Busting the Myth of Picking “The Right Person”
Through the experience of interviewing thousands of applicants over a span of 10yrs of restaurant management, I can tell you that after 6-8mths of tweaking and refining a regular recruitment program that you’ll start getting statistics for many stages of your program.
How many people show up to the open roll call that you invited by email or phone out of 10 applicants? How many people are a good fit out of 10? How many people actually show up for their first training shift? How many people finish your training program? How many people stay after the probation period? How many people perform at your expectations after training? How many people quit after 1 month? 3 months? 6 months?
Once you understand your numbers in regards to acquiring, training and retaining staff, then the negative emotions and frustrations will leave you.
Can you be a good or bad restaurant recruiter? Are the employees that didn’t work out bad people or poor employees in general? Not necessarily. Very few people are actually bad apples, just the wrong timing or environment. You will make good choices and some poor ones, what holds it all together is your system of hiring and training that will minimize your time and money investment in new employees.
At the end of the day you have to realize that the more people you have working at your restaurant then more problems will intersect at your business. Employees that get into car accidents, family members becoming ill or close to death, other opportunities or priorities that they are passionate about that spring up, forgotten commitments, better offers that lagged a few days or a few weeks after you have hired and trained them. Life happens. Or if you work in a restaurant or bar everyone would say, “Stuff happens“.
So?! How do you keep the ebb and flow of many people’s lives intersecting from destroying your sanity and business and keep your organization stacked with great people…?
- Create ways to get a constant flow of applicants coming in. Always be watchful for talent. Keep asking your friends and family (if you want to), asking current staff, keep placing free online ads, look to local colleges and universities, recruiting people from other businesses when you are out and about living your life, etc.
- Have regular interviewing periods. Bi-weekly or bi-monthly, or whenever the interval needs to be depending on your business. It has to be regular and constant. The current staff has to be expecting it. It will make the weak staff nervous. New blood coming into your organization that is not apathetic to your company’s culture can be a fresh injection of energy and motivation. Have it in blocks of time during your super slow periods. Don’t make individual appointments; it’s a waste of your time. Have applicants come as a first come, first serve basis, like a casting call for a commercial.
- Have the applicants freely choose to leave the process anywhere from the ad to the 1st training shift. Write clear ads that have people who don’t want to do that specific kind of work that you require, or for that kind of money, not waste your time. Have templated emails that you can cut and paste to invite applicants to come within your interviewing time frame.
Other aspects to hiring the ‘right’ restaurant employee:
Have a set of questions ready. What criteria are most important to you?
My top two things are: attitude and willingness – You can’t mold someone who has a bad attitude and doesn’t want to be or do.
Have their homework ready if they get hired. Ex. Memorizing a portion of the menu, dressing a certain way for training, signing company rules and policies form, etc.
What makes any program work are mini improvements that add up over time, and consistent effort in maintaining the integrity of the procedures that you set up. If you commit to be consistent in your plan, attitude, moods and actions, then you will eventually get ‘The Right Restaurant Employee’ on your team, not by picking them by fluke.