Do you know how to hire staff for a restaurant? Several aspects must be taken into account when hiring the professionals for the different roles. Learn more!
With every step followed to the letter to launch your business in the food service and entertainment industry, now comes the crucial moment for your success: hiring an efficient team to serve the public.
Before starting the selection process, you need to keep in mind that hiring qualified people for your restaurant isn't easy, but it's essential in order to hit the targets that were set out in your business plan. Por isso, você precisa especificar muito bem o que você busca, as qualificações, a formação e o período que será realizado o trabalho. Desta forma irá atrair as pessoas que realmente se interessam pela vaga para construir uma carreira e que preencham os requisitos que você deseja.
A very common problem in this industry is the difficulty of finding the right person for each role. Often, because these employees can't be fitted perfectly into their jobs, turnover in this sector runs very high, disrupting the whole operation. You ask for experience when hiring, but many times, for lack of options, you end up having to hire a beginner who needs training. That takes time, slows down adaptation and holds back the pace of work.
Check out some tips on how to hire the right professionals for each role in bars and restaurants.
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What are the specific roles in a restaurant?
These restaurants have been around for many years; over time they have become more professional and modern, and at this pace of growth, culinary schools have come to help a great deal in this segment. Training professionals in specific areas to work in businesses in the industry is increasingly part of the requirements in the selection process for open positions. There are several roles within a restaurant — take a look:
Head chef
When you decide to go to a restaurant, what do you look for first? Good, quality food, of course! And to reach the level of excellence customers are looking for and that you want to offer at your establishment, you need to hire a head chef.
In a more refined restaurant, the chef has far more duties than cooking, since the establishment usually carries a wide variety of dishes on the menu, which require assistants to keep up with the range of orders. It also takes presence to manage the entire team, on top of running the kitchen and cooking.
Within this team you need professionals such as the people who chop the seasonings, the ones who wash the dishes and the commins who help the waiters clear the plates from the tables and leave them clean for the next customers.
It's also the chef's responsibility to put the menu together, define the dish of the day and look for new recipes, always keeping the menu up to date and appealing. In the kitchen hierarchy, the chef sits at the top. That's why it's so important to define the chef profile you're looking for at your establishment and put real effort into hiring this professional.
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Kitchen assistant
This is the professional who gives the chef all the support needed for dishes to be prepared with real skill and flavor. This is the person who chops the seasonings, slices the meats and other ingredients, peels the vegetables and gets everything ready so that whoever runs the kitchen has the time they need to focus only on creating and finishing dishes.
The assistant is also responsible for cleaning the areas used to handle food, keeping flavors from mixing, as well as keeping every utensil in use clean and ready at hand.
Depending on the size of the restaurant, each person has very distinct duties, but they need to work in harmony. The professional your restaurant needs for this role is a dedicated one, who doesn't mind being directed, but who over time gets the job done on their own initiative, with quality and proactively.
Waiters or service staff
Regardless of the size and nature of the restaurant, having waiters or service staff is necessary and very important. The customer's first contact with your space usually happens through this person. That's why a waiter needs to be very well prepared, well trained and carry the face and the soul of the business.
This professional must work in complete sync with the kitchen, because they're the one who takes the order, writes it down, brings it to the kitchen, picks it up when it's ready and delivers it to the customer.
In the case of fast food restaurants, it's the waiter or the counter attendant who gets the food ready and hands it to the customer. In the end, in both experiences, this professional is the direct contact with the consumer, and that first impression will make all the difference to good service and to whether or not the customer comes back.
Learn more: How do you create a customer service manual?
Finding good, efficient professionals and avoiding turnover is the entrepreneur's dilemma. To make that search easier, there are more and more technical and vocational courses, for service staff, waiters and kitchen assistants alike, making it easier to find people with the theoretical and practical knowledge to meet your demands.
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