How can you hire smarter? Greg Moran, CEO of Outmatch, a leading consultant in business development, shared his ten point recipe for success with Restaurant Hospitality. According to Moran, your staff is the cornerstone of a successful thriving restaurant. Just one “bad apple” can cause a negative ripple effect– damaging your sales, your word-of-mouth, and ultimately, your overall financial picture. If you think that the occasional wrong hire is no big deal, think again.
According to the Council of Hotel and Restaurants Trainers, the average cost to replace an employee is $20,000 per manager and $2,225 per hourly employee. That doesn’t include the bad hires who stay and end up costing you even more—in labor, food costs, employee morale and guest experience.
So, what’s is the winning strategy?
Consider these 10 RESTAURANT ESSENTIALS for a new perspective on the age-old challenge of hiring:
- Recruitment brand:Attracting the right employee is just as important as attracting customers. Potential employees need to know specifically what you want and what you expect. Make sure your hiring practice is lean, up-t0-date, and focused on snagging the best of the best.
- Employee engagement: It’s up to you to create an environment that employees want to support. Mentoring is key in raising the bar high and keeping it there. Hire people who are social, resilient, driven and team-oriented. Do that, and you’re more like to have engaged restaurant staff., which means lower turnover and higher profit per employee.
- Screening: Spend time to develop interviewing that really identifies the strengths you want, and screens out the attitudes and behavior you don’t. Think guest focus and sales ability.
- Talent pool: Not everyone is interested in hospitality work, but your job is to capture the people who do.
- Automation: Don’t be stuck in a paper chase. It’s an old-fashioned, cumbersome way of employee screening. Find the right software for your particular needs. Electronic screening saves time and money in the long-run.
- Unethical behavior: With the right screening, you build a staff committed to doing their best. Use online assessments to identify the personality traits and behaviors that will and won’t work for you.
- Return on hire: Streamlining hiring gives you and your managers tools to build a strong service staff. There’s strength in numbers and real-life financial benefits with this approach.
- Applicant flow: Owners of multiple restaurants have a large applicant pool to screen. Automation cleans up the hiring process, and keeps managers free to do what you hired them to do.
- New hire impact: With an organized automated hiring process, you will see trends and patterns of who you hire and how long they stay. It will show your success rate and reasons why people leave.
- Turnover: The industry turnover is averaging 30 percent for managers and 114 percent for hourly employees, according to the Council of Hotel and Restaurant Trainers. A more comprehensive, thoughtful hiring strategy can save you time and money.
Create the culture you want for success, and develop hiring practices to fast-track you and your restaurant over the goal line. Take an in-depth look at the rest of Moran’s advice in the full article at Restaurant Hospitality.
