I’ve done it before but it’s still frightening ...

Mar 7 2008 by Bill Oldfield, The Journal

ONE of my sisters is a teacher, an honourable profession for which she underwent a thorough training, was tested in exams and given on-the-job experience before being let loose within the well-ordered structure that is a school.

It’s not an easy job and one that I would avoid like all the plagues the world has ever known. However, what she was trained for is what she does and, apart from the odd missile aimed at her or the introduction of a new swear word, there are few surprises and things she can’t cope with.

There are many structured walks of life down which one might stroll. You want to be an accountant? Sure, get a training and go and do what you’ve been taught. Personnel manager? Much the same process. Even if you wish to be a restaurant manager or chef there are courses that will teach you all you need to know to get by. But giving up the structured life of an engineer and going self-employed the way I did and then, for some reason, becoming a restaurateur was a step into the unknown. I got myself a bit of an apprenticeship by offering my services for free to a number of restaurateurs around the UK who all thought I was mad. But it taught me a lot in a short time about running a restaurant.

What it didn’t teach me was all that’s necessary before the restaurant actually opens to the public; the designing and building and decorating and so on. But I’ve done it four times so far and should be getting to be a bit of an expert at knowing what to do. Therefore this project we’re currently undertaking to hopefully open our fifth restaurant soon in the centre of Newcastle will be easy, right? Wrong.

Let’s just take builders. Nowhere in the “Learn Yourself Restauranting” book is there a chapter on how to manage the chaps that rip the place apart before, hopefully, putting it back together again. For instance, how can there be a 100% difference between two different quotes based on one set of instructions from us? Let’s think about the possibilities here. Maybe I’m not very good at making myself understood. Or perhaps someone’s trying to take us for a ride. Or, more likely hopefully, there are very different ways of doing things that result in such different costs.

But it doesn’t help with the decision making and it makes you agonise. Does the cheaper guy really know what he’s doing or will it be like a house built on sand? Are we being ripped off by the expensive one or does he know something the rest of us don’t? Do we plump for one in the middle or is that just a cop-out?

All the hospitality training in the world doesn’t prepare you for this. When you go self-employed you find you have to become jack of all trades and master of none. Well, I’ve succeeded in the latter. Now who’s going to train me in the former?

Are we being ripped off by the expensive one or does he know something the rest of us don’t?