Kim Bechtel is changing the world… one workplace at a time!
Don’t you hate bios that are written in the third person, like ‘Kim Bechtel is a dynamic thought leader in the field of Human Resources; Kim loves puppies and cooks ancient Roman recipes when Kim is not writing bestsellers.” You know either the person wrote it themselves or their mother did. Nobody could ever be as dynamic, or expert or passionate as we think we all need to be these days. So, what’s the real scoop on me? I have enough brains to know what’s wrong with Human Resource practices in most organizations today, the experience to have seen all the fads come and go, and I’m married to the most patient and interesting person I know (you should really meet her because she is truly dynamic!). I’m enough of a know-it-all to be more than happy to explain to anyone who is interested just how to fix your people management practices.
Why is it we spend more time and effort picking what ink jet printer to buy than we do deciding who we should add to our team? Tom Peters was quoted recently as saying the most important thing a manager can do is decide who to hire. I’ll bet the hospitality sector navel gazes about new menus far more than it does about the criteria used to hire service staff.
Let me be clear, though, I’m not suggesting you dust off more interview questions, or stay up until 3 in the morning to scan more resumes. Neither of those activities will help you get better results from your selection process. Structured interviews were adopted by big organizations to avoid being sued for discriminatory hiring practices and resumes were used by upper class university graduates applying for jobs with people they already knew, their dad knew, or at least who knew the people who were their professors at university.
A much better approach to getting the most return on your investment of time, energy and money in the recruitment and selection of people for your hospitality business is a referral bonus system connected to a robust probationary process. Let me explain.
Unless you have a complete bunch of turkeys working for you, and I know some of you do, look at your best service staff and ask yourself the question, “Why is this person so good at what they do?” You will probably answer that question by describing their personal attributes, things like pleasant personality, self-discipline, honesty, work ethic, and not their education and experience. Once you have identified your best people and their attributes, go to them and offer to pay them a referral bonus for every person they bring to your business from their circle of family (yes, you read that right) friends and neighbours, who you hire. Try about $500 per hire (yes, pay it when you hire them, not after three months – the purpose of the bonus is to get them to recommend lots of people, not to wait to find out if they fit). It’s a lot cheaper than putting an ad in the paper or online, you get someone who your best people think should be working with them (trust me, you want your best people to like the people they work with), and you get new hires who reflect the same attributes as your best workers. Some of the most successful huge multi-national companies use this type of program very successfully.
Then once you have these new hires working for you make sure you have a robust (meaning more than one hour of reading the company safety and personnel policies manual) orientation and training process. This process should include being assigned a mentor (can you think of anyone they know and trust at your business who could provide support to them during their important first few days and weeks? Think hard, if you have trouble with this one, see the previous paragraph for a hint). Every minute of the new person’s early days with you should be planned so that they answer yes to the most important question they will ask themselves in the first three days of working for you, “Will I stay with this company?” By training I don’t mean spending a week in a training class. Training should make sure that the new person has the tools and the understanding to not embarrass themselves or your company. That’s right, it’s that simple, give them enough skill to get through their tasks so that they don’t go home feeling like a loser, and you will have a loyal employee for enough time to get a return on your investment. And, more importantly, they won’t lose you any customers while they’re learning the ropes.
That’s it. Hire people your best people know, like and recommend. Then treat them the same way you would have liked to have been treated by your in-laws when you first met them. You know, all the inside jokes that nobody took the time to explain to you, the embarrassing mistakes like leaving your shoes on inside the house. All the stuff that made you feel stupid and have been lingering with you all these years. Leave that out. Do these two things, and you’ll have the beginnings of a great working relationship.
Kim Bechtel – Chief Idea Officer & CEO
http://www.yourhrco.com/
kim.bechtel@yourhrco.com
LinkedIn – http://ca.linkedin.com/pub/kim-bechtel/4/a78/80a
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Very nice, well thought out article. I was once one of those people/managers who thought my extra hours spent poring over resumes was an effective way to find the best people in the hospitality industry. I have done similar things in the recruitment end that this article recommends and I have only one word of caution; be aware of how many friends/family are working for you.
Restaurants, esp. Front of House, can get very clique (clicky?) very fast, making it virtually impossible for new hires to fit in and a manager can lose control very quickly.
A manager needs to oversee more than just the password to the POS and when staff decide they do not want or like something, regardless if management is correct, and simply decide not to follow direction, you have a big problem as the solution may involve losing all your staff, or losing your manager. Neither option is generally looked upon as a positive occurence.