I'm sure many of you read each Saturdays Positions Vacant columns in the Merc. I'm sure you will have noticed the amount of (particularly) hospitality-related vacancies getting more and more common.
I'm also sure you have some kind of explanation for this?
Speaking to industry people over the last few days about this very issue, I am coming more and more to the conclusion that not only are we in the midst of the proverbial skills shortage, but we're just about at crisis mode in it - in our hospitality industry anyway.
As was pointed out to me yesterday, the vacancies now are (as well as the usual chefs, cooks, waitstaff, kitchen staff ads) middle management positions. This means that we've been using our middle management to substitute for the lacking floor staff we can't find.
What to do about it?
When you get a 'treasure' - guard them! Look after them. Pay them above award. Respect them. Offer them training, so they can expand their horizons within your business. Encourage them. Offer them extras. Hopefully all your staff will fall into this category, so there's no one to get jealous.
Be clever and intelligent about rostering. Don't just have the same old reliable few on every Friday and Saturday night. Share the work around so that they all get a chance of at least one weekend night a month out with their friends. Plan it between you, so they know you value their free time for them too.
Rotate their work round the business so they don't get bored and take the job for granted. When people are bored and know a job inside out, then they can get sloppy, and not take so much pride in a job well done.
If you think it's hard to find staff now, just wait. It's going to get a lot harder - this summer then next year, then the year after.
2009 marks the crossover time when the number of people leaving the workforce (the Baby Boomers, as they're called) - ie retiring - is higher than the number entering the workforce.
If you're poaching good staff, or any staff, now - what do you think you'll be having to do to attract staff in 2009?
Well - you'd better start planning now. It's called 'succession planning'. It means basically that you actually think in advance of where you want to be in, for instance, 2 years time within your business.
Far be it from me to say "I told you so", but I will!
Tuesday, 11 September 2007
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Kind of hoping to be watching them through binoculars from my recently purchased yacht and issuing instructions to them, "I can see you" Well thats my plan for two years, or fanciful dream.
Great & timely post Rita.
I could not agree more with your idea of forward planning, after all its part of every good chefs repetoire. This goes for any manager in hospitality also.
The bulk of the problem may well lay with the owner of the business. How often do restaurants & cafes stagger along from year to year seemingly without direction? I've heard staff complain too many times that 'we are on a rudderless ship'or 'No one can make a decision around here" etc.
It seems that many businesses in hospitality dont actually have any kind of plan at all.
Compound this with an attitude of some owners that there is another 'body' to replace you should you moveon, fall ill or die & you begin to see why the creeping resentment of some employers gatheres momentum.
I had a friend recently be told by a former boss, that'You chefs are a penny a pound'.
Well in that particular instance I hope that person finds the struggle to get staff particularly arduous.
My final comment is that some owners are 'cushioned' by the day to day macchinnations of their businesss & rely on middle managers to fill all the gaps etc. This is obviously coming at a cost as you say now they are getting harder to replace.
Roll on Summer!
I'm taking matters into my own hands and am currently breeding my own staff.....although the two year old struggles with the pans!
Food Nazi
I totally agre with you Gobbler. I have heard a few very unsettling things said recently by owners of hospitality businesses, indicating their displeasure about their staff resigning, and what to do about it. There is absolutely no introspection about it. They blame their employee for leaving, totally ignoring the facts that are staring them in the face - that if they themselves had a different attitude, they wouldn't have had these problems in the first place.
We need to up the ante in hospitality. We need to make it into a respected career specifically, not an avenue for getting from A to B. It's great to use uni students, but these are people who are en route to totally different lives (and earning capacities). They are not the ones you should be using as your middle management, because they just won't be there in 2 years time, You need to be training people up now, for then.
Experience comes with actually being there doing things. You don't do a 3 month course in Experience. Hospitality owners should urgently be looking at this NOW, if they are planning on their business being successful in 2 years time, or selling said business at a profit between now and then.
Yes, Rita, it is our biggest problem.
The staff some places DO get are not really interested.
Take the two girls at a takeaway near us.
No smiles or hellos when you go in. No, ``Do you know how the menu works?''.
No thankyou at conclusion of business.
The absentee owners have spent some money on the place and it looks the business.
Now,either they decided they would scrimp on the staff, or they just can't get anyone who has the right attitude and experience.
It becomes a slide into going bust and a misery trip for the customers, who give it one or two chances before never going back.
Word spreads and the business closes.
A far-too common story in them there parts.
I feel a bit defeated by it all today.....
Sir Grumpy
Ah Sir Grumpy. Poor sole. I absolutely feel for you there with the two girls. I really hate that attitude - but it comes back to the owner, doesn't it? He's (or she's) not there on a daily basis. He's not seeing what's going on with his customers. Maybe he isn't aware that you have to cultivate your customers. You have to 'work' them.
