Brendan Corkery is a restaurant owner and chef with years of experience in food safety. The recent outbreak of Covid-19 has forced him to change up his approach in his restaurants to keep his staff safe. And many of his steps are becoming standard in many competitive businesses, showing how advanced they are compared to others.

Steps That Keep Waitstaff Safe According to Brendan Corkery

As the Covid-19 pandemic shifts and changes through various stages, Brendan Corkery has taken several steps to keep his waitstaff safe from the dangers of this disease. First of all, he has made masks and gloves mandatory. And he also asks that his staff disinfects their gloves with sanitizer at various points throughout the day. Doing so creates a double-level of protection, Brendan Corkery states.

Beyond this step, Brendan Corkery also works to create a system of area control that makes waitstaff as safe as possible. For example, each worker serves only a specific area of his restaurants and never crosses another server’s zones. Instead of forcing servers to cross paths, Brendan Corkery has one server who takes dishes to a specific serving area that only a waiter can access in their zone.

In this way, serving is not only safe but more efficient, Brendan Corkery believes, because waitstaff isn’t running into each other, getting the wrong plates, or dealing with fights in the kitchen. By working hard to create this system, he believes that restaurants can keep their waitstaff as safe as possible and ensure that they can avoid dangerous health conditions.

Just as importantly, Brendan Corkery has taken steps to ensure that his line cooks are safe during this time. Typically, this process starts by creating specific stations at which each worker stays. For example, some may be assigned to cutting ingredients or deep-frying. Brendan Corkery says the main idea is that people have as much safe area around them as possible during their workday.

And between each station, Brendan Corkery has placed a wheeled cart attached to each station with a rope. In this way, each preparation expert can pull the cart to their area, place items on top, and let it get removed back to another in as safe a manner as possible. And after each shift, these ropes and carts are carefully sanitized to ensure that no viruses spread, Brendan Corkery says.

Each worker who comes to his restaurants every day also gets a temperature check to ensure that they aren’t running a fever. If they are running a fever, Brendan Corkery gives them the day off – with pay – to get tested. And he never turns down unemployment claims for those who need them during this time, ensuring that everybody on his staff is as healthy and safe as possible during these trying times.