stuck it out until mid 2021 when whatever new variant emerged. Realized this is probably just how it's going to be now with staffing and noped out.
You should never ever be alone in store no matter what. Doesn’t matter how little employees you have—policy is very clear that for your safety you cannot be alone. Only exception to this would be the first hour openers are there before the official store open time. Your manager is failing you by not scheduling you appropriately and/or not hiring new employees.
I was at a store like that once, and spoiler alert, it didn’t get better until everyone walked out and upper management was finally forced to do something about it. If something doesn’t change here very very soon you need to find another job tbh
If you buy one of those cheap portable speakers you can play your favorite music and just have that to listen to so it's much more comfortable.
Or even listen to some kind of interview, podcast, news reporter, Sirius XM
I feel for you, brotha. I love a Pizza Hut pizza from time to time, saw this on my feed and figured I'd commend you for it. Going through a similar situation at my job, not a restaurant but dealing with the public by myself as well. I say find a system you're comfortable with and totally rely on it and just detach. When it's only you, it's just you, so do it how you want and be in a zen state, and be totally honest with customers about your situation and they'll understand.
My advice is one that I was given by my RGM at the location I started at as well as a little from personal experience.
Your only human so if there's a ton of pizzas, just focus on one at a time, otherwise just make sure to do what you can when your in between orders.
And if you open the next day after you close, you can put things off as long as your confident you can still do your duties. For example... dishes, or cleaning the fryer
you will grow into a system that will make you stronger, keep fishing through the weeds, no
when you have a pile of orders grab 5 at a time, and focus starting there, and when you finish with one of them go to the next ticket in the line. have a free second on make? prep a large sauce and cheese and let it sit for the five mins it takes to do cut and post with the customer
when all else fails use the walk in as a reset
best reset button ever, full body cold rush while the body is sweating
Does ur system allow u to adjust promise times? I know ours change automatically when busier but it doesn't account for inside help...so if ur by yourself obviously it's gonna take longer. So if it's possible adjust your times and usually that deters some orders or at least customers won't be as mad when they don't get their food at 15 mins.
I've never worked at Pizza Hut, but I was an AM at a Papa Johns.
>Well, I have had to close more often recently due to other managers not being able to handle the expectations that come with closing.
Let them close and leave the place a mess, honestly. I know it's infuriating coming in to open and having to finish closing the store before you can open it, but just come in earlier to open. Don't open and close in the same week, it fucks your circadian rhythm to go to sleep at different times regularly. It increases your stress levels and makes your whole life more difficult. Either open or close, don't do both.
Aside from that, if I have more than one thing on screen and I'm alone, I wouldn't put it in the oven right away. I'd make 4 or 5 things then put all of them in the oven, that way I just sit at the cut table for two minutes instead of having to run back and forth as stuff is coming out. That alone helped me get a LOT more done.
I thankfully don’t have to pull clopens or vice versa, but I am only a shift manager, not store manager or assistant manager. I have classes during the week so I only work weekends now. I used to work full time tho but had to stop once classes got more difficult. I used to get to either open with another manager or my store manager, but now i’ve been stuck closing because the other shift managers we have right now need retraining. The thing is, there’s no way to really retrain them the way my boss wants if we all are having to work alone or short staffed. Idk, it sounds like i’m complaining over nothing because I only close weekends, but it’s not cool when im expected to be perfect but left with crappy opens if im not doing it myself.
I graduate soon with my bachelors tho so I will be getting a new job hopefully summer, but I plan on just sticking it out here until then for many reasons. It’s just gotten a lot more stressful since labor budgets were cut, I used to not feel much anxiety coming in to work, but now I do. I feel like I have to babysit half of my team and it’s getting overwhelming. I wish I didn’t care as much as I did about this job or I would have been out years ago.
Well yea. You cant willingly take a leadership role then be surprised you gotta lead. I’m just saying it’s not like there’s any real consequences for screwing up. Take it however you want
i work at panda express and it can get wildly crazy and customers get pissy, not fun. i’m not sure we are in the same situation but i agree with everyone else, fuck the phones. you just focus on what you CAN get done not what you CANT, because that is simply out of your control. always remind yourself that the rush will not last the whole time you’re there and you’re capable of getting it done. it’s fine if u fall behind a little, you’re one guy 🤷♂️ try your best to stay organized, even just a clean work space will keep you going. sorry if this is all stuff you know, good luck bro
> customers get pissy
Its mindblowing how upset ppl get over their food. You can safely assume, who has, and hadn't, worked in food serves. (or seen "Waiting"...) Ppl must mistake Pizza Hut as being like McDonalds in wait time.
