Top 12 Front of House Manager Skills to Put on Your Resume
A compelling resume for a Front of House Manager role should broadcast a sharp blend of people savvy, operational finesse, and steady leadership. Show you can choreograph the rush, soothe the friction, and keep service humming. Spotlight these skills to prove you can raise the guest experience while keeping revenue, labor, and pace in balance.
Front of House Manager Skills
- OpenTable
- TouchBistro
- Customer Service
- POS Systems
- Reservation Management
- Staff Training
- Conflict Resolution
- Sales Analysis
- Inventory Control
- Event Planning
- Health Regulations
- Team Leadership
1. OpenTable
OpenTable is a real-time reservation, waitlist, and table management platform that helps restaurants seat smarter, capture guest preferences, and pace the dining room without chaos.
Why It's Important
It streamlines bookings and walk-ins, trims wait times, and turns data into better staffing, more accurate pacing, and personalized service. Fewer empty seats, fewer bottlenecks, happier guests.
How to Improve OpenTable Skills
Train the team: Book, modify, waitlist, quote times, add notes, and turn tables with consistency. Practice the edge cases.
Dial in the floor map: Accurate layouts, daypart turn times, and pacing rules prevent overloading the kitchen or one server section.
Use guest profiles: Tag allergies, VIPs, seating preferences, and special dates. Make it human, not robotic.
Tame no-shows: Enable confirmations and reminders, set deposits or card holds when warranted, and track no-show rates by daypart.
Work the waitlist: Offer SMS updates, quote realistic times, and re-forecast as tables flip faster or slower than expected.
Mine the reports: Covers, turn times, demand spikes, review trends—feed that back into staffing and marketing.
Respond to reviews: Same day when possible. Close the loop and log learnings for pre-shift huddles.
How to Display OpenTable Skills on Your Resume
2. TouchBistro
TouchBistro is an iPad-based POS built for restaurants. It speeds orders, manages tables, streamlines payments, and surfaces sales insights in real time.
Why It's Important
Cleaner tickets, faster turns, fewer comp/void errors. Front and back stay in sync, and you see what sells before the night is over.
How to Improve TouchBistro Skills
Mirror reality: Configure the digital floor plan to match the room, including joins, splits, and patio or bar nuances.
Engineer the menu: Smart modifiers, forced choices, 86 alerts, bundles, and auto-discounts reduce mistakes and speed flow.
Tighten hardware: Stable network, tested printers, handhelds for tableside ordering, and a plan for offline mode.
Integrate wisely: Payments, loyalty, online ordering, and inventory—connect what the team will actually use.
Audit reports: Track comps, voids, discounts, and tip distribution by shift. Coach from facts, not hunches.
Keep it current: Update software during downtime, then spot-check workflows before your next rush.
How to Display TouchBistro Skills on Your Resume
3. Customer Service
Customer service is the craft of making guests feel seen, heard, and well cared for—before they sit down, while they dine, and after they leave. For a Front of House Manager, it’s the system and the standard.
Why It's Important
Service defines reputation. It drives repeat visits, word-of-mouth, check averages, and staff pride. Miss it, and everything else wobbles.
How to Improve Customer Service Skills
Build the baseline: Clear greeting standards, time-to-table targets, and proactive table touches.
Empower recovery: Simple steps—listen, acknowledge, solve, thank—and defined comp/refund limits for fast fixes.
Coach communication: Warm language, confident pacing updates, and allergy-aware ordering.
Personalize: Preferences and names matter. Use guest notes without being intrusive.
Collect feedback: QR cards, receipts, or post-visit messages. Close the loop and share wins in pre-shifts.
Design for access: ADA-aware seating, clear pathways, large-print or digital menus, and staff trained on inclusivity.
How to Display Customer Service Skills on Your Resume
4. POS Systems
POS systems manage orders, payments, and data across the floor. They connect front, bar, and kitchen while tracking inventory and sales in one source of truth.
Why It's Important
Speed, accuracy, and insight. The right setup removes friction for guests and staff, and the numbers tell you what to fix tomorrow.
How to Improve POS Systems Skills
Upgrade for mobility: Support handhelds, QR pay, and tap-to-pay for fast turns and fewer lines.
Lock down security: Follow current PCI DSS standards, enforce strong user roles, and review audit logs.
Integrate the stack: Accounting, inventory, reservations, loyalty—connect systems so data flows both ways.
Train relentlessly: Menus, modifiers, splits, transfers, void rules. Reduce guesswork at the table.
Use the data: Dashboards for item mix, promos, voids, labor-to-sales, and hourly demand. Adjust staffing and menus accordingly.
Plan for outages: Offline mode tested, clear manual card fallback, and printer contingencies.
How to Display POS Systems Skills on Your Resume
5. Reservation Management
Reservation management means balancing bookings, walk-ins, pacing, and table turns without throttling the kitchen or bruising the guest experience.
Why It's Important
It maximizes seat hours, reduces waits, and aligns service tempo with kitchen capacity. That’s both revenue and goodwill.
How to Improve Reservation Management Skills
Set smart rules: Turn times by party size and daypart, pacing caps, and holds for large parties.
Tackle no-shows: Confirmation texts, deposits for peak periods, and a fair, clear policy.
Run a live waitlist: Accurate quotes, proactive updates, and quick adjustments as tables flip.
Pre-assign strategically: Block certain tables, cluster large parties, and avoid server overburden.
Forecast demand: Use historical covers and local events to shape staffing and prep.
Honor preferences: Note accessibility needs, high chairs, quiet zones, and special occasions.
How to Display Reservation Management Skills on Your Resume
6. Staff Training
Staff training equips hosts, servers, bartenders, and support with the skills and standards to deliver consistent, gracious service under pressure.
Why It's Important
Great training shrinks errors, boosts confidence, and keeps standards steady when the dining room tilts into overdrive.
How to Improve Staff Training Skills
Clarify outcomes: Define what “good” looks like—greeting times, order accuracy, recovery steps, pacing calls.
Mix methods: Short modules, shadow shifts, role-play, and quick quizzes. Teach, then test.
Cross-train: Expose staff to host stand, expo, bar support. Empathy and flexibility skyrocket.
Certify smartly: Food safety and alcohol service credentials where required; track expirations.
Codify SOPs: Playbooks for allergies, comps/voids, VIP handling, and incident reporting.
Coach in the moment: Pre-shifts for focus, post-shifts for debriefs, one-on-ones for growth.
Reward progress: Public praise, small incentives, and clear paths to trainer or lead roles.
How to Display Staff Training Skills on Your Resume
7. Conflict Resolution
Conflict resolution is the steady hand—defusing friction between guests and staff (or among staff) while protecting dignity and service flow.
Why It's Important
Left to fester, small sparks become wildfires. Addressed quickly, issues fade and trust grows.
How to Improve Conflict Resolution Skills
Listen first: Let each party speak. Reflect back what you heard to lower the temperature.
Validate and clarify: Acknowledge the impact, confirm facts, and separate emotion from outcome.
Offer options: Present fair, quick solutions—seat move, remake, comp within limits—and act decisively.
De-escalate language: Calm tone, neutral words, and firm boundaries against abuse.
Document: Log incidents, patterns, and resolutions. Train from real scenarios.
Follow up: Check back with guests and staff. Make sure the fix truly fixed it.
How to Display Conflict Resolution Skills on Your Resume
8. Sales Analysis
Sales analysis turns POS and reservation data into action: what sells, when it sells, who returns, and where profit hides.
Why It's Important
It shapes menus, staffing, promos, and layout decisions. Without it, you’re steering in the dark.
How to Improve Sales Analysis Skills
Track the right KPIs: Covers, average check, RevPASH, item mix, voids/discounts, labor %, promo ROI, repeat rate.
Segment by context: Daypart, channel (dine-in, takeout), section, and server. Patterns pop when you slice correctly.
Forecast realistically: Use history plus local events and weather. Staff and prep to the forecast, not the wish.
Engineer the menu: Promote high-margin winners, reprice or 86 low performers, and test limited-time features.
Test and learn: A/B promotions, measure lift, keep what works, ditch what doesn’t—fast.
Schedule reviews: Weekly huddles with clear actions. Data should change behavior, not just fill a report.
How to Display Sales Analysis Skills on Your Resume
9. Inventory Control
Inventory control for FOH means right-on-time stock for beverages, disposables, linens, and smallwares—without overflow, mystery shrink, or last-minute scrambles.
Why It's Important
Availability keeps service smooth. Accuracy keeps costs in line. Waste eats margins; discipline returns them.
How to Improve Inventory Control Skills
Set pars that breathe: By daypart and season. Adjust after busy weekends and events.
Count with cadence: Cycle counts for high-value items, full counts monthly. Reconcile variances immediately.
Receive like a hawk: Verify quantities, dates, and condition. First-in, first-out every time.
Standardize pours: Jiggers, measured taps, and recipe cards keep beverage cost sane.
Track waste: Log spills, comps, and breakage. Fix patterns, not one-offs.
Tighten supplier comms: Confirm lead times, backup SKUs, and holiday schedules before you’re in a pinch.
How to Display Inventory Control Skills on Your Resume
10. Event Planning
Event planning pulls together logistics, staffing, floor flow, and guest care so private dinners and large functions feel effortless.
Why It's Important
Done right, events boost revenue, fill slow periods, and create raving-fan moments that spill into regular service.
How to Improve Event Planning Skills
Build rock-solid BEOs: Clear timelines, menus, allergies, rentals, AV needs, and contact info for everyone.
Map the room: Accurate diagrams, thoughtful traffic flow, and contingency seating for last-minute changes.
Staff by ratios: Assign captains, runners, and bartenders to match service style and guest count.
Rehearse the run: Tastings, AV checks, and a day-of run-of-show with who-does-what-when.
Protect the downside: Weather plans, permits, insurance docs, and vendor check-in windows.
Close the loop: Post-event debrief, cost recap, and a thank-you note that invites the next booking.
How to Display Event Planning Skills on Your Resume
11. Health Regulations
Health regulations define the standards for cleanliness, food safety, and public health that protect guests and staff—and keep you on the right side of inspections.
Why It's Important
Compliance prevents illness, fines, and bad press. Consistency builds trust you can taste and see.
How to Improve Health Regulations Skills
Train and certify: Food handlers and alcohol service where required. Refreshers on time/temp, cross-contact, and sanitizing.
Enforce sick policies: No exceptions. Clear guidance on symptoms, return-to-work, and coverage.
Document everything: Cleaning schedules, sanitizer ppm checks, thermometer calibrations, and pest logs.
Label and date: Allergen tags where needed, tight rotation, and clean, closed storage.
Audit regularly: Internal walk-throughs with a checklist. Fix, retrain, and verify.
Design for hygiene: Handwash access, splash guards, ventilation, and frequent restroom checks.
How to Display Health Regulations Skills on Your Resume
12. Team Leadership
Team leadership is the art of setting direction, modeling standards, and lifting people so the whole floor moves as one.
Why It's Important
It aligns service, sharpens communication, and creates a place people want to work—and guests want to return.
How to Improve Team Leadership Skills
Set the tone: Clear expectations, crisp pre-shifts, and calm under fire. Consistency builds trust.
Coach, don’t just correct: Real-time feedback, weekly one-on-ones, and visible growth paths.
Make schedules fair: Respect availability, honor breaks, and keep labor in legal and ethical bounds.
Recognize relentlessly: Celebrate wins in public; handle misses in private. Morale is a flywheel.
Delegate with clarity: Assign owners for side work, 86 board, comps log, and section resets.
Protect your people: Zero tolerance for harassment, safe escalation paths, and post-incident support.
How to Display Team Leadership Skills on Your Resume
