My employees know their incomes rise and fall in direct relation to the quality of service they offer our customers, including how good the food is. So, when I ended up with what I thought was going to be a problem business I empowered the employees (almost all females who are good cooks in their own right) to refashion and change the menu as they felt was appropriate. About the only thing left from the original menu is what I call "chunk of cow with side dish,"; the expected cut of rare rib roast found everywhere in Nevada. The Baron of Beef roasted for the prime rib is the same, but now it comes with a Thai/jicama, Won Ton/clear noodle, or Feta/three-bean salad, plus potato of choice. They are in charge of hiring new personnel. So, if a waitress or bartender spends too much time being "dizty" and not pulling her weight, they have a "come to Jesus" meeting with the new employee. That little intervention usually works. But when it doesn't they have my full authority to can anyone's ass who isn't pulling their own weight.
I get these little summaries from my CPA (and separate ones from my employees). According to the most recent "official" CPA report my little bar restaurant (which is a business I never intended to own) served 487 meals Monday night (between 5:00 PM and 8:00 PM), with only three waitresses working the dining area and two waitresses working a full bar. When you break it down each waitress served 126 meals (remember, they serve that many glasses of water and 80% of the time two or more beverages per diner). So, they're getting a good cardio workout caring for 40+ clients an hour. They also bus their own tables and seat diners waiting to eat.
That was just last Monday evening and doesn't include the same employees who worked lunch from 12:00 PM to 2:00 PM, during which they served 136 meals.
Average age of my employees is 52. There are a couple of gals my age who, despite having practically no cartilage in their knees, still race around as if they are 15 years-old. They all have children and most of them have grand children. And there's plenty of nepotism to go around. When several young pieces of window dressing were hired to work the bar and keep it churning money from 2:00 PM to 10:00 PM, all but one ended up being replaced by daughters-in-law or grand daughter who were equally as moist and fetching as the young blondes who were originally hired. Old cowboys, miners, and ranchers need someone to fantasize about as they suck down suds. This was not a policy I put in place. It was something I learned about from the middle-age waitresses. We've had a couple of male bartenders, too. But they quit as soon as Neumont Mining offers them a job. There is a sign the wimmin made and placed over the bar register that says, "Sexual harassment will not be reported, but it will be graded!"
However, just about everyone is my age. The after hours clean up crew is a family, legally working as citizens of the USA as they argue among one another in Spanish. The ONLY Board of Health violation we've had in 6 years was one of the faucets from which we pour well drinks was "a little gummy." Compared to the Big Gulp dispenser at any 7/11, our drink well faucets are sterile.
So, I don't see much of a problem with the work ethics of those wonderful wimmin who keep Elko's favorite place to lunch, dine, and argue while watching sports on one of the four flat screen TVs, and everything thriving at a steady pace. We're known as the home of the $10 martini. But that's only if you've been brainwashed into drinking Grey Goose. You can't imagine our markup on that shit and we serve the cheapest Grey Goose martini in town.
As for the house keepers I have who show up twice a week to clean my long-term rental apartments in Barcelona? They clean my place, too. And once they've finished I'm afraid to use the bathroom because it's to fucking clean. I tend to overpay them because they have to deal with the porno and occasional used condom stuck to the ceiling that renters often leave behind. But they are as reliable as a quality wristwatch.
The only people I've encountered since 1990 who have lax work ethics have been attorneys in the State of Ewetaw, regardless of age. They blow. :biggrin1: