Invest in your staff. It does not pay to treat them as disposable, like your cooking ingredients. See them more as an ongoing construction project, which takes time and expense to develop. But which, once completed, can stand firm on the foundations you have laid and gives back all the effort you have put in.
Laying aside the building analogy, there are real-life scenarios when a revolving door policy towards recruitment means that waiters and waitresses hit the floor with a bare minimum of training. Catering agencies particularly are guilty of this. Watching a few online videos is thought sufficient to show recruits how to clear while balancing four plates on their left wrist, but they might not have had the chance to put it into practice before their first shift. Hurled in at the deep end, half of them sink before they learn to swim. Granted, this may prove a surer way of sorting the experienced waiting staff from the pretenders, than interview questioning where many no doubt exaggerate their weight of previous experience. But in the process the agency might have lost a client. And this streaming process might prove so efficient it has to undergo another recruitment drive.
The best agencies create a genuine sense of inclusiveness as well as excellence. Instilling confidence in your waiting staff is more effective than subjecting them to a hazing process, and will better equip them to deal with unexpected problems and difficult guests. Holding staff training days fosters group spirit, and can enable employees to road-test basic serving skills in a secure environment: serving and clearing; laying tables; boxing drinks tables; accustoming themselves to the weight of a loaded drinks tray, which will encourage them to hold it correctly close to their body. Training day could also be used as an opportunity for them to pass a simple test and gain a Food Hygiene certificate, a useful qualification for employees, and for the agency as it enables them to deploy workers in occasionally preparing food.
Feeding your staff while on shift is a major job perk, and stops them looking hungrily eyeing customers’ unfinished dinner-plates. It might work out cheaper though to run out to a convenience store for cut-price sandwiches than serve them an expensive dish from that day’s menu. Keep your options open until you can decide whether you have over-estimated inventory for cooking ingredients, and pitch whatever you put their way as a reward for all their hard work. Another perk some agencies offer is holiday pay, accrued as part of employees’ hourly salary. They offer workers the option of taking the pay without taking any leave, an unofficial bonus which guarantees their loyalty and continuing availability for work. Restaurant Consulting
