Help me interview/evaluate restaurant manager candidates
July 22, 2023 2:52 PM Subscribe
I am on the board for a branch of a combo fraternal order / social club / benevolent society. We have a small restaurant and bar, and need to hire a general manager responsible for overseeing inventory, pricing, books, cooks, bar manager, event coordination, and gambling manager. I have zero experience in these areas, and neither does the rest of the board. Have you done this, and can you help me identify good interview questions and rubrics and models for evaluating candidates? tysm!
I have zero experience in these areas, and neither does the rest of the board.
Do you, or anyone on the board, have friends or family with restaurant management experience? Can you reach out to other branches of this same fraternal order/social club to see of anyone there can help you with this?
The reason I bring this up is that I worked for a few places where the owners (in this case, you and the board) had no experience in the restaurant business, and they were constantly getting ripped off and stolen from by the folks they hired to run their businesses for them.
Restaurants are tricky businesses with slim margins and a lot of room for theft, and there are folks out there who will happily prey upon that for as long as they can. You definitely need someone on your side who can help you find a good candidate.
posted by ralan at 3:49 PM on July 22, 2023 [4 favorites]
Do you, or anyone on the board, have friends or family with restaurant management experience? Can you reach out to other branches of this same fraternal order/social club to see of anyone there can help you with this?
The reason I bring this up is that I worked for a few places where the owners (in this case, you and the board) had no experience in the restaurant business, and they were constantly getting ripped off and stolen from by the folks they hired to run their businesses for them.
Restaurants are tricky businesses with slim margins and a lot of room for theft, and there are folks out there who will happily prey upon that for as long as they can. You definitely need someone on your side who can help you find a good candidate.
posted by ralan at 3:49 PM on July 22, 2023 [4 favorites]
This is probably "round two" stuff, but I would recommend let the candidate actually do the job for a couple hours (paid, of course) as a try-out, with every employee (and the board) watching his or her performance. Is this a person who will throw their staff under the bus to keep customers happy, or back up their staff when they were mistreated? Is this the person who hides in the office all day playing solitaire while delegating everything, or proactively prowl the area, even helping out as needed? You may need to engineer some of the situations, but better to find out before you actually hire the person.
Also, have you considered promoting someone from within? If not... why not?
posted by kschang at 3:49 PM on July 22, 2023
Also, have you considered promoting someone from within? If not... why not?
posted by kschang at 3:49 PM on July 22, 2023
Response by poster: This club is small, private, and volunteer-led. We have a rotating staff of volunteer cooks (5 people) (small stipend) and volunteer bartenders (about 8) (work for tips). The managers get small salaries. We are not running, say, an Applebee’s here. We are of course reaching out to other people for advice (including outgoing manager), but that’s also why I’m posting here. There are a couple of people who already work there who plan to apply. The ethics of the staff are not a huge worry—there are already good controls in place, and they are members of the org and we are held to standards as part of that.
To reiterate tho, I’m really in need of specific questions and evaluations here, not generic advice on how to conduct the overall process. Hopefully that’s enough extra detail, and I will stfu now to avoid thread sitting.
posted by 0xABADBABE at 4:08 PM on July 22, 2023
To reiterate tho, I’m really in need of specific questions and evaluations here, not generic advice on how to conduct the overall process. Hopefully that’s enough extra detail, and I will stfu now to avoid thread sitting.
posted by 0xABADBABE at 4:08 PM on July 22, 2023
Best answer: Thanks for the clarification.
You already told us the areas of responsibility, so ask the candidate how would s/he handle each of those areas, as well as a couple of the following areas:
* how to handle conflict among staff members
* how to handle difficult customers
* how to handle problems with vendors
* how to comply health and safety regulations (is there a plan for audit existing ones?)
* how to build and maintain positive employee and customer satisfaction
* how to keep up with latest trends and innovations (if they apply to your venue)
* how to process customer feedback
* how to handle staffing, scheduling, peak hours and demands
* how to handle hygiene in the whole place
posted by kschang at 4:20 PM on July 22, 2023 [1 favorite]
You already told us the areas of responsibility, so ask the candidate how would s/he handle each of those areas, as well as a couple of the following areas:
* how to handle conflict among staff members
* how to handle difficult customers
* how to handle problems with vendors
* how to comply health and safety regulations (is there a plan for audit existing ones?)
* how to build and maintain positive employee and customer satisfaction
* how to keep up with latest trends and innovations (if they apply to your venue)
* how to process customer feedback
* how to handle staffing, scheduling, peak hours and demands
* how to handle hygiene in the whole place
posted by kschang at 4:20 PM on July 22, 2023 [1 favorite]
Volunteer management is pretty different from managing employees, and restaurants typically have high turnover, people get fired or quit with regularity. I’m guessing that’s not the case for workers at your club. Make sure the candidates have volunteer management experience.
posted by momus_window at 6:21 PM on July 22, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by momus_window at 6:21 PM on July 22, 2023 [1 favorite]
Best answer: I have lots of experience with this.
