With humble beginnings as a hot dog cart inside Manhattan’s Madison Square Park in 2001, Shake Shack has grown to be an iconic restaurant brand. Since its founding, it has been one of the fastest-growing food chains, eventually becoming a public company filing for an initial public offering of stock in late 2014. Shake Shack has brought its hamburgers, hotdogs, fries and its namesake milkshakes to 250 units across the globe.
However, in March, Shake Shack found its world rocked with the challenge of the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition to its food, Shake Shack and all things “Danny Meyer” have been looked to by the restaurant and foodservice industry to provide vision when it comes to its human capital/people. So, we reached out to a very busy Diane Neville, Shake Shack’s Senior Vice President, People Resources, to walk the Total Food Service community through the company’s approach to getting back on its feet and once again welcoming customers.
Did you decide at Providence College that you were going to build a career in HR?
My plan was to work in business, but I was not aware of what aspect I really wanted to pursue. The organizational theory and HR classes were interesting to me, but it was not a passion until early on in my career when I realized helping solve people with things they were struggling with was a forte of mine (so I am told).
Where did the interest in the hospitality industry come from?
As most of us, I kind of fell into it. I had worked in restaurants in college a little. When the opportunity came up to work for P.F. Chang’s, I was enamored by the brand and what they had accomplished with growth and from a hospitality experience. From there, I have not looked back. I have come to love the restaurant space in general and the energy and passion of the people that run them on a daily basis, makes it that much better.
How has HR evolved in the 20 years that you have been involved?
HR has begun to finally have a seat at the table to work with the leaders to drive business initiatives versus just the administration perspective. New legislation and the war on talent, particularly in the hospitality space has altered how we do business from many perspectives. It is imperative that as an HR leader you stay on top of all the changes to ensure you are managing the business well while reducing risk
We are a “people” business and yet in many cases we rely on faceless technology to recruit/train/retain?
Technology is key to our HR practices in order to recruit and engage candidates quickly in addition to the engagement component to ensure training and development is continuous. With our demographic population being on the younger side, this is how employees choose to engage with us. However inside the four walls, technology will never replace the human component of a smile and a warm greet at the door or to provide a “genuine and heart-felt thank you”.
What were you able to build at Piada?
Piada was beginning a high-growth phase of branching into new markets. I had the opportunity to build the HR infrastructure from talent processes, new benefit and compensation programs. We developed a Piada University to kick off our people development programs all while ensuring we had a strong compliance foundation in place for the future. This was accomplished by creating a foundational strategic roadmap for HR that was shared with the business to engage all the cross-functional teams.
What impact did working with Rick Federico at P.F. Chang’s have on your career?
Rick is such a graceful leader. His poise and demeanor are so well-placed in all situations, good and bad. Rick was the one that taught me how dignity and respect in all decisions relating to people is non-negotiable.
Who are some of the other key mentors that you have learned from?
Bert Vivian and Mike Welborn, both P.F. Chang’s executives.
You have a unique background both in and out of foodservice. So what makes this industry so unique?
Of all the industries I have worked within, the passion to serve others in a high-energy space is just several notches higher. The excitement of the shift, or solving problems is so invigorating.
What are some of things we can learn from corporate HR?
1) Never underestimate the power of an amazing team – take the time to hire, nurture, teach and coach them. And we are a resource and a guide to help you navigate the people world – utilize it.
2) Compliance is not a bad word – it creates structure and reduces risk and liability allowing the company to be more profitable in the end.
What attracted you to the opportunity at Shake Shack?
The brand is stellar – from the people to the product and culture. The opportunity to help grow such an amazing brand is second to none.
What was the agenda that Randy Garutti (President of Shake Shack) presented you with last year when you joined the company?
Build an infrastructure to scale quickly. Let’s make sure that we have a foundation set, with people, policies and practices that are going to help us ramp for growth. This company grew so fast in the beginning that the time simply wasn’t there to put it in place. We have to do it now so that we can prepare to open 40 more Shake Shacks next year.
Has that agenda now been completely tossed as a result of COVID-19?
Absolutely not. It has shifted a bit in terms of priority, but the right plan was devised from the start. There’s a certain level of frustration that came from needing to think outside the box, because we just felt like we were caught off guard and we weren’t moving fast enough. Ironically, we had just finished a crisis management exercise prior to COVID-19.
As you look back on four months of this (COVID-19), what are the lessons that are going to be learned?
There are three things. The first is to have a business that can pivot in a very short period of time. The second is that your crisis management teams are well rehearsed, practiced and tested. The third is never underestimate the power of communication.
What has the payoff been from the year plus of planning that you have done?
We really saw that payoff from our long-term commitment to the power of communication both internally and externally with 8,000 employees. We reached out to every single employee. We have hosted a number of sessions online for furloughed employees to call in and talk every two weeks. We have kept them engaged with constant communication. We’ve built an entire furloughed site for our community and paid their benefits through July 1st.
Takeout and delivery were never part of The Shake Shack experience that has always been about dining in the restaurants.
Our system included very long (sometimes) two hour waits for our guests. We found ourselves working through social distancing and the addition of delivery windows. It was a challenge because Pre-COVID, we only had a single delivery relationship with Grubhub. We needed to create partnerships and infrastructure to expand to multiple delivery platforms.
How will the addition of takeout and delivery change your floor plan moving forward?
Again, at the top of that list was working to see if existing units can be retrofitted with drive through windows. In some cases actual walls are being blown out. We are actually testing our first drive through, this week in Vernon Hills. IL. We are also looking to design kitchens moving forward to allow space for an increased number of delivery orders and drivers. We had a number of additional changes in technology that included the removal of buzzers we had always used to let customers know when orders were ready. We have eliminated all condiment stations. Some of that space is actually being used to prep delivery orders. We have taken a new approach to packaging of orders. We had the advantage of always using a brown bag that self sealed. Our menu will remain a la carte driven and not move to a family style menu.
Can you share the strategy Shake Shack used to clean your restaurants to prepare for reopening?
It actually began with the fogging and cleaning of our offices.
We describe it as heightened cleaning. It’s really part of us becoming scrappy. That attitude has brought incredible creativity from our team. We knew that nothing was ever going to be the same again, I like to describe it as picking up a roll of duct tape and making it happen.
It really started with creating and implementing our plan for the new protocols from taking temperatures to using the proper PPE. We’re constantly cleaning. We checked bathrooms every 30 minutes. There are timers that go off so that employees are washing hands every 15 to 30 minutes.
How did you implement your safety protocol?
Every time a team member comes in, before they clock in, they get a series of questions: How are you feeling today? Do you know all of the symptoms to look for? Do you have a temperature?
What is the plan for employees that test positive for COVID?
We have had 18 employees test positive for COVID-19. We are unique in the way that Shake Shack actually has short term disability in place for every hourly team member. We pay those employees for two weeks of their quarantine.
What has it been like as you prepare to reopen and need to bring staff back again?
It has been a challenge getting furloughed employees to return to work. In some cases, due to the virus and in some cases that they are making more money on unemployment. That is coming to a head as we change their status from furloughed to terminated. The in-between step is to explain that we cannot guarantee that your job will still be here. We are moving slowly and cautiously and have begun with the re-opening of Las Vegas in June. We are finding the East Coast employment marketplace much easier than the West Coast.
All images courtesy of Shake Shack