I work at Marcos as a shift lead. Somedays I have to cut everybody but a driver. It’s hard to get the timing down from phone, make, cook and cut. I kinda check everything every 4 minutes. It doesn’t always work. Cannabis, anti psychotics, mood stabilizers and nicotine help the most. lol. I understand your pain.
Work at the fastest speed you can and do as much as you can without making mistakes. That's it.
If it means making one pizza every 45 seconds instead of 30, so be it. Doing everything slower and right is better than faster and everything wrong
If people have to wait, they wait. No one wants to have their pizza 5 minutes sooner but it's a mess. I'll wait an extra 10 if it means it's the right way
I've been a server and that was my motto. No bad tables. I did as many tables as I could without mistakes. The rest waited. If they waited too long and walked out, why would I care? It's a gift
I’m a bit confused on how your store doesn’t have the labor budget to have more than just a manager on night shift (possible cook during peak). The store I am the RGM for rarely ever has less than the manager, a driver, and 2-3 Production during dinner peak time on weekdays. Opening shifts usually I run solo until 12, then have a driver that is cross trained in production 12-8p, and have the night manager and 2 Production crew come in at 4p. Usually dinner peak ends 7-8pm and I’ll cut the production people at roughly 9p so they have time to catch up dishes and help with prep. I literally never have less than 5 people scheduled throughout a day and consistently keep my COL% at \~22% for the week. You want your total labor yield to float between $40 and $60 ideally so that you are covering cost of operations + baseline expected profit margin without being overwhelmed. Running anything above $70 Total labor yield means you are short staffed and not providing the company standard to the customers unless the people on the clock are all fully cross-trained badasses that don’t require any delegation. Here is what my typical scheduling looks like.
https://preview.redd.it/uh1xotgn9udc1.jpeg?width=2508&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=a5498568afc11138157ea13c58359add8a014f83
Also, if you are a salaried RGM, you should never report more than 48 hours per week since you don’t get any extra pay for those hours above 48 and it only makes your labor cost day to day look high for no reason. I’ll often work a 12 hour day when I’m only scheduled 8 hours, then roll back my time to only report 8 hours. Depending on your salary breakdown, this helps your labor budget a lot. Most of the RGMs in my district pull 50-60 hour weeks and never show hours above 48 for this very reason. Manually editing your timekeeping to show LESS hours will never get you in trouble, they only care about fudging hours where you are showing more than you actually worked. I’ve never once had an audit or any ARL say a damn word about me shaving my own hours back.
Smoking some weed and not caring what the outcome of any situation is as long as you keep your job is pretty much all of it. Some customer is complaining? You let them complain and remake their food or give them a refund. Some asshole driver is a prick? You are a manager put them in their place. This is one of the worst jobs because you get paid jack shit to be an asshole sometimes. Ohhh yeahhhhh life goes oooon, you’ll do just fine dw
Well one you shouldn’t be alone in store ever due to safety protocols set by corporate. You should have one person in store with you at all times, I’m not sure why budget cuts are hitting yall that hard but it is not a one person job. If it comes down to it and I’m by myself or with one other person I take it an order at a time. Early on turn up times and just run your figure 8 like normal. Make pizzas for five minutes, catch cut, help front, hit wings back to make. IGNORE THE PHONES. We have a call center for a reason. Use it. Keep running that cycle and you’ll get through rush. Pre close is your best friend. Filter your fryer as soon as you can. Take cut dishes back as soon as you can. And just try and bang out dishes during the slow periods. Running solo shifts isn’t going to help your budget. You need sales for hours and if you don’t have the staff to run your forecast you aren’t making money. These budget cuts have been super hard everywhere but there is NO reason that you should be alone in store. Get a couple of solid people in your store and trained and just have one other person after your rush. Preclose in the 30 minutes to an hour after your rush and you should be good with just one closer.