-First, ask for resumes not just an application. When I look at resumes, I look for that they put at least some effort into a resume. A decent restaurant manager should have professional resume. If someone can’t put the effort into their resume, it’s often indicative of not putting effort into other professional areas.
-I look for working at previous jobs at least 1 year. There’s a lot of turnover in restaurants and a lot of restaurants are not great places to work. But when I see a resume with 2 months here, 3 months there, I usually pass.
-A lot of lateral moves can be a red flag. If a resume has several jobs that were fairly short term, but you can see career growth in them (with titles, responsibilities, or company size), that can be a green flag.
-I phone screen before setting up in person interviews. If there are a lot of short term jobs, I ask about it up front. I will also ask why they left specific places. I take extra consideration for folks who are not straight, white cis men. There is a long history of discrimination towards those folks In restaurants and I will never fault someone for bailing on a toxic environment. As a woman, I know that I am more likely to hear about leaving a job due to sexual harassment from female candidates than a male interviewer would be.
-for hard skills, like inventory, pricing, etc, a say “tell me about your experience with doing inventory”.
-I ask what they think is necessary for a successful operation. Then I will ask what they do to foster these things.
-If there is a specific job that is closely related to what I’m hiring for, I ask them to tell me more about it. It shouldn’t be hard for the candidate to tell you what day to day operations looked like, what kind of numbers they were doing, what their role in that was. I ask what they liked and disliked about that job.
At that point, I usually have a good idea if they will be a good fit or not. If it looks good, I bring them in for an in person interview with another person in the company. Sometimes, the other interviewer will ask questions that I already have asked. It’s good to see if their answers are consistent. In person, I have the expectation of them showing up on time, dressed appropriately, and able to have a conversation with us. Great interviews often feel like just hanging out and talking about work, with back and forth conversations that are comfortable.
-After the interview, I will ask about the candidate to people I know who may have worked with them in the past. It’s helpful to know someone who has a lot of restaurant contacts. It’s usually not hard to find out if someone was fired for theft of has a bad reputation for whatever reason.
That’s a short list, but it’s a start. Reach out if you have more specific questions and I’ll help answer what I can.
posted by August Fury at 2:29 AM on July 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
-First, ask for resumes not just an application. When I look at resumes, I look for that they put at least some effort into a resume. A decent restaurant manager should have professional resume. If someone can’t put the effort into their resume, it’s often indicative of not putting effort into other professional areas.
-I look for working at previous jobs at least 1 year. There’s a lot of turnover in restaurants and a lot of restaurants are not great places to work. But when I see a resume with 2 months here, 3 months there, I usually pass.
-A lot of lateral moves can be a red flag. If a resume has several jobs that were fairly short term, but you can see career growth in them (with titles, responsibilities, or company size), that can be a green flag.
-I phone screen before setting up in person interviews. If there are a lot of short term jobs, I ask about it up front. I will also ask why they left specific places. I take extra consideration for folks who are not straight, white cis men. There is a long history of discrimination towards those folks In restaurants and I will never fault someone for bailing on a toxic environment. As a woman, I know that I am more likely to hear about leaving a job due to sexual harassment from female candidates than a male interviewer would be.
-for hard skills, like inventory, pricing, etc, a say “tell me about your experience with doing inventory”.
-I ask what they think is necessary for a successful operation. Then I will ask what they do to foster these things.
-If there is a specific job that is closely related to what I’m hiring for, I ask them to tell me more about it. It shouldn’t be hard for the candidate to tell you what day to day operations looked like, what kind of numbers they were doing, what their role in that was. I ask what they liked and disliked about that job.
At that point, I usually have a good idea if they will be a good fit or not. If it looks good, I bring them in for an in person interview with another person in the company. Sometimes, the other interviewer will ask questions that I already have asked. It’s good to see if their answers are consistent. In person, I have the expectation of them showing up on time, dressed appropriately, and able to have a conversation with us. Great interviews often feel like just hanging out and talking about work, with back and forth conversations that are comfortable.
-After the interview, I will ask about the candidate to people I know who may have worked with them in the past. It’s helpful to know someone who has a lot of restaurant contacts. It’s usually not hard to find out if someone was fired for theft of has a bad reputation for whatever reason.
That’s a short list, but it’s a start. Reach out if you have more specific questions and I’ll help answer what I can.
posted by August Fury at 2:29 AM on July 23, 2023 [1 favorite]
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Experience, a good rapport with people they will be managing and management.
Ask them why they would be the right fit for the job, and listen carefully. Ask them the worst place they ever worked at and why was it the worst. Same for the best.
Create a scenario where things are not going right. Ask them how they would deal with a missed delivery of the days food order. And how about if the liquor didn't show up? What do you say to the bar manager?
Only have ever waited, but did do some hiring in the long-ago past. Try to figure out if the applicant can do the job, and then try to see if they can do the job well. Without driving the existing staff away, lol.
posted by Windopaene at 3:37 PM on July 22, 2023