You can't just expect to take their money and not give anything back to ensure they return.
A business owner in hospitality needs to be sure of the reasons they buy or own the business. Especially today when that customer service is all important.
Yes - you can moan about customer service but there are all the reasons in the world why it's poor, or non-existent.
In this case, it's not "cherchez la femme" but "cherchez the owner"!
Friend's daughter is doing a traineeh\ship at a cafe/restaurant. $7.00 an hour, unpredictable hours and 20 hours per week. She wants to do it, wants to be independent and can't afford to live in her (reasonable) flat. What's the answer?
Kzee
Totally unrelated - went to Salt last week. Rushed, work lunch. In and out in 40 minutes. They did it well. Best thing, for me, was the salad. Beautifully dressed and very fresh. Fish and chips great! Perfectly cooked and HUGE! Coffee OK, service great. Bit disappointing that so many eaters ignored their salads. Loved the outdoor tables with heaters.
Kzee
Your not wrong on trainees wages Kzee. But the wage rates are complicated, to be on $7.00 you realy are at the lower end.
Its worked out on how old you are when you left school, did you complete year 12 etc. I mean each time I take someone on I'm always ringing someone to double check the correct pay etc. You can have people working side by side doing the same job, but earning different rates of pay. I'm not getting into the whole workplace reform debate here, but the current system here is a train wreck, something like 90 different pay rates under the restaurant and barkeepers award.
We try to homogonise our pay rates as best as we can.
My apprentice chef is 23, he earns $15 or so an hour, he leaves in a fortnight, and down to his award rate of of aprox $9.00.
OK its a pay cut, but its a good evolutionary move for him.
Cartouche has illustrated what I mean about employers needing to look out for their employees in order to retain them. If I have a trainee doing their Cert 3 Hospitality Ops traineeship, yes, the wage they get paid varies, but if I use the 3 month probation period wisely, accurately observe my trainee, then decide at the end of the probationary 3 month period (or 6 months, if I've decided I want more time to assess this person and have extended the probation period by another 3 months) I want to have them as an ongoing employee, I would raise the pay and conditions for them, to ensure they would remain with me.
Your friends daughter is obviously doing a part time traineeship? She should still get the usual overtime rates as the rest of staff if she's working any of the worktime over and above the standard 9 - 5, Mon - Fri hours.
Trying to work out how to...really do anything in Hospitality is like trying to nail jelly to a tree.
Therer are so many variables it makes your head spin.
Having a hospitality background, I've always found it difficult to:find good staff, motivate them continually and try and retain them.
There is also afear out in "restaurant land" that if they train their staff they'll leave. As Tom O'Toole the famous beechworth baker says; "what if I train my staff and they leave? Well, what if you don't train them and they stay!!"
You can spout on about Gens X,Y,Z et al.. but giving is what Hospitality is all about, most people these days are either in survival mode or only thinking what's in it for them, no long term goals, just what they can get now.
What is good to see is some staff that are older than myself, they do know how to be hospitable.
The other thing that I notice is most people don't know the difference between being servile and giving service.
It all boils down to communication, some owners go into hospitality thinking it would be "nice" to have their own restaurant/B&B, but don't have the people skills to cope with confused, angry and guests who don't know the rules plus staff who don't care, so the solution to this is, well, unique to every business, so many considerations, but I believe it comes down to the owners and managers, it is they who have to guide and direct and train and foster staff, it's too easy to bag TAFE etc syaing that they're not producing what they need (this opens another can of worms), so before I go far too much longer (I think i have already), I'll leave you to contemplate wot I have rit.
Lord B
Hi Rita ,theres been a dramatic increase in hospitality jobs advertised in the rags over the last few years.Hobart and surrounds is really growing and new places are popping up all over .As for skills shortages ,certainly,but what are venue owners really doing about it?Not that much from what i can see and have experienced .I can understand from an owners/high management point of view that they want the world and to pay the least amount as possible (a lot of cases,not all)there lies problem one not enough $$especially for tradespeople.From a workers point,if you take on a full time job you are pretty much dedicating your life to your workplace,you will see more of your colleagues than your children.In a lot of cases it become s a matter of just getting someone to fill the position ,ease my own stress! "you'lle do"
THen theres the dirty filthy kitchens ,turns me off straight away!The extremely outdated equipment,The job where your head chef but also have to do the dishes aswell!Another one was ,"we dont take breaks here ,i cant have my staff out the back smoking all day"e whilst working a TEN hour shift,c,mon .
On the other hand there are some places now willing to negotiate and offer "flexible hours"good move!! I think bieng proactive and offering good conditions hours, pay is start to finding decent people to get to an interview ,then theres the trick of bieng able to spot the gem in amongst all the shit,then you have to keep your word ,have or create an enjoyable workplace to keep them .
Anyway cricket about to start more another time. bbv
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