Jump to content

The Restaurant Labor Shortage and Customer Service Issues


DaveO

Recommended Posts

This is NOT the result of  a wide spread statistical survey or a labor study.  It is impressionistic based on our observations into the restaurant (and catering industry) from the placement office at the Professional Bartending School in Arlington.  This school has been providing strong bartender placement services for the past 3 + decades.  We've always focused on placement services and have provided them in a variety of ways over these decades trying to service our students and employers while doing so in a manner that works for the staff and volume of graduates.  Its a free service to employers. 

Specifically over the last year we have simply seen an astonishing increase in the number and variety of restaurants, bars, hotels, clubs, and caterers that post with our school.  This increase corresponds to a significant increase in available positions advertised for both FOH (front of house) and BOH (back of house) positions in the various classifieds on the web.  Over the decades we've monitored this, and we are simply seeing significantly more positions being advertised.  Its a dramatic increase.

With both unfilled positions and industry norm (always high) turnover I'm not surprised at the volume of complaints about customer service. Its difficult to provide great customer service at any level or time. That is not a function of unemployment rates or staff and management stability, but a function of the remarkably few people with great customer service qualities.  As we've heard over the decades its not difficult to train a lot of people for most restaurant positions, its always difficult to find great people. 

Even as we regularly and continuously contact employers to list job opportunities with us and accordingly see increases in the volume of listing employers the natural increase of employers over the last year has been breathtaking.  Besides the hundreds or thousands of bars, restaurants, and hotels that don't get referenced at DR.com there are an increasing number of employers from among those restaurants including those that are highly lauded here.  There is simply a shortage of staff and an ever increasing volume of job opportunities.  I could cite the comments from owners/management in general but one recent comment struck me as an employer referenced that as of May, he needs to start reviewing resumes, and interviewing for autumn hires NOW.  He can't wait.  The influx of student employment will leave as he well knows and hiring good staff is always difficult and more difficult now.

Staffing is a major issue.

All of this results in customer service issues.  New staff, management turnover, etc. always culminate in customer service glitches.  They could pop up in neighborhood restaurants, and frankly they can pop up at your favorite fine dining establishments especially if and when internal turnover that customers don't see result in entirely new staff and/or staff that is less well trained and managed by new management.  I suggest this may be a recurring issue, at least as long as this under employment status continues.

What would I do?  Well I think I'd continue to visit and patronize the family run operations that maintain dedicated staff and/or any restaurants wherein I know when I walk in the door I'll see some or hopefully many of the same staff faces.  Hopefully if I see the same faces in the FOH, the same faces will be in the BOH.  In the meantime I'd suggest get used to customer service glitches.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I spoke recently with someone I've knew years ago but hadn't seen in "forever".  She has been managing restaurants for the last dozen years.  Known restaurants in the region, both high end and high volume.   Her comments:  This year is horrible, the last 3 years have been terrible.  There are horrific staffing shortages everywhere:  FOH, BOH:  everywhere.  Staffing shortages all the time.  It only increases problems as various customer service issues can't be plugged.  Hard to keep employees.  Hard to train them up.  Its epidemic.

Its a tough time to be in the restaurant business...and its probably a period where don't be surprised if your customer service experiences aren't great.

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

When I saw the comments in the La Vie thread/Sietsema 0 star review and more specifically the problems, especially those in the first paragraph of the list of "issues" it made me think of this thread:

Quote

Lack of common sense. One visit, after everyone had placed their orders, a server asked, in all seriousness, “You’d like the appetizers first? And then the entrees? How about the sides?” I know the T-shirts say “Life is short; eat dessert first,” but does anyone want their steak ahead of their salad, or their sides anywhere
but ... on the side (of the main course)?

Also, servers should never interrupt guests who are clearly in conversation to ask if everything is okay. The better tack: They should do a walk-by to “read” the table, using facial expressions and other cues to determine guest satisfaction.

If they see something, they should say something. Most diners aren’t going to leave $15 cocktails or $46 entrees unfinished unless there’s something wrong with them.

Overall industry folks are well aware there is a labor and talent shortage in the area.  Reading the above had me thinking this server had NO TRAINING, BAD TRAINING, or was a knucklehead or was a knucklehead and had no training.   It just sounds terrible. 

