Restaurant staff shortages ? Blame it on Masterchef
By Dr Samantha Johnson
Good Food Guide editor , Myffy Rigby blames Masterchef for the staff shortages in restaurants around the country .
As she puts it , the show ’ s depiction of “ rock star ” chef lifestyles attracts lots of young Australians . Trouble is that it ’ s not all glamour and they don ’ t want to put in the hard yards to make it .
Releasing the latest annual Sydney Morning Herald Good Food Guide , Rigby said the food industry was going strong . At the same time , however , restaurants were struggling to find staff . And the jobs are there .
The accommodation and food services sector employs the greatest proportion of young workers of any industry . It is estimated that 44 per cent of staff in restaurants and food places are aged 15 to 24 years . According to the latest forecasts , there are 37,000 new jobs for hospitality workers ready for the taking in the five years to November , 2020 . And there ’ s a big shortage of good staff .
A Deloitte Access Economics report last year revealed a gap of 38,000 staff across the tourism and hospitality sector . And it forecasts that shortage will increase to 123,000 by 2020 . Deloitte forecasts demand will be particularly high for chefs and restaurant managers .
The bottom line , as Rigby says , is that restaurants are finding it hard to recruit quality staff . " They constantly struggle ," Rigby told ABC News Breakfast . " You ' ve got to think , if you were looking for work , start in a kitchen as a kitchen hand and work your way up . You are guaranteed to actually make a career out of that .” " People are seeing it as this real rock
IQ 16 star career , but what it takes to be that rock star is going through every single stage to get there . It ' s really actually driving and picking away and a lot of people don ' t want to do that hard work . It is heavy labour . It ' s manual labour ."
by Leon Gettler , September 14th 2016
SMEs growing in confidence & predict a bright Q4
• The Westpac Melbourne Institute SME Index sits at 95.6 for Q3 2016
• The Future Conditions Index rose by 18.7 percent
• SMEs in Hospitality & Recreational Services are most optimistic about general business conditions in the next three months
The Westpac-Melbourne Institute SME Index ( SME Index ), which aims to provide information about the economic health of Australian small and medium sized enterprises , has revealed a 15.2 percent increase in business confidence , going from 83.0 in Q2 2016 to 95.6 in Q3 20161
Westpac ’ s General Manager of SME Business Bank , Julie Rynski said , “ It ’ s pleasing to see a strong uplift in business optimism . These results are a solid recovery from a weaker level last quarter with a promising view for the lead in to Christmas .”
“ Our customers are telling us their top three business goals in 2017 are revenue growth , retaining customers and increasing business efficiency . Now is a pivotal time when SMEs should be critically reviewing the past 12 months and making meaningful changes for the year ahead .”
This quarter saw reasonable increases in the SME Index across most states , with a rise of 21.6 percent in New South Wales ( to 99.3 ), 15.2 percent in Victoria ( to 105.8 ), 11.2 percent in Queensland ( to 87.6 ) and 17.9 percent in Western Australia ( to 90.4 ). South Australia was the only state that saw a dip in confidence with a 12.5 percent decline in its SME Index ( to 74.7 ), a result of possible underlying factors of harder access to credit and finance ( reported by a net balance of 44.4 percent ) and rising government regulations ( reported by a net balance of 61.8 percent ).
“ According to the latest forecasts , there are