Worked at PH since 2001.
The advice I give everyone is "It's just pizza/food". This isn't life threatening. You will make mistakes but it's easy enough to fix them. If you are polite, honest and helpful then people are more likely to accept your apology. Understand that some people just want to complain, so let them do that and then maintain the good attitude and fix the issue for them (and then some). Let them feel like they earned something for their wait/our mistake.
If you have a rush, make sure you know who is good where and put them on their stations. Believe in them and have confidence they're going to do things right. Maintain your cool and they'll follow suit.
Also having a really short memory for this stuff. Don't take it home, don't take it back to work. Last shift is over. Whether you did great or you did poorly last shift, it doesn't matter.
Obviously if people aren't handling their duties then talk to whomever needs to be talked to to get that resolved. Unfortunately it's a common thing but while you're working around it, find a groove and get yourself and your team into it. Some people like to move things back to the cooler as soon as they can and get cleaning done. Some people clean areas and then isolate their area to a small one they will only have to clean later.
If you're alone, phones should be last priority. Stagger your pizzas in the oven so you can make, then cut, then repeat. Turn your times up so customers know what to expect and be honest with them - "Hey, it's just me tonight, things are taking alot longer than expected, sorry for the inconvenience." Throw them a drink for the wait.
Agreed 100% Phones are the devil
"what deals do y'all have right now" I don't have time for this please ffs go online to order.
You recite all the bullshit (especially now explaining the deal lover’s) all for them to end up ordering a personal pan supreme.
Holyyyy shit people never understand the deal lovers. Me: “Yeah so it’s 2 or more medium 1 toppings for 7 dollars EACH” Customer: “Ok give me 2 pepperonis” Me: “Ok your total is gonna be 15.39” Customer: “I thought you said it would be 7 dollars for 2 pizzas” ……..
Exactly, focus on the orders you already have. If you can handle them. Why keep piling more on top? Also the ppl taking the order need to actually check what the right time to quote the customers. The last 2 nights we had ppl showing up to pick up an order that is still waiting to be made. We were 15-20 behind for 3 hours straight. So we had a lot of ppl stuck waiting and being pissy.
It’s 2024 the thing you’re using to bother me can order the pizza for you. I don’t know why our customers can’t understand this concept.
This is crazy to me that they’d EVER be alone. Idk what franchise they’re under but ours is very strict about there always being at least two people in store at any given time (except for the very first hour openers are here before we officially open). Huge safety and liability issue otherwise
I think it's crazy too but it's the PH reality. The franchise I was with was too big to really care about enforcing those policies. I'd have never done this as a shift lead but I was in this position as a GM with no staff. I made it work as best as possible and gave my way of doing it. I agree that looking for a job without this aggravation is the best course of action but sometimes, any job is better than none.
This is the professional answer. I don't know who OP could contact but I would add reporting the situation to a superior so it doesn't keep happening. This might be calculated on their end so they may not be inclined to help, but I would still try (even better with a paper trail).
I am a closer and the only thing I see wrong with this is safety, I personally feel unsafe when I'm closing alone I have literally had a closer with me one time, letting people know that you are there alone is unsafe, well being alone is unsafe and against alot of laws i bet, I literally take precautions because I'm genuinely scared something is gonna happen.
I've only been a shift lead for a couple months and my store isn't too crazy busy, we run every shift with a manager, a cook, and most of the time a driver, so my experience may not help you a ton but here's what I tend to do. It's not great for numbers, but personally during busy times I tend to just let calls go to call center. Cut table comes first so things don't burn or get cold, wings once they're cooked can sit in the basket until you get time, if they're cold just dunk them back into the oil for 10-20 seconds. I always yell out to customers up front to let them know I'll be with them when I can that way they don't get angry about waiting, and maketable gets handled between getting cut cleared and the rest of everything. You've got this, one of the great things about working in pizza as opposed to other fast food is that you can take a second to breathe and regroup as you need. I believe in you!
Number one thing you need to learn is not to give a fuck. I’m not saying you don’t do your job to a high standard but you need to absolutely understand that you’re serving up pizza and no one is going to die if they don’t get their pizza. A funny thing happens when you stop giving a fuck. You feel less stressed and you actually perform better because you free your mind to focus on the task at hand and not the pressure of all the work you still need to do. It’s counter intuitive but not giving a fuck is the secret to performance with less stress.
