MANAGEMENT
CREATING A NEW T By Robin Shelton • CCM, PGA Master Professional General Manager • Newport Beach (Calif.) Country Club
“I am not telling you it will be easy. I will tell you it’s definitely going to be worth it.” This quote has always been a ‘north star’ or guiding direction when asking our team members about big ideas or new and challenging concepts. Our club had been facing a challenge that I think is common in our industry—the onboarding of new employees and ensuring they understand the club’s culture, performance standards, and measures of success. Too often, I found, we were ‘delegating’ training to anyone working the same shift. I used a football analogy with our team— no team would just put eleven players on the field and tell them to ‘go play.’ The football team will have a playbook, huddle before plays, review video footage, discuss opportunities from the bench, and so on. So the questions became: How do we improve our onboarding and new teammember training? How do we not just do what we’ve always done? How can we learn from other industries or sports?
NEW POSITIONS FOR A NEW APPROACH Our team has embraced the opportunity to prioritize our employee training with a strong new focus on club culture and hospitality. We have created two new management-level positions, Training Manager and Assistant Director of Food & Beverage–Training, that have quickly had an impact and been well-received by both members and staff. Melanie Stacklie, a 20-year employee at our club, was promoted to the Training Manager position. Every new hire now completes an individual comprehensive orientation, including videos and situational training, with Melanie before he or she starts work. With this approach, all team members have, at minimum, two days of training before performing any duty. Additionally, Melanie has been developing training programs for all team members and working with all departments to make continuous improvements through training and re-training. The videos used in the orientation
Newport Beach CC’s guides for each of its five food-and-beverage outlets include photos of dishes and detailed lists of all ingredients, including sauces, as well as menu-knowledge tests.
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process are all hospitality-focused. They feature Danny Meyer, Bobby Stuckey and other prominent hoteliers and restauranteurs, on topics that include hospitality vs. service; team-member empowerment; making connections, and putting your people first. The videos are discussed before and after they are watched, and it has been interesting to see each person’s interpretation of them. For the situational training, some fairly simple scenarios involving hospitality are used, with the goal of getting new hires focused on seeing opportunities to enhance the member experience. For example, one scenario involves a member asking for a Gatorade in an area where it is not served. Because we do serve it in another area, what would they do in that situation? The objective of these exercises is not to try to stump or trick the new employee, but to help them realize that there are numerous times each day when they can make an improvement. We love it when they get every answer correct, and because the situational training comes at the end of the orientation, the great news is that most of the new hires do. Melanie, who previously held an Accounting Manager position here, and has also served as our Interim Director of Spa & Recreation, has been excited about the opportunity to help create this brand-new program and to see how it can have such a huge impact on the entire club. Her decades-long knowledge of Newport Beach CC, and the relationships she’s built in her 20 years here, are proving to be an incredible asset for her in her new role. To put a special emphasis on our foodwww.clubandresortbusiness.com
