The coming holiday period is an opportunity to engage guests, encourage some extra spending, and hopefully give people an incentive to return and keep your business humming during quieter periods this winter. But you need to plan for it. According to a survey of restaurant operators by ResDiary, only 18 percent of early planners were never fully booked over the holiday period, compared to 34 percent of all restaurants surveyed; 82 percent of early planners made significantly more money over the holiday period; and only 10 percent of early planners did not say they struggled with no-show guests, compared with 26 percent of all restaurants surveyed. Hopefully you’ve already got a solid plan to generate holiday sales but there is still time to fine-tune your practices to protect your margins this season. Ensure you’ve optimized your menu with high-profit items (and have developed some subliminal cues to lead guests to your best ones). Scrutinize your food waste and make adjustments to your food ordering and preparation so you can minimize it. Consider how people are getting in touch with you to make bookings, order food or buy retail items – how can you use web-based and automated systems to ensure you’re not missing inquiries, orders and sales? Be the gift that keeps on giving into 2024 by offering gift cards and other incentives to return in the New Year. Finally, prepare your team from a scheduling and training perspective – make scheduling clear, arrange backup support where possible, offer incentives for staff working on key holiday shifts, and provide any special training they need to deliver your best service during the holiday season. Well before restaurants ever had employee referral programs in place, talented staff members have been powerful sources of other valuable job candidates. So why not put some systems around this resource to ensure you are doing all you can to encourage staff to refer people to jobs with your restaurant – and then make it worth their while for them all to stay employed with you? You stand a better chance of creating a workforce of people who enjoy working with each other and limit the amount of turnover you have. Of course, there can be drawbacks to hiring employee referrals – potentially less diversity of backgrounds and skills, for example. To get what you desire from your program, Toast advises that you focus your program on a goal: Perhaps that’s decreasing your job ad spending by 40 percent or hiring people who are likely to stick around for more than a year. Be clear about who you’re looking for – share your job description and specific desired qualities of new staff members. If you hire a person referred to you by a current employee, tie rewards for both people to the new hire’s longevity. Perhaps there’s a reward after 100 days or 150 days – whatever amount of time you feel is short enough to feel attainable but also long enough for the new staffer to adjust to the job, learn your culture and make some contributions. You can also open your program up to the general public – maybe you have a valued customer who knows your brand so well that they would be a strong asset to you on staff. Finally, make it easy for people to not only refer a strong candidate but to be rewarded for the person’s hire. Use social media, a form on your website, and your restaurant’s tech tools to accept and track employee referrals and automatically issue rewards after the introductory period. Cash and gift cards are always good incentives for employee referrers, but rewards could be as simple as offering shift preferences. Inflation has changed the job market, bringing many workers back into it after they had retired, or offering flexible roles for others who shifted gears during the pandemic or left jobs for other reasons. Restaurants are hiring more of them — and are poised to continue to do so: According to data from the U.S Department of Labor, average hourly earnings increased 5 percent in retail jobs and 7.5 percent in restaurants and bars over the past year, as compared to just 4.6 percent in other industries. In quick-service restaurants alone, the share of job candidates aged 30 and older climbed from 4 percent in 2021 to 7 percent at the end of last year. If you’re looking to take on more staff, or even just diversify the candidates you attract, focus on your company culture in your outreach. Share stories about your team, promote your mission and values, and showcase your community involvement and commitment. Partner with community organizations and local colleges with continuing education programs to promote open positions. On social media, think local. For example, many local Facebook groups permit small businesses to promote themselves one day of the week — there many be potential candidates watching in places like this. Retaining staff is more difficult in an environment that is especially rewarding for the voluntary quitter: Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics found that as of February, people who switched jobs saw their pay increase by 7.7 percent (compared to a 5.6 percent rise for staff who stayed in their role). While it’s true that people who switch jobs generally gain in pay, the increase is normally around .7 percentage points – not 2.1. So getting staff to stick around is more challenging now. However, retaining these people may have just as much to do with communication as with wages. To smooth relations with your team, make sure you have a vehicle for communicating with them in a timely way about everything from shift updates to menu changes so they aren’t caught by surprise – particularly if you’re operating several restaurants and have staff working at a combination of them. The Rail also suggests restaurants keep all policies, procedures in a digital format so information is easy to access and doesn’t fall through the cracks or get misinterpreted. Then provide some outlets to allow your managers to focus on the individual: Have a weekly or monthly one-on-one chat with each employee in neutral territory so they feel free to voice any concerns and discuss development opportunities. At the same time, also provide a means of allowing staff to share a problem anonymously via a physical or virtual suggestion box. Finally, encourage a fun, communal spirit on your team by gathering them for regular meals where you can set the scene for people to get to know others outside of their roles on staff. The job market is booming – especially for the hospitality sector. The January jobs report indicated that the U.S. economy added 517,000 jobs in January, marking the lowest unemployment rate in 50 years and dissolving lingering worries about a recession. So how do you keep the talent you’re able to attract? Max Wesman, CEO at GoodHire, told QSR web that setting goals is critical – along with providing rewards when those goals are achieved. That could involve setting a specific target for preparation speed, order accuracy, or some marker of customer service provided, then providing an incentive for staff to come together and achieve the goal over a set time period. What motivates your team might be a cash reward or simply getting priority in selecting shifts for the next month or quarter. Assess your biggest pain points and biggest team motivators to make the best matches between goals and rewards. You may be familiar with the menu engineering model that guides restaurants to categorize menu items into one of four buckets: stars (top-selling, high-profit items), plowhorses (popular items that aren’t necessarily high-profit), puzzles (items that sell and make a profit but aren’t consistent) and dogs (lowest