To his credit, on the following day one of the restaurant owners said he and his team was looking at the criticisms and reacting to fix issues, referencing that some of the issues that reflected earlier dates when Sietsema dined, had been rectified by the date of the article.

Regardless, I know there are staff shortages region wide and I'm sure there are training deficiencies everywhere.   But Uggghhhh.   Going out I despise sitting through experiences as described by Sietsema in the review.

 

Alternatively a friend and I were out to dinner about two weeks ago, nice restaurant, tremendously busy on a Tuesday evening.  I had a vantage point to see the dining room.  We neither overate or overspent, with a dinner with mains, apps and one drink apiece plus tax and tip running about $120 for two.  Neither of us thought the food outstanding--sort of okay.

Meanwhile the service, from my vantage point was superb across the dining room.  I'm sure they were understaffed, the servers were hopping.  The manager never had to step in.  Many pleased faces across the dining room.  Our service looked like what everyone was receiving--very professional, knowledgeable, helpful and efficient servers.  None of the experiences described above by Sietsema.  We'd both return--just hoping the meal quality or what we order would be better choices.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 minutes ago, dracisk said:

What really put us all off, though, was the service.

How often have we heard this of late?

If or when the economy tanks, this problem will auto-correct to some degree, but for now, there are so many restaurants open, and so many poorly trained servers working, that, unless you go to a top restaurant, you can pretty much write off the service.

"Being a good server" does not equal "being pleasant and friendly" - this is a profession, or should be, and it takes both training and experience to be good at. 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, DonRocks said:

How often have we heard this of late?

If or when the economy tanks, this problem will auto-correct to some degree, but for now, there are so many restaurants open, and so many poorly trained servers working, that, unless you go to a top restaurant, you can pretty much write off the service.

"Being a good server" does not equal "being pleasant and friendly" - this is a profession, or should be, and it takes both training and experience to be good at. 

I would add a couple of additional points:

Management:   There is an acute shortage of well trained managers.   Restaurants might not have the knowledge base to do a good job with training.   I’ve been hearing about the shortage of mid level managers for FOH and BOH for at least 2 years.

The gig economy and more particularly work such as lyft and uber.   Reportedly there are over 100,000 people driving for lyft, Uber, and other services in this region. Without those jobs and opportunities more people would enter the restaurant industry.

Finally of all the people that enter the industry there are only a relatively small number that treat it like a primary profession.  I suppose of that number a large percentage migrate to finer restaurants but the overall percentage remains small.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

A couple of weeks ago I met a friend at a sports bar to watch some NCAA basketball.  We sat at the bar.  Its not an extraordinary place whose food might be well recognized here, but it is a substantial sports bar with plenty of TV's, the opportunity to watch multiple events and an "okay-acceptable" menu that can work with watching sports

Service at the bar sucked.  Two different bartenders served us.  Neither was good.  We didn't complain.  We tolerated it and watched some games. 

At the DMV bartender school I took a call for our placement services from the GM from this place.  He is looking for some bartenders.   The place is well established with a group of bartenders working full time and part time.  At busy hours they will staff up with 2 or possibly 3.    They can be busy serving the bar and doing service bar (drinks for the tables).  Its a large place.

First I took all the requisite information so we can provide this information for currently more than 3,000 grads subscribing to these leads; both new and experienced including deep experienced.  After we went through the details I described the "poor experience" from a few weeks earlier.  I didn't reference the individuals, but as I described it he identified two staffers by "looks".  I'm pretty sure we are thinking of the same two individuals.  

He is planning on getting rid of them. 

There are MANY employers in the restaurant industry who will hire based on personality and a sense of a strong motivation to give great service.  It doesn't have to come with deep knowledge or experience.  People can learn the knowledge part about the restaurant and the technical parts of bartending over time on the job.  If they focus, pay attention to what experienced good bartenders are doing, and work on it they can pick up the techniques that will make them fast, efficient and effective.  (We are better at it--but that is a different story).

If they get proficient they can do whatever they want with it. 

We have grads who are miserable at the customer service level.  We also have grads that excel.  I know this aspect of FOH customer service is sort of status quo--there are people who are good and not good.  The only difference these days is that there are fewer people entering the industry.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...