Step into the life of Ffolkes' Restaurant Supervisor and find out what his day-to-day tasks are, how he overcomes challenges, and what makes Ffolkes so special.
So it wasn’t hospitality initially. I actually studied graphic design in college and wanted to work for Apple, that was my big aspiration, or lego. The graphic industry can be quite competitive and it’s a difficult one to get into. I wanted something more hands-on than theory-based. I was looking for something local to the area, and this was perfect! I had a trial and went from there.
Ffolkes is a fantastic place. It’s a very quirky place. The work, the food, the staff and everything that happens here. The events we do, we’ve got OktoberFEAST, this year we did St. Patricks’ day, we’ve got the street food vendors, the traditional menu on a Sunday. Just the whole shebang of the place!
One day I could be in a bunch of meetings, one day I could be solely serving customers, or unfortunately doing emails and rotas. It may be making our lemonades or producing something that we sell.
People is quite a broad one but a big one that I’ve learned. Managing people and helping people are the main two parts of my role and I think the main lesson I’ve learned is how to deal with people.
Try and hit it head-on. Anything that may come up, we’ll just try and crack down on. Whether I go to a room issue or one of my colleagues goes, we always like to tackle it but if one of us isn’t sure, usually another knows the answer straight away.
Obviously, the customer comes first so we have to keep ourself go go go! I think having something to do and a purpose when you come into work is a big one, even if it’s cleaning or if you’re designated to a section, I think you’ve got to have a purpose somewhere, it keeps people motivated.
We get daily feedback from Norfolk Passport customers. It’s sent out to each and every team member here, it’s not something that just management holds onto which is quite nice. It’s quite a cool thing, I thought, when I first joined. Everyone gets it as a whole and we can review it day to day to see how we can improve, what we did well, and I think that’s big for the team.
Preparation is a big one. Making sure you’ve got what you need, ready to go, whenever. Whether that’s stocking up the spirits or cocktails, or making sure you’ve got a spare sprit of each. Granted, some days some spirits are more popular than others. There’s only so much preparation you can do!
One time we were doing a bit of furniture moving and we managed to get one of my colleagues stuck in the office, because we were trying to move a sofa round a corner. We just lifted it up but we managed to put the leg through the wall. We couldn’t get it out, and neither could they get out!
I just like taking a bit of a step back, spending time with my family and my partner. Whether it’s going on holiday, or we’re both foodies so we like to try different places around the area or in other locations. We’ll head up to Norwich for the day for instance and try out a new place there.
Good feedback forms. Knowing that as a business as a whole, we’re doing well for every customer that comes in. Anything 95%+ is fantastic for us. We are aiming for 100% next week, that’s our aim!
I try and say this in most of the interviews, but a big one is attitude. It doesn't matter if you know a lot about the industry or you’re unsure of anything that happens here, as long as you have that positive can-do attitude, it will get you a long way.
My next aspiration will be to become the general manager and then progress from there!