performing, lowest profit items). A webcast from US Foods encourages operators to think of labor in the same way, categorizing employees according to their productivity and alignment with your culture. Like your menu items, your staff behave and respond in different ways – some demand (and deserve) your attention and resources, while others are best guided out of the business before they damage the morale of others. Specifically, an “A” employee is aligned with your culture and highly productive, a “B” employee is aligned with your culture and not as productive, a “C+” employee is not aligned with your culture and isn’t as productive, and a “C-“ employee is productive but creates a counterculture in your organization. There is power in knowing where each person sits at a given time. Your A players – your stars – are those you want to keep at all costs, so direct your resources toward them to help them develop and secure their loyalty to your business. B employees could be up-and-coming A’s with some additional training from the A’s. C+ players could be new employees – they may have the right attitude but they need help to become more productive and aligned with your culture. The C- players may well be good at what they do, but they are dangerous because their attitudes can work against the business. Are you taking stock of where your staff fits? Doing so helps you continuously recalibrate so you can maximize your sales and service while weeding out detractors. As so many restaurant operators struggle to recruit and retain employees, it may help to consider tapping into alternative sources for potential staff. For a growing number of operators, that has involved hiring people who have been through the justice system and are reliant on their work as a bridge to an independent life. Recently, 50 representatives from around the country joined the National Restaurant Association Educational Foundation in Washington, D.C., to celebrate the success of the Foundation's HOPES (Hospitality Opportunities for People (Re)Entering Society) program, which has enrolled more than 700 people who have been through the justice system and were subsequently connected with career opportunities in the restaurant, foodservice, and hospitality industry. The program, which launched in 2019, is a collaborative effort across seven states to identify, train, employ, and ultimately advance people who have been through the justice system and are seeking a career path in the restaurant industry. It facilitates work-readiness and restaurant industry-specific training through its network of state Departments of Corrections, state restaurant associations, and 13 community-based organizations. Following their training, participants are connected with opportunities through its network of local and national employer partners, including MOD Pizza, Inspire Brands, and Dave's Killer Bread Foundation. Chooserestaurants.org provides more information about the program, its results and how to get involved. In September, the restaurant industry added 60,000 jobs, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. While the industry is still 4.5 percent below pre-pandemic staffing levels, the data represent a healthy jump in employment for a sector hit hard by the pandemic. While the majority of operators expect economic conditions to deteriorate in the coming months, according to a National Restaurant Association survey, such an environment may shift the dynamics of the labor market, bringing a fresh infusion of people looking for employment and a continued uptick in hiring. For restaurants, this represents an opportunity to attract and retain talent – but doing so relies on having the kind of culture in which staff can thrive. In a recent podcast, Brant Menswar, an author and speaker who helps organizations navigate change and improve culture, shared several components of high-performing cultures. He said top cultures offer connection – a sense of purpose, belonging and partnership with others toward reaching a common goal. They provide safe spaces where people can contribute without fear of ridicule and be their authentic selves. These cultures offer opportunities for personal growth – and that could be through professional opportunities and responsibilities and/or opportunities for personal improvement. Finally, employees need to be given the freedom and authority to make decisions and find creative solutions to problems. If and when the dynamics of the labor force shift, will your restaurant provide the kind of culture in which people can thrive? Restaurant culture is a frequent news maker right now, and as evidenced by the popularity of the drama series The Bear, it’s a source of entertainment too. Against the backdrop of workplaces of all kinds being reinvented to suit employees, restaurants – and their reputations as high-pressure environments that can be tough on employees – are coming under increased scrutiny. Changing the industry’s reputation for the better can start with individual restaurants making decisions that support career longevity so you can retain the staff you currently have. As we approach the time of the year when seasonal illness begins to ramp up and holiday gatherings are being planned – both of which put additional strain on restaurants – give your culture a health check. Take care of your team by regularly giving them an outlet to share feedback and ask for support or help without judgment. Make sure they have time and space to rest between shifts. Review your policies for sick leave and overtime so you can anticipate challenges and make fair decisions. Train staff regularly to keep them motivated and engaged. Get to know them as people. As part of your daily conversations, ask what they’d like to learn and encourage them to set written goals to prepare them for positions of increasing responsibility in your business. Give them incentives to keep going by rewarding the stand-out performance of individuals and teams. Then make it worth their while to stay – through a bonus or other benefit for those who stay past a certain period of time. Remember when the public was just coming out of lockdowns and happily shrugged off restaurants’ limited hours, restricted seating, and unpredictable menus if it meant they could still enjoy a meal from their favorite establishments? You may have noticed that sentiment has faded a bit as consumers have lost patience with the ongoing pandemic. For many customers, the pre-pandemic mentality that “the customer is always right” has returned. They aren’t afraid to voice their dissatisfaction with a restaurant meal – or simply offer unsolicited comments about how the operator could improve the experience. This is despite operators’ ongoing challenges in recruiting and retaining staff, sourcing supplies, and paying larger bills for everything from ingredients to fuel. (A recent Eater report detailed the account of a much-lauded California restaurant that launched early in the pandemic but couldn’t continue operating amid the many demands it faced in the current economy.) Times are far from normal and a looming recession adds to existing pressures, so consider running your business with the same rigor as you did early in the pandemic. That means focusing on the basics of why you’re in business – know what values you stand for, who your ideal customer is, where you are (and aren’t) willing to compromise, what core things you want to make sure you execute well right now, and how many staff members are needed to help you accomplish them. Then don’t be afraid to stand your ground if guests ask for more. |
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