Building Your Crew

Bring on the masses…

The great thing about opening a new restaurant is that people find it exciting.  If you can get the word out that your restaurant is soon to open, you will get some of the most excitable, personable hardworking individuals, along with all the other less than desirable candidates.  Picking through the lot can be hard, but the turn-out is amazing.  You will never be blessed/cursed with so many applications and recommendations at one time.  So think positively, and get to work.

Sorting the good from the bad and the potentially dangerous

It’s no secret that the restaurant industry attracts some very weird people.  For every hardworking, clean, drug-free candidate without a criminal record, you will find 25 lazy, drug-addicted or just plain crazy people applying for the job.  You’ll never have a completely “clean” crew; the trick lies in finding which ones are actually manageable and what jobs you can give them within a restaurant that will make you money without putting anyone in harm’s way.  I’m not saying that you can hire the knife-wielding drug lord as long as he’s secluded during his shift.  But in reality, some of the hardest working dishwashers I have ever had the pleasure of working with are people I would probably walk away from if I saw them on the street.  One of the hardest lessons to learn as a manager is that you are the minority.  I love working in restaurants.  I have an education in it and the desire to be there for a long time.   But ninety percent of the people I currently work with do not love it, nor is being a server or line cook their life plan.  Some people, like those scary looking dishwashers will come to you for work because they know their past drug use is not welcome in many places, but you throw them an apron and 15 bucks an hour and they go to work.  Other employees are only there because they have some other goal in life (become a teacher, doctor, astronaut, etc) and they need a quick, legal method of making cash to get through school or pay their rent in the meantime.  And some employees will be lifers in the industry, but with no real desire to be there.  Working in restaurants is convenient for their lifestyle, so they enjoy it, but they’re not usually going to put in an extra effort for your sake (unless you’re paying big).  And every once in awhile, you find a rare gem of an employee who will work hard without immediate reward, because working hard is their reward.  They will care more than you expect and will wind up saving you in more than one instance.  Find these people, and at all costs, keep them as long as you can.  They will be the heart of your crew, and will be the ones to lead the others better than you can ever hope to do.