Through Food and Beyond

This is a sponsored post written by me on behalf of National Restaurant Association Educational Foundation for IZEA. All opinions are 100% mine.

Let me paint you a picture: Have you ever fixed a drink with five liquors, while listening to two drink orders from antsy customers at the bar, sent the busboy back to the kitchen for crisper chicken wings and poured the perfect Sam Adams for your server, tapping her foot at the service bar? All in the space of 120 seconds?

That is the essence of restaurant work. Where else can you learn multitasking on this level? And this is after showing up two hours before your shift to stock the bar and brief the manager on how closing went last night.

You need to be dependable, reliable, dedicated and in complete control of your duties. Gee, do those sound like skills that could be valuable in any career?

The restaurant industry is the first training ground for the majority of the American workforce. One in three Americans have their first job in foodservice.

Technical skills that are forged in the heat of a kitchen in the weeds on a busy Saturday night can power your next career. Once you’ve fixed a wonky sink that gets the restaurant through a dinner shift, you can fix anything. And running the front of the house as an assistant manager can foster business leadership skills that pay off in the boardroom 20 years later.

The National Restaurant Association Educational Foundation is rolling out its Food and Beverage Service Competency Model, which details all the skills and competencies that foodservice workers gain on the job. People love working in restaurants and foodservice. Many stick around for fulfilling long-term careers, while plenty of others transfer to other industries and vocations where their foodservice-incubated work ethic pays off big-time.

With so many individuals starting their working life behind a bar or in front of a stove, it can be said that our industry is a training ground for America’s workforce.

The Competency Model encapsulates all that foodservice has to offer employees and provides an excellent bellwether for companies to base long-term training and employee strategies on. Read more on the Food and Beverage Service Competency Model.