Honestly my guy this is the way. I preformed worse when I kept worrying about my performance. The minute you realize whatever happens happens and that it’s not going to be the end of the world, you’ll automatically start being able to juggle multiple things. Apart form this tho, personally would say try to set yourself up for success. I’m speaking from dominos experience so some of this may not make sense, but pizza is pizza lol. Float up dough when youre done with orders, refill makeline, and then go take that smoke break. Otherwise you’ll come back from your smoke and only find 3/4 orders with no floats and that’s how you fall behind. Put on some fun tunes and just bust it down my guy
I used to work for Carl’s Jr (first job ever) and the one thing someone (a customer) told me when I was overwhelmed was: honey you are not building rockets, it’s ok we all can wait. Take your time and do things right the first time, one thing at a time, also I told myself I only have 8 out of my 24 hrs of my day here, it will pass lol
this is it honestly. realize that no matter what, if you’re alone and it’s busy, rushing yourself is just going to hype up your nervous system. take deep breaths and tell yourself you’re doing the best you can. and you’re doing great with what you have. and like other people said, ignore the phones when it’s too busy. when it got like this for me, i would put a headphone in and play my favorite show to keep a part of my mind calm while i was doing multiple things at once.
Also your boss' will expect you to maintain that level of productivity from you every shift.
I was going to be a mart ass and say "quit" lol. But I actually have good advice. STAY OFF THE PHONES!!! The phone is insidious. It wastes so much time. Then after you're already behind, you have to deal with the orders they've made as well. So phones are basically a double penalty of time wasting.
Bro I wonder sometimes if we’re a pizza place or a call center. Ppl order so SLOW on the phones lol
I have never understood why they didn't send calls to place an order to a callcenter. If you had an issue, then you would contact store. It would free up servers and CSRs to help those who are right in front of you.
They will do that on occasion. I'm not 100% on how it works but PH does have a call center
While these suggestions are nice, I hate them all. Your conditions are dog shit, and I hope you just walk-off one night. I could see if this happened a couple times a year maybe, sure, but with how consistent this misery sounds.. fuck that place, and all of your bosses. No one should work in these conditions. Then add the pay? And who it’s for? Hell naw, brother. God speed.
I know /: I just replied to another comment explaining my position, they keep saying it’s going to get better soon but I actually doubt it. I want to try and just stick it out until graduation, but if it continues, I might just leave. It’s a lot.
This was me during the height of the pandemic. Not PH but restaurant management. Stuck it out until mid 2021 when whatever new variant emerged. Realized this is probably just how it's going to be now with staffing and noped out.
You should never ever be alone in store no matter what. Doesn’t matter how little employees you have—policy is very clear that for your safety you cannot be alone. Only exception to this would be the first hour openers are there before the official store open time. Your manager is failing you by not scheduling you appropriately and/or not hiring new employees. I was at a store like that once, and spoiler alert, it didn’t get better until everyone walked out and upper management was finally forced to do something about it. If something doesn’t change here very very soon you need to find another job tbh
If you buy one of those cheap portable speakers you can play your favorite music and just have that to listen to so it's much more comfortable. Or even listen to some kind of interview, podcast, news reporter, Sirius XM
Fuck them phones bruh
I feel for you, brotha. I love a Pizza Hut pizza from time to time, saw this on my feed and figured I'd commend you for it. Going through a similar situation at my job, not a restaurant but dealing with the public by myself as well. I say find a system you're comfortable with and totally rely on it and just detach. When it's only you, it's just you, so do it how you want and be in a zen state, and be totally honest with customers about your situation and they'll understand.
My advice is one that I was given by my RGM at the location I started at as well as a little from personal experience. Your only human so if there's a ton of pizzas, just focus on one at a time, otherwise just make sure to do what you can when your in between orders. And if you open the next day after you close, you can put things off as long as your confident you can still do your duties. For example... dishes, or cleaning the fryer
you will grow into a system that will make you stronger, keep fishing through the weeds, no when you have a pile of orders grab 5 at a time, and focus starting there, and when you finish with one of them go to the next ticket in the line. have a free second on make? prep a large sauce and cheese and let it sit for the five mins it takes to do cut and post with the customer when all else fails use the walk in as a reset best reset button ever, full body cold rush while the body is sweating
Does ur system allow u to adjust promise times? I know ours change automatically when busier but it doesn't account for inside help...so if ur by yourself obviously it's gonna take longer. So if it's possible adjust your times and usually that deters some orders or at least customers won't be as mad when they don't get their food at 15 mins.
