How to reinvent franchising with tech and transparency

When somebody mentions gemba, it always makes me think of veggie smoothies. You know you should drink them because they are super healthy. But you never do.

Too much trouble and not as tasty as a greasy bun with some fried beef and cheese from the fancy burger joint around the corner.

Have no doubt: gemba is as healthy for your company as the smoothies are for your body. Yet while millions tout the benefits of the gemba process and continuous improvement and hammer home again and again how good it...

OK, we’ve got a problem: the business is growing. It sure brings excitement to our CEO, but it also brings tons of trouble to our IT team, which has to keep up with the pace.

All our pizzerias are run by our own IT system. It’s responsible for every step of our pizza making.

By the end of 2016, we at Dodo Pizza had 154 pizza shops in 9 countries. Now it’s 247. The guys from the franchise department brag that by the end of the year it could be 300 easily.

The growth itself takes its toll on our infrastructure, which needs bolstering. The expansion also increases the demand for new features: the more people join our pizza chain, the...

"I'm not the only one who deals with such a mess." Doesn't this revelation help? Sometimes, when managing a restaurant, we need just that—to know that we're not alone. Sometimes, we seek guidance or inspiration. All that can be found online nowadays. Coming across useful pro resources, though, may be tricky in the abundance of websites made for those who simply love to eat. So in this post, we'd like to share a few of the best restaurant management blogs we find practical and inspiring—the ones we actually read despite being swamped in our daily routine.

The task of measuring employee engagement and satisfaction can sound like a total snooze—especially for those entrepreneurs who work shoulder to shoulder with their team and think they know what’s on everyone’s mind. Isn’t formally surveying your employees too much of a fuss for a small business, like a pizza shop or a burger joint? Actually, it’s not.