Donald Burns says restaurants hire for skills when they should hire for culture fit. The industry has a 73% turnover rate, and bad hires tank morale and drain money on recruiting. He uses the three Cs: Character, Core Values, and Connections to find people who stick around.
73%.
February 26, 2024.
If you ever hired someone you thought was going to be great only to have them turn out to be a dud, then pay attention, because I'm about to share the biggest mistakes your restaurant is making with hiring. And I'm going to give you a three step plan to fix it. Welcome to the Restaurant Coach podcast. It is the cure for the common restaurant. So here's the situation. You're looking for a cook. You find a resume online from a young, fresh culinary school graduate. I mean, they have all the skills required for the position. You call them in for an interview, they come in and they wow you with their culinary skills. So you think to yourself, this is it, and you hire them on the spot, and then three months later, they're gone. You see, the turnover rate in the restaurant industry is a whopping 73%. That means that the average restaurant with 100 employees is going to replace 73 of those people each year. And the real question is why? You see you've fallen into the trap of hiring for skill. And trust me, it's easy to do, I've done it. You see a resume and you see words like saute deglaze, expo, mise en place, amuse, bouche, and you think, wow, this guy, this girl really knows their stuff. And then you bring them in and they're in your kitchen and then you realize that, that they don't know the most important skill of all, how to work with a team. Here's the thing I want you to remember and write this shit down. Skills are easy to learn. Anyone can pick up a knife, learn to chop an onion. You can teach people on how to wait tables. You can teach people how to bartend. You can teach people how to bust tables. The hard part is learning to work together as a team. And the number one cause of turnover is just poor culture fit. So what does that mean? It means that you didn't take time to really make sure that they fit in with the rest of your team dynamics. And I've been there too. You're so busy trying to fill that position that you don't stop to think if that they're going to be a good fit with your current team members. You see, when you hire for skill and not for cultural fit, you create a negative ripple effect that can last for years. And there are warning signs you want to watch out for. It all starts with low morale. And as soon as you hire for skills, see, what happens is your team starts to question if they're a good fit and they're going to See this new hire as a threat and then they start to have doubts about their position on your team. See low morale and doubt on your team. It's kind of like throwing gasoline on a fire. It's going to spread quickly and it amplifies the drama. Remember this hashtag, write this down. Drama is great for movies. Really, really bad for restaurants. And then what happens is more people quit. Then you try to get back on track by hiring in to replace the person who just left. And what happens is you're getting the same results, more low morale and doubt. And then that ripple effect just keeps continuing to grow and grow and it gets worse and worse. You keep losing people. You're spending more time recruiting, you're spending more money on recruiting. And you're also probably getting some negative feedback from your team. Now, if you're honest with yourself, you're going to see that the reason your turnover is high is because again, you're trying to fill a spot on the schedule instead of really trying to find a person that is going to really contribute to the team. So how do you fix it? Focus on the three Cs. So when you're interviewing a new team member, I really want you to focus in on the three things. Character, core values and connections. Let's break each one down. Character, you need to dig deep to understand who this person is. And when you're talking to them, try to get them to open up. Have you ever asked someone like, you know, what do you like to do outside of work? You want to go beyond the surface and really dig deep. Use behavioral based questions and don't be afraid to kind of shake up your interview style. Core values, what are their core values? You see, core values are what you hold to be true. And there are a few questions that you can ask to get to the core values of any person. You can ask them, like, what are your favorite books? What's your favorite movies? What have you done in life that you're really, really proud of? One core value that I like to look for is a desire to learn and grow. And the third C is connections. You need to make sure that they're going to fit in with your current team dynamics. And what you need to do is you need to talk to people that they've worked with before. Because if you're going to hire someone from a restaurant in another town, you really need to talk to the GM and the chef. You need to make sure you need to guarantee that they're going to be a good cultural fit with your brand. And I'll tell you, when you start hiring for Cultural Fit, your turnover is going to go way down. And when your turnover goes down, your profits go up. And if you want your profits to go up, you got to start really being picky about who you allow to be on your team. Because when you can afford to be picky, you're going to be able to find the perfect person for the job. You're going to be able to attract better talent for your team, and you're going to be able to really grow your restaurant to its potential. And you're also going to be able to take your team to the next level. When you take your team to the next level, your restaurant is going to rise to the very top. Hey, make sure to hit that like and subscribe button before you go. In my next video, I'm going to share seven tips to becoming a Better Leader.
If your restaurant only works because you work 80 hours a week, it doesn't work.