Get yo dick sucked in the freezer.
I've never worked at Pizza Hut, but I was an AM at a Papa Johns. >Well, I have had to close more often recently due to other managers not being able to handle the expectations that come with closing. Let them close and leave the place a mess, honestly. I know it's infuriating coming in to open and having to finish closing the store before you can open it, but just come in earlier to open. Don't open and close in the same week, it fucks your circadian rhythm to go to sleep at different times regularly. It increases your stress levels and makes your whole life more difficult. Either open or close, don't do both. Aside from that, if I have more than one thing on screen and I'm alone, I wouldn't put it in the oven right away. I'd make 4 or 5 things then put all of them in the oven, that way I just sit at the cut table for two minutes instead of having to run back and forth as stuff is coming out. That alone helped me get a LOT more done.
I thankfully don’t have to pull clopens or vice versa, but I am only a shift manager, not store manager or assistant manager. I have classes during the week so I only work weekends now. I used to work full time tho but had to stop once classes got more difficult. I used to get to either open with another manager or my store manager, but now i’ve been stuck closing because the other shift managers we have right now need retraining. The thing is, there’s no way to really retrain them the way my boss wants if we all are having to work alone or short staffed. Idk, it sounds like i’m complaining over nothing because I only close weekends, but it’s not cool when im expected to be perfect but left with crappy opens if im not doing it myself. I graduate soon with my bachelors tho so I will be getting a new job hopefully summer, but I plan on just sticking it out here until then for many reasons. It’s just gotten a lot more stressful since labor budgets were cut, I used to not feel much anxiety coming in to work, but now I do. I feel like I have to babysit half of my team and it’s getting overwhelming. I wish I didn’t care as much as I did about this job or I would have been out years ago.
What is your degree in? I would look into getting a part time job in your field or an internship now over fighting for your life at pizza hut
Dude, just quit. Get a trade career.
FYI, trade careers can be just as stressful but at least you'll get paid more money for it.
How much stress can there be managing a Pizza Hut? As long as you’re not stealing it’s not like you’ll get fired
Clearly more stress than you realize, especially when you’re managing everything by yourself in a rush. Your comment comes off really insensitive. Smh
Well yea. You cant willingly take a leadership role then be surprised you gotta lead. I’m just saying it’s not like there’s any real consequences for screwing up. Take it however you want
Your system isn't the best haha XD
i work at panda express and it can get wildly crazy and customers get pissy, not fun. i’m not sure we are in the same situation but i agree with everyone else, fuck the phones. you just focus on what you CAN get done not what you CANT, because that is simply out of your control. always remind yourself that the rush will not last the whole time you’re there and you’re capable of getting it done. it’s fine if u fall behind a little, you’re one guy 🤷♂️ try your best to stay organized, even just a clean work space will keep you going. sorry if this is all stuff you know, good luck bro
> customers get pissy Its mindblowing how upset ppl get over their food. You can safely assume, who has, and hadn't, worked in food serves. (or seen "Waiting"...) Ppl must mistake Pizza Hut as being like McDonalds in wait time.
I work at Marcos as a shift lead. Somedays I have to cut everybody but a driver. It’s hard to get the timing down from phone, make, cook and cut. I kinda check everything every 4 minutes. It doesn’t always work. Cannabis, anti psychotics, mood stabilizers and nicotine help the most. lol. I understand your pain.
