By Violetta Njunina, Contributor
In 2018, restaurants served over 200 million guests, and employed over 9.9 million food workers. This scale of operation only seems to be on the rise, with the projected number of restaurant employees expected to grow to 17.2 million by the year 2030.
With the restaurant industry being infamously labor-heavy, restaurants are notoriously at risk of human errors. These can range from food quality complaints to food safety lapses and their consequences.
Regardless, any issue stemming from a food handler’s lack of training could end in extreme monetary losses for a restaurant. So how can a restaurateur deal with these issues and prevent these errors in the first place?
The answer lies in the creation and implementation of a strong food safety and hygiene training program for food handlers. Let’s explore how you can do that.
The Importance of Food Safety Training
The importance of food safety training is demonstrated by the consequences that could occur due to a lack of training, such as:
Revenue loss. The cost of a foodborne illness outbreak is estimated to be between $3968 and $1.9 million for a fast-food restaurant. This number is expected to be much higher if food safety complaints and allergen incidents are taken into consideration. A 2017 study by CDC estimated that almost half of food allergy-related deaths occur in food establishments.
Operational challenges. Over 35% of restaurant owners and operators state that training new food handler recruits is a major operational challenge. And a lack of training and employee engagement strategies could lead to increased operational challenges due to employee attrition.
Training Tools: The First Step Towards Great Training
There are certain tools that operators need to acquire in order to ensure that the building blocks of a training program are strong. These include:
Qualified Trainers. Hiring an industry-experienced and qualified trainer to execute training sessions for food handlers is an indispensable part of any training program. Experienced professional trainers will be able to impart crucial information to food handlers in an easy and comprehensible way. Additionally, they will be able to assess what training methodologies might be most effective for different individuals.
Training Material. Ensuring that the training material used to train food handlers is comprehensive and up-to-date is essential so that your food handlers can effectively apply their knowledge to any real-time scenario in any food establishment setting.
Training Methods: Which One Is the Best?
Another important aspect of training food handlers in food safety and hygiene is the method of training itself.
Analyzing and picking out the right kind of training methodology by considering factors such as time restraints, resource constraints, and practicality can help contribute to the overall effectiveness of the program itself. Here are two main methodologies you should consider.
On-The-Job Training
On-the-job training is a type of training methodology through which food safety and hygiene trainers conduct short briefings and demonstrations for food handlers within a restaurant and/or kitchen space. These demonstrations can include activities like demonstrating cooking temperature measurements and showing effective cleaning methods for production equipment, for example.
There are various advantages to using the on-the-job training methodology. These include:
Knowledge retention. On-the-job training can be done in short briefs, which allows for better knowledge retention by food handlers.
Ease of execution.: For trainers, conducting on-the-job briefings/demonstrations can be made possible within a restaurant space even during peak hours, making them more practical.
Classroom Training
Classroom training is a training methodology that is used to relay theory-based knowledge, such as HACCP systems, to food handlers through classroom-style sessions. Some common features of classroom style training are:
Visual aids. Classroom training involves the use of visual-heavy teaching material, such as presentation, posters, and equipment.
Longer training duration. Classroom training is often conducted over extended periods of time, i.e., anywhere between one hour and several days.
Although class-room style training is where the much-needed theory is taught, it is also one of the less frequently used training methodologies for ground-level food handlers and staff.
The reason for this is simple — food handlers who are working on the floor during operational hours simply do not have the time to dedicate to several hour-long training sessions during the work day.
Another disadvantage of using classroom-style methodology is low knowledge retention. Most food handlers will not be able to focus on the subject at hand if training sessions extend beyond an hour.
Training Methodologies: A Balance
As you can see, class-room style training has the ability to relay large amounts of important information in a small number of sessions. At the same time, on-the-job training is more feasible and practical.
So one of the most effective methods that trainers can implement in a restaurant setting is to create a training schedule that will allow food handlers and management an even mix of both the training methods.
Doing this ensures that both theory and practical knowledge can be relayed to trainees, and allows you to facilitate effective knowledge retention and application in real-life scenarios.
Conclusion
Training restaurant staff in food safety and hygiene is an essential part of the operation of any food establishment. When creating a training program, make sure to consider the training material, training methodology, and trainer qualifications.
Of the two kinds of training methodologies usually used, on-the-job training is a better choice in terms of application-based learning and demonstration of hygiene concepts. On the other hand, classroom-style training is better at imparting theoretical food safety knowledge to food handlers.
Your goal should be to create a training program that consists of both these training methodologies.
About the Author
Violetta is the Head of Sales at FoodDocs and is an experienced restaurant and event manager with a demonstrated history of working in the food & beverages industry.
