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Human resources continues to be the most troubling issue for U.S. restaurant owners and operators. When 448 restaurateurs were given the chance to state their top concerns, they chose finding and keeping competent employees, closely followed by a constellation of concerns relating to government regulation, taxation, and legal liability. Other issues that respondents cited were ensuring safe food handling, finding effective marketing strategies, and staying ahead of competitors in a tight economic environment.
Keywords: restaurant managers; restaurant owner concerns; problems in hospitality; key issues; human resources management
In a time of economic instability and international turbulence, it is worth examining what issues most worry restaurant owners and operators in the United States. The restaurant industry finds itself struggling with long-term problems that can only be magnified by the current environment. In the midst of this turbulence, it could be valuable to know whether a set of shared problems may be hampering the ability of managers to cope with today's uncertainty. Given that a common set of problems may elicit industry-wide solutions, I undertook the study reported in this article to elicit a broad range of perspectives on the following simple question: What one or two problems or concerns are most troubling to you as a manager?
Human resources, still. As I describe below, the study found that the fundamental issues of recruiting and retaining skilled employees continue to be the most important concern on the minds of many operators, while the specter of government regulation is also a major problem-notably as part of the ongoing debates over obesity. As explained in this article, the human resources challenge seems particularly thorny. The critical nature of human resources is consistent with previous research that has identified key issues of concern for lodging managers.1
While times of prosperity would seem to be ideal for making bold changes in an operation, instead complacency often sets in. Changes and initiatives often do not occur until a period of crisis arises. It is ironic that the motivation to do something different and to make radical revisions to current practice is strongest in those periods of greatest stress, when change is most difficult and resources are stretched. The key issues of concern reported in this article were gathered to help...