What are the best ways to maintain high standards of mixology in a team of bartenders?

Make education the focal point of your entire program. Education is what differentiates a career opportunity from a job. We split trainings into 2 per month, 2-3 hours/session, pay them, supply food, and get them excited beforehand with a preview a week out. Be organized; don't waste their time (and your money). Get them in and out, but make it intense and exciting. Demonstrate how education improves their career possibilities as much as their immediate earnings. Offer education from within (highlighting the experience and skills of your own team) and from external sources (talented brand ambassadors, distillers, blenders, other bartenders and bar owners, etc.). Provide additional resources for their independent study (books, online, etc.).

Quality maintenance starts with education on product (brands, categories, production processes and evaluation skills). It is ensured by good processes for cleaning, storage, equipment maintenance, prep, loss/spoilage control, purchasing and reviews. It is held to a high standard by people with pride in what they are doing, producing and presenting, which goes all the way back to the hiring process to sort out those who would stop at nothing to produce their best. I always look back to a business book called The E-Myth Revisited, which I read 20 years ago while opening my bar, and it's main premise: build good systems and hire the right people to run them.

The sooner you realize that it's about them, not you, the better your program will be. Empower everyone. Nothing gives people more pride in their work than being acknowledged for their abilities and empowered to affect change. Encourage them to give feedback, present new ideas, and draw the same from their customers, friends and research. Treating everyone like a professional that can change the business will create that change.

AI can generate content from known sources and rewrite it a million different ways - but in the end, if the right people, with the right aptitudes & attitudes, & the drive, responsibility & mindset of entrepreneurial problem solving, business helping, & value adding aren't hired - (& how many businesses hire everyone whose right?) - then the 1st step must be identifying right up front, & removing, those who are ruining quality. Anyone good enough to be paid should be good enough to own their profession/job/service (whatever) & be good enough & interested enough in what they're doing (aka selling what they get paid to do by the businesses that pay them) to constantly keep on top of self educating & understanding the jobs of other teams.