My first waitress job was for a family style restaurant. We could seat 72 people. Most tables were for 2 or 4 seats. IF larger parties came in, we moved tables together to accommodate. We mostly served subs/sandwiches with a few hot dinners, pizza & he chose certain cuts of steak. The owner was our short order cook. He had a decent steam bar for the veggies of the day. He cooked any meats that went with the veggies as they were ordered. Pizzas were made fresh when ordered & people didn’t mind the wait because they were so damn good.
As I said, the owner was the cook, he had 1 assistant to help him coordinate the orders. The dishwasher started out her morning prepping the veggies needed for the day. We had 2 waitresses (1 for each shift) & 1 busboy. The waitresses prepped the individual salads & desserts so all we needed to do was uncover them & go!!! The owner’s wife came in during lunch & dinner to run food to the customers so the waitresses only had to take orders & refill drinks. We were open from 11am-11pm. The owner warned any new hires that he expected a lot from his employees & you had to be a team player. Everybody was ready to fill in where needed at any given point in time. We had a small bar & the owner was the bartender most of the time. When necessary, a waitress would make a drink IF the owner was busy on the grill. Now days, most of my waitress friends complain about how bust they are IF they have more than 10 tables. I normally worked lunch & I usually had 3 turnovers between 11 & 1:00 & I was taking ALL the orders, serving ½ the orders, & I had 1 busboy to clean the tables during the rush. After the rush, I bussed my own tables. I don’t know how we managed with just 2 waitresses, but the other girl & I always seemed to work out any scheduling problem between us.
IF you aren’t willing to work hard to get your business off the ground, your employees won’t be willing to work hard either. We ran that restaurant with 5 employees total & the owner & his wife doing their part. So, 7 people ran the place very efficiently!!! Most people don’t want to work that hard now days so that system might not work today. But I really don’t see why you’d need 3 managers unless maybe you plan to be open 24 hours a day. YOU are the manager until you become so overworked that you’re ready to drop & then you add others as needed. You don’t need to have 3 managers on day 1.
Might I suggest that you start out smaller & work your way up as you learn what you can control. Starting out large with NO real experience will close you down faster than you think!!!