You're operating your restaurant as best as you can. You're probably experiencing some success, too! However, your family is taking the hit. The dinner table has an empty chair. When you're body is at home, you're mind is at the shop. You're phone keeps going off and your family looks at your phone with disappointment written on their faces.

You need a different way so you can get back to the family table.

Mastering restaurant freedom requires three steps: standardize operations, measure the system, and improve flow through your restaurant.

1. Standardize operations

From food acquistion to how customers receive their food, arguably the most important part of your restaurant is standardizing operations. Consistent performance comes through clarity.

There should be no question how much food needs to be ordered and prepped, what the recipes are, how to recover from a mistake, and when it is appropriate to call you.

Checklists are your friend when it comes to standardizing operations. Ordering forms, inventory sheets, opening and closing tasks, and more make daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, and annual operations clear.

2. Measure the system

This is the numbers of your restaurant. But what are we measuring and why? You definitely want to make money, often measured in profit. And that's part of it. Ultimately, you want to know that you're making a great return on your investment (ROI).

ROI is built on your investment (including inventory and property, plant, equipment) and profit (the difference between throughput and operating expenses). Throughput is determined by your revenue and variable costs (known as Prime Cost in the restaurant world).

Standardizing operations will free you up to measure your system properly. Yes, it takes time to put the numbers together even after standardizing your finance process, but this is one of the key areas you must track in order to know the health of your restaurant.

3. Improve flow

Lastly, you need to understand where the constraint is in your restaurant. Likely, it will be a bottleneck somewhere in the flow of food through your store. The issue is not whether you have a bottleneck or not, but whether you are managing the bottleneck appropriately.

As you leverage the bottleneck, you may find the constraint moves elsewhere in your restaurant. That means you have broken the constraint and can now manage the new constraint. This is the process of on-going improvement you will need to get on top and stay on top.

Focus

Mastering restaurant freedom is about focusing on what matters most. By working through these three steps, you will find your way back to the family table. When you're body is home, your mind can be present. And when your phone goes off, everyone will know it is for something important, not where to find bathroom broom.