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Judging Interest Form: ProStart Invitational

10/19/2018

 
Thank you for your interest in becoming a judge for ORLAEF’s ProStart Invitational, sponsored by Sysco, on Monday, March 18, 2019 at the Salem Convention Center. We appreciate your support.

The event work is demanding but inspiring. Many judges and volunteers return every year because it is so exciting to be part of the day’s energy, and to witness the results of our students four months of hard work. Truly amazing!

Time Commitment
  • Actively participate in a one-hour teleconference training call
  • Thoroughly review rules and category rubrics, including: 
    • Sample scoresheet for the culinary competition 
    • Sample scoresheet for the management competition 
  • Participate at the competition on Monday, March 18, from approximately 7:30 a.m. - 5:00 p.m. and commit to providing positive, constructive feedback to our students in-line with the competition rules.

Please complete the form below and type in N/A where answers do not apply. Thank you, we appreciate your support!

Wendy Popkin, Executive Director, ORLA Education Foundation.
​WPopkin@OregonRLA.org, 971-224-1505
Picture
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    Type N/A if not applicable
    Type N/A if not applicable
    Type N/A if not applicable
    Type N/A if not applicable
    There are two categories of competition, Culinary and Management.
    Culinary Judging Categories:
    • Product Check-in: includes temperature checks, packing, storage, labeling, accuracy
    • Team Presentation: includes work skills, teamwork and communication, proper cooking methods and knife usage, degree of difficulty
    • Safety and Sanitation: throughout entire preparation, cooking and clean-up process
    • Product Taste Starter: includes appearance, balance, portion, degree of difficulty, taste
    • Product Taste Entrée: includes appearance, balance, portion, degree of difficulty, taste
    • Product Taste Dessert: includes appearance, balance, portion, degree of difficulty, taste
    • Menu Presentation: includes format, recipe structure, presentation, costing, pricing, source acknowledgement

    Please note: Menu and Recipe Presentation is the one category that is  judged prior to the competition. The process takes approximately 12 hours of time and needs to be completed between 3/4-3/15/19. Menu judges do not need to commit to attending the competition, though they are welcome to visit or judge another category on-site.

    Management Judging Categories:
    • Concept: includes description, SWOT, presentation skills​
    • Menu and Costing: includes description, photos, concept, poster
    • Marketing: includes concept match, ROI, budgets, creativity, presentation skills
    • Critical Thinking: includes teamwork, presentation, ability to problem solve, depth of knowledge when presented spontaneous questions
    • Operations: includes layout and floor plan, décor, organization chart, presentation
Submit

Empowering Guest Service

10/8/2018

 
GSG Picture
Valuable Training for Recruitment and Retention

“When we play a game, we always ask the questions ‘What are the rules?’ and ‘How can I win…?’ When employees are asking these questions and the questions are not answered for them up front, they can become frustrated and upset because they do not know how to win at their job.” - Joe Lipham, Training Account Manager, Signature Worldwide

The power of training has been proven to help attract and keep good employees in this very competitive employment market. Clearly, despite varying levels of passion for the job, nobody goes to work hoping to look stupid and fail. 

Skill needs vary by job within each organization and necessitate specialized instruction. However, what is the one common skill that all hospitality employees need to feel comfortable in their role? Universally, experts agree that a company that focuses on teaching and empowering its associates to provide excellent guest service not only is more successful at gaining and keeping loyal customers but also more successful at attracting and retaining its employees. Standards are set high and employees are trained and empowered to deliver. Happy associates, who treat each other well, tend to create happy guests and help create a positive and rewarding work environment. 

​"A culture of high standards is protective of all the 'invisible' but crucial work that goes on in every company," writes Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, it’s the “work that gets done when no one is watching. In a high standards culture, doing that work well is its own reward..." 


Bezos also notes that to build and maintain a culture of high standards, there are four critical elements; “they are teachable, they are domain-specific, you must recognize them, and you must explicitly coach realistic scope."

​
CREATING AND EVALUATING A TOOL
I have been proud to be a partner in Oregon’s statewide initiative to build a guest service curriculum that incorporated those four elements, via the support of Travel Oregon and the American Hotel & Lodging Educational Institute (AHLEI). 

Our goal in creating Guest Service Gold Tourism: Oregon Edition, which awards the internationally-accredited credential Certified Guest Service Professional (CGSP) upon successful completion, was to provide a tool that offered a common language and teachable principles specific to challenges employees in Oregon’s hospitality industry face.

The effort has been a bit of a case study for us all, as I now realize students’, managers’, and trainers’ feedback all support the theory of the value of training and its secondary benefits overall. Here’s what we’ve learned:

From Students:
  • “I always have loads of fun whenever I get a chance to learn something new…”
  • “Good training. A useful vehicle for reminding myself of my weak areas and reinforcing my strengths.”
  • “In addition to learning many tools for providing service, I loved being able to interact with employees in other departments as well as our managers during the training.”
  • “(I appreciated the Service Recovery Principle) because I have a tendency to panic when people are upset and now I have a better toolkit for dealing with that.”

From Managers and Owners:
  • “….For me as a GM, I was very pleased to find a program that all staff could participate in regardless of the department or what position they worked….I believe it helped boost morale. The training was well received…the feedback I got was the employees really felt like they learned something,” Martin Alletson, GM, Driftwood Shores
  • “….As an owner and a chef, I can tell you that usually we say we are too busy to train or it is too expensive, but this training will pay for itself. The feedback from the team was off the charts and everyone found it to be time well spent,” Brian Williams, Owner/Chef, Big Waves Café

From Our Trainers:
  • “While working with the National Forest Service, some of the greatest breakthroughs came from people realizing they weren’t alone and that the same challenges happen to their colleagues in other departments,” Thomas Moser

TAPPING ADDITIONAL TOOLS
Preparing employees about what to expect in their roles is a skill and confidence builder. Many accommodation and foodservice businesses use online courses, such as the internationally-accredited courses offered by AHLEI. Line-level position curriculum includes Certified Front Desk Representative, Certified Restaurant Server, Certified Kitchen Cook, Certified Guestroom Attendant, and Certified Maintenance Employee. Supervisory courses are also available; learn more about their tools at AHLEI.org/certifications.

“According to Canadian tourism and hospitality HR association Go2HR, around 40 percent of employees who do not receive adequate training end up leaving their post within a year.” - Entrepreneur Magazine/ Stephen Maclaren, Head of Regional Sales Employee Benefits, Al Futtaim Willis

While there is certainly intense competition for employees, perhaps considering increasing training opportunities can help you better recruit and retain staff. If you think our guest service training tool can assist in your efforts, please visit OregonGuestService.com and feel free to contact me with any questions. | Wendy Popkin

Wendy Popkin is the Executive Director for ORLA’s Education Foundation (ORLAEF), a nonprofit foundation dedicated to supporting the educational and training needs of the hospitality industry. Wendy is a 32-year career veteran who describes herself as “fanatically enthusiastic about helping others enjoy the same type of fabulous career opportunities I have enjoyed in the hospitality industry.” 

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  • ABOUT
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  • FOUNDATION
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  • TRAINING
    • Alcohol Server Training
    • Food Handler Training
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      • Experiential Learning Overview
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