Management and Training Challenges in the Foodservice Industry

 Experts in the foodservice industry agree: the single biggest challenge in foodservice management continues to be the availability of quality trained staff and management. Even in this current strained economic environment, companies continue to invest significant sums of money to bring people into the organization and train them to the company's methodologies. A company also inculcates new hires into the culture of the organization. Employees with quality food service training are valuable and most companies focus on hiring these employees because they will help the company grow and succeed. The quality of training, as well as the attitude of the prospective employee, are both important to a company when the company decides who it will hire.

The better a company is at finding people, the better the organization performs, and the better the organization serves the customer's needs. Serving the customer's needs is the universal goal for all companies. Because of this flow, finding good people probably has been, and will continue to be, the number one challenge and priority in the foodservice business. In the entire foodservice industry, whether it be in retail, hospitality, or restaurants, those in foodservice management will all say the same thing -- the availability of a quality trained staff and management is their main challenge. It is very difficult to find qualified people to hire. Those with good training, ambition and skills are in high demand and have a good chance of being successful in the field.

If staffing is the main challenge a foodservice company faces, a second challenge for foodservice management is sourcing a quality product. For example, several years ago there was an outbreak of mad cow disease in Europe. The outbreak caused significant disruptions in the supply of available protein products (all protein products, not just beef). Although mad cows initially affected the production of beef, the impact of the outbreak also affected other proteins - this is because the demand for the other proteins increased suddenly. After all, people were avoiding beef. The purchasing and sourcing of fresh and safe products have always been and will continue to be a concern because the foodservice industry commits to keeping its consumers safe. A situation like this has never been an issue domestically because the U.S. has (in general) a great distribution system. In the U.S. we are generally able to trade-off suppliers and distribution at will, which means that we can switch from a producer with possible issues to one that is safe without much delay. It is important to note that while quality product sourcing is not a significant issue domestically, internationally it can be a significant problem and it should be covered in foodservice training.

Finding qualified employees are the major challenge that foodservice management faces. Foodservice training can help an organization to ensure that all of its workers have the proper skill sets so that in challenging times the company will be able to stay profitable. In challenging economic times, the most important thing a company can do is to make sure that its workers are the best they can be.