When Nick Hampton became the Sanitation Supervisor at Ochsner Medical Center in New Orleans last year, he quickly made changes that turned it into a symbol of pride for Morrison.
His performance is also the latest example of how a frontline associate can be recognized and build their career at Morrison.
After an initial inspection, he immediately noticed that all utensils were stored in buckets. For a kitchen that serves 1,500 patient meals daily and has more than 2,000 plates and thousands of utensils, Nick knew he needed to improve conditions while also making plates and utensils easily accessible for Patient Services associates.
“It’s important that Patient Services is never waiting on anything from the dish room to serve our patients,” he says. “To make that happen, I decided to build a wall in the dish room to hang the clean dishes and other items they need to serve our patients.”
Other changes include a new technique to improve sanitation levels. For example, every two hours, each of the 17 Sanitation and Culinary associates in the massive kitchen must stop working for a couple of minutes to clean and wipe down their workspace.
“It’s important that we just stop and take the time to ensure we are working in a clean environment,” Nick says.
Nick’s management methods have led to significant improvements in safety and sanitary conditions while also making the team more productive.
Steritech, a vendor that conducts regular food and workplace safety audits in the kitchen, has raised the dish room’s rating to 4 Stars over the past year. The most recent audit concluded that the sanitation and organization of the dish room were the best in the past decade.
The Impact of Training
Nick’s responsibilities also include detailed training for dish room employees, including a summary of how the inspection process works and how inspectors assess a kitchen cleanliness.
“Nick spearheads the training for multiple initiatives, including responsibility for training the sanitation staff in ‘what right looks like’ for the kitchen,” says Director of Culinary, Chuck Cundiff.
In addition, Nick trains sanitation and culinary staff members in the WasteNot program and provides continuing education about chemical and equipment safety and use for the entire kitchen staff.
Together, these actions have improved productivity allowing Cundiff to relocate two full-time employees to the night shift. Because the kitchen operates 18 hours a day, these two associates can deep clean the facilities and further improve the kitchen cleanliness.
“Dish rooms can be chaotic and messy, but Nick has done an excellent job of creating a strong system,” Laura Feeback, Regional Director of Operations says. “His preparation and readiness are top-notch; he’s conducted many mock sanitation audits and has empowered his associates to talk with him to improve the process.
Taking the Next Career Step
While Nick had never worked in a dish room, he learned quickly when he joined Morrison in 2023 as a dishwasher at Ochsner Baptist Health. Under the direction of Lindsey Vasquez and Monique Smith, he was promoted to dish room supervisor and learned how to ensure the dish room operated properly.
At that point, he began thinking he could have a long-term career in food service.
Given his strong performance in his current position, Nick was recently nominated as the Culinary Department’s candidate for the Management in Training (MIT) course for high-performing supervisors who want to become managers.
He’s now taking a six-month frontline associate development course created by Morrioson in conjunction with the Compass Learning team. Once he completes the course, he will likely enter the Accelerated Management Program or be offered a management position.
“Nick is a strong frontline leader who is capable of tremendous growth,” says Senior Director Daniel Zambito, who nominated Nick for the MIT program. “He’s always open and willing to receive feedback and faces challenges head-on.
“His team looks up to him, and he is invested in their growth and well-being. I’m extremely happy he is part of my team, and I’m excited to support his career and future development with Morrison.”
