2013 Annual Report - Investor Relations - Darden Restaurants

Restaurant Support CenterEmployees of our Restaurant SupportCenter are focused on ensuring ourrestaurant teams have what they needto succeed every day.Recently, we have taken steps to ensurethat, in an ever-changing operatingenvironment, we continue to have a highlevel of operational effectiveness. Duringthe first quarter of fiscal 2013, we transitionedto a new operations leadershipstructure outside our restaurants thathas our Senior Vice Presidents leadingfewer but larger geographic divisions.While these leaders remain accountablefor competitively superior execution in ourrestaurants today, with the changes we’vemade they are also now able to spend moretime defining the operational changes,innovations and standards required torespond effectively to the elevated demandswe know our guests will have tomorrow.What provides our Senior Vice Presidentswith more time to spend ensuring we wintomorrow is the addition of a new leadershipposition, the Managing Director.Specialty Restaurant GroupThe Specialty Restaurant Groupleverages Darden’s supply chainexpertise to procure the most basicto the most sophisticated products.Each of these leaders is responsible for50 to 70 restaurants and is able to moreproactively provide timely coaching anddirection to our Directors of Operations,who each lead 7 to 10 restaurants.The management structure within ourrestaurants has been refined as well.There is now a full-time, dedicated Staffingand Training Manager in each restaurantwho is focused solely on ensuring therestaurant is fully staffed, employeesare effectively trained and schedules areconsistently aligned with the needs of thebusiness. This enables the restaurant’sCulinary and Service Manager to focusexclusively on ensuring we consistentlydelight our guests with exceptional foodand attentive service that exceeds expectations.We also created new full-timehourly roles within each restaurant to helpthe restaurant’s managers effectivelycover all shifts and that also providesmore formalized paths to management forour highest-potential hourly employees.We believe our enhanced operationalstructures, combined with the talentand experience levels of our restaurantoperations teams, positions us wellto elevate day-to-day operational excellencein our restaurants, respond moreeffectively to future guest demands andbuild an even stronger talent bench forthe future.Recently, we havetaken steps to ensure that,in an ever-changing operatingenvironment, we continue to havea high level of operationaleffectiveness.Darden Restaurants, Inc. 2013 Annual Report 15