Hooters? Have you every heard of that place?
You may have seen the owl logo before, potentially on Tik Tok. A classmate of mine did a blog last week about another famous owl logo, you can read it here. But, for now, back to Hooters.
Hooters is an American restaurant chain that was founded in 1983. It serves traditional food such as hamburgers, steak, seafood, appetizers, and other similar items. The restaurant's name is a double entendre referring to the slang term relating to women's breasts and for the sound that owls (the logo) makes. The restaurant is best know for the young women who are hired as waitresses, who are often referred to as "Hooters Girls." It is these "Hooters Girls" and the uniforms they are asked to wear, which are quite revealing, that we are going to talk about today.
Here is an example of the Hooter's uniform
A few days ago, maybe about a week ago, I came across a Tik Tok on my For You Page that talked about the new Hooters uniforms that waitresses were being asked to wear. Maybe you have seen it, but here it is in case you haven't. This was not the only Tik Tok that had come across my page that referenced these new shorts for Hooters waitresses. The shorts, as part of the mandatory uniform for employees, were incredibly short and made employees so uncomfortable that some were quitting.
This is another example of a employee's Tik Tok complaining about the length of the shorts. This is just an image, it will not play.
This is not a good thing. It is a corporate problem not an employee problem because Hooters did not use its employees as resources.
Chapter Twelve of The Groundswell discusses the groundswell inside your company. What does that mean to us? It means how we interact with our employees and use them to support our groundswell efforts. There are many examples of how to use the groundswell internally for a company, but the main important thing is to create significant and clear communication. A company needs to listen, talk, energize, support, and embrace their employees if they want to succeed.
The employees of a company or organization are a invaluable asset. What could Hooters have done to be better prepared? Listening. Listening to and with employees can rapidly turn into problem solving before it goes out to the public. When it comes to uniforms that impact employees, especially for a company that has been attacked for sexualizing women in the past, the company must listen to those employees. If we don't support our employees and use them as resources, they can turn against the company.
A few days ago on October 16th, this Tik Tok came across my For You Page. It was the same Tik Toker who works at Hooters describing how after her video went viral a corporate employee contacted her to tell her that the old shorts could be worn as part of the uniform again. Her Tik Tok went viral and got the uniform changed back with help from the groundswell. Here is a news report regarding how employees pushing back on Tik Tok got the old uniform brought back.
This employee got what they wanted. And many other employees that may have felt similar as they are reaping the benefits of this one young tik toker and her use of the groundswell. But this is the exact reason that Chapter Twelve was written in the Groundswell. If Hooters corporate executives had reached out to the employees around them, this problem could have been avoided before it began. To prevent another incident like this, Hooters can make a community, similar to other companies like Best Buy, that allows employees to connect and discuss their feelings amongst themselves. This will allow Hooters to see and interact with their employees as a groundswell to see what is happening. Hooters should invest in this technique to protect themselves from future embarrassment and to prevent any further lose of trust from the groundswell.
What do you think? Do you agree that Hooters should try an employee community and engage the groundswell? Are you happy that employees got their preferred uniform back? Please tell me any of your thoughts in the comments!
Hey Tereza,
ReplyDeleteI actually saw some of these Tik Toks and found DailyMail discussing this on Snapchat as well. It also sorta hits home since one of my friends almost applied there - after seeing this go viral she immediately changed her mind. It's ridiculous that Hooters thought to change the employee uniform without any input or feedback from the waitresses who work there and honestly attract their customers to their restaurant in the first place! (the food is NOT that good :/ ) However, you brought up a valid point of how Hooters wasn't using their employees as resources -but instead tossed them to the side and said deal with it. Great post :)
Hi Gloria, sorry to hear about your friend not wanting to work there :/
DeleteI have had dance team members who have worked their in the past and always expressed their enjoyment from working there . . . maybe I will ask them their thoughts on this.
But thank you for your complement, I think it is really important for Hooters to listen to their employees because the restaurant clearly does not have the greatest reputation. Hopefully they don't do this in the future.
Hi, Tereza, I think the angle of your blog post is very novel! I think maybe we spend too much time studying customers and neglect employees instead. You cited this example, I think as a woman, if I were a staff member of this restaurant, I would not accept this kind of clothing, and I might also express my dissatisfaction through social media. Complaints about the company are often particularly easy to arouse the audience's resonance, which makes the company's first impression on the audience negative, because the audience has learned this from the employees through social media. Employees are a very important part of stakeholders, which will inevitably affect other stakeholders, including customers.
ReplyDeleteHi YiXie, thank you for your comment. I completely agree with you that employees are a very important stakeholder. I am hopeful that Hooters will begin listening to their employees in the future because frankly without Hooter Girls there is not much Hooters has making them different from any other restaurant chain.
DeleteYes, having sexy girls is the unique feature of this restaurant, but unfortunately, it failed to make good use of this unique advantage before. I also hope that it can listen to the opinions of these girls, so that this restaurant can appear in a more acceptable way by the audience, diners and employees.
DeleteHi Tereza，
ReplyDeleteNo company can do without communication in management. I agree with what you said, "If employees want to succeed, the company needs to listen, talk, motivate, support and embrace them." Strengthening internal employee communication is a very important thing. Employees are always listening to each other and communicating and understanding. On the basis of common values and common vision. Leaders should pay close attention to the ideological trends of employees, promptly talk with employees, clear up employees’ ideological difficulties, and create a good working atmosphere, especially for employees with greater emotional fluctuations. The company needs to clarify the improvement measures and maintain the best mentality and working condition of the employees, so that it can exert a greater effect.