Hiring and staffing could be considered one of the most important and difficult aspects of running a restaurant, with out the staff you can not execute the business.
First of all it costs a large amount of money to hire and train new staff members so it best to retain them, but it is almost impossible to never lose employees. Second, all applications should be screened and considered. Then during the interview it is very important to try and figure out whether or not they possess the experience, personality and charisma that you want to put in front of your guests. It is also very important that the expectations be clearly set here, at the interview. This will sometimes weed out the individuals that will not be able to live up to your expectations and do not care, and in fact I tell them that if they can not live up to the expectations to not even bother wasting their or my time, because I will not hesitate to let them go if I feel they do not live up to their interview(a lot of people can talk, but not all can walk that talk.) Of course they will tell they can and will, but then they simply do not show up to orientation. This is great because it saves you a lot of money.
It is important that if you have any interview procedures you use to check their skills, that you apply them to every interview to avoid any possible discrimination issues. For example, I like to have a prep cook show me their knife skills by having them cut some vegetables so I can observe how they do before I actually hire them. For broiler cook I have them cook me a burger or steak to a certain temperature and so on.
Then at orientation, it is important to make sure all paper work, both legally required documents as well as any company required documents are filled our properly. This will save a lot of time and head ache in the event that you are audited.
I also believe it is important to make sure you reinforce the job expectations and that you sincerely welcome them to the team. For a lot of people their job is their home away from home, so make them fell at home. I know I spend more time with the people at work than I do my family. Then it is time for the training to begin.
