Restaurant training isn’t there to teach you how to serve.
It’s to get you functional in their system fast: where things are, how the place operates, what the side work is, memorize the menu, etc.
It’s not about how to interact with guests, manage your workflow, operate more efficiently, increase earnings, any of that.
Why Most Restaurants Don’t Invest in Training
Few reasons for this.
1) It's high turnover. Most restaurant staff are young, in transition, or working weekends until something else clicks. There’s drama, burnout, life changes...people come and go.
2) Then there’s money. Margins in restaurants are tight. Training programs take time and money and don't always make sense given the turnover...
So most training is assigned to other servers that may get a free meal in exchange. This makes sense — these are the people actually running the operation. But it's not like they're dedicated trainers. It's usually just whoever’s on that night and seems decent enough...
3) Nature of restaurants. These are not corporate machines with fully developed systems of operation. Typically - and yes I know this isn't all restaurants - but typically, they're just flying by the seat of their pants.
They need bodies that can run food and talk to guests now. Like tonight. 5-year development of staff... not often a real consideration.
What it looks like
You follow that person around, watch them talk to their tables, they'll explain where to find things, how to work the POS, what the table numbers are, and hopefully cover service standards.
Once it get's busier into the shift, you'll likely start acting more as a server assistant - help grab plates, get forks, run plates, etc.
And after a few nights, you should have a pretty good idea how to operate. Assuming you've done this before.
If you're new to serving, you'll learn over time.
That's virtually everyone I've ever spoken to's experience. Fortunately - and this would be the part where I encourage you to buy my course or join my member community or whatever - we put all these training material together for free. Enjoy.
Thank you for your service.