If you are involved in the catering industry, you will already know that staff retention can be a big issue. Whilst the recession has meant there are far more people looking for work it does not mean that all of those people are cut out for working in the catering industry. The reality is that whilst there are far more people responding to adverts for catering jobs a bigger percentage of those applications are from people who are simply not suitable. This leaves many in the catering trade wasting a lot of precious time wading through applications from unsuitable candidates.
Even when caterers take people on, they often find that they end up leaving after just a few weeks. However, it is possible to reduce the occurrence of both of these issues simply by changing a few things about the way you recruit people.
More Targeted Recruitment for Caterers
The most important step is advertising vacancies in the right place. If you are lucky enough to be situated by a catering college, it makes sense to tap into that opportunity. Advertising your roles at the college should bring you plenty of suitable candidates. However, it is important to realise that even this recruitment technique has its limitations. Given that most students have only limited time available, the chances are you will only be able to fill your casual and your part time roles this way. You also have to bear in mind that the vast majority of the students will simply move on once they have completed their course. Therefore, whilst you get staff with the right skills they are very unlikely to stay with you for long.
By far the most effective place for catering and hospitality firms to advertise their vacancies is the web. A job advert that is placed on a job board that focuses exclusively on the catering industry will typically attract candidates with previous experience. Naturally, this means far less unsuitable applications to wade through. It should also mean better staff retention because the people applying already know what it is like to work in the catering industry and actually want to continue to do so.
If you have catering or hospitality roles that you would like to fill consider posting them on the specialist catering recruitment board http://recruiters.caterer.com.