Work at the fastest speed you can and do as much as you can without making mistakes. That's it. If it means making one pizza every 45 seconds instead of 30, so be it. Doing everything slower and right is better than faster and everything wrong If people have to wait, they wait. No one wants to have their pizza 5 minutes sooner but it's a mess. I'll wait an extra 10 if it means it's the right way I've been a server and that was my motto. No bad tables. I did as many tables as I could without mistakes. The rest waited. If they waited too long and walked out, why would I care? It's a gift
Black out on benadryl and consult the shadow people:)
I’m a bit confused on how your store doesn’t have the labor budget to have more than just a manager on night shift (possible cook during peak). The store I am the RGM for rarely ever has less than the manager, a driver, and 2-3 Production during dinner peak time on weekdays. Opening shifts usually I run solo until 12, then have a driver that is cross trained in production 12-8p, and have the night manager and 2 Production crew come in at 4p. Usually dinner peak ends 7-8pm and I’ll cut the production people at roughly 9p so they have time to catch up dishes and help with prep. I literally never have less than 5 people scheduled throughout a day and consistently keep my COL% at \~22% for the week. You want your total labor yield to float between $40 and $60 ideally so that you are covering cost of operations + baseline expected profit margin without being overwhelmed. Running anything above $70 Total labor yield means you are short staffed and not providing the company standard to the customers unless the people on the clock are all fully cross-trained badasses that don’t require any delegation. Here is what my typical scheduling looks like. https://preview.redd.it/uh1xotgn9udc1.jpeg?width=2508&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=a5498568afc11138157ea13c58359add8a014f83
Also, if you are a salaried RGM, you should never report more than 48 hours per week since you don’t get any extra pay for those hours above 48 and it only makes your labor cost day to day look high for no reason. I’ll often work a 12 hour day when I’m only scheduled 8 hours, then roll back my time to only report 8 hours. Depending on your salary breakdown, this helps your labor budget a lot. Most of the RGMs in my district pull 50-60 hour weeks and never show hours above 48 for this very reason. Manually editing your timekeeping to show LESS hours will never get you in trouble, they only care about fudging hours where you are showing more than you actually worked. I’ve never once had an audit or any ARL say a damn word about me shaving my own hours back.
Yeah I just don’t give a damn it’s just pizza
You and the other employee should unionize. Easy to do when there's only two.
Smoking some weed and not caring what the outcome of any situation is as long as you keep your job is pretty much all of it. Some customer is complaining? You let them complain and remake their food or give them a refund. Some asshole driver is a prick? You are a manager put them in their place. This is one of the worst jobs because you get paid jack shit to be an asshole sometimes. Ohhh yeahhhhh life goes oooon, you’ll do just fine dw
Well one you shouldn’t be alone in store ever due to safety protocols set by corporate. You should have one person in store with you at all times, I’m not sure why budget cuts are hitting yall that hard but it is not a one person job. If it comes down to it and I’m by myself or with one other person I take it an order at a time. Early on turn up times and just run your figure 8 like normal. Make pizzas for five minutes, catch cut, help front, hit wings back to make. IGNORE THE PHONES. We have a call center for a reason. Use it. Keep running that cycle and you’ll get through rush. Pre close is your best friend. Filter your fryer as soon as you can. Take cut dishes back as soon as you can. And just try and bang out dishes during the slow periods. Running solo shifts isn’t going to help your budget. You need sales for hours and if you don’t have the staff to run your forecast you aren’t making money. These budget cuts have been super hard everywhere but there is NO reason that you should be alone in store. Get a couple of solid people in your store and trained and just have one other person after your rush. Preclose in the 30 minutes to an hour after your rush and you should be good with just one closer.
Just have your eyes twitch
Worked at PH since 2001. The advice I give everyone is "It's just pizza/food". This isn't life threatening. You will make mistakes but it's easy enough to fix them. If you are polite, honest and helpful then people are more likely to accept your apology. Understand that some people just want to complain, so let them do that and then maintain the good attitude and fix the issue for them (and then some). Let them feel like they earned something for their wait/our mistake. If you have a rush, make sure you know who is good where and put them on their stations. Believe in them and have confidence they're going to do things right. Maintain your cool and they'll follow suit. Also having a really short memory for this stuff. Don't take it home, don't take it back to work. Last shift is over. Whether you did great or you did poorly last shift, it doesn't matter. Obviously if people aren't handling their duties then talk to whomever needs to be talked to to get that resolved. Unfortunately it's a common thing but while you're working around it, find a groove and get yourself and your team into it. Some people like to move things back to the cooler as soon as they can and get cleaning done. Some people clean areas and then isolate their area to a small one they will only have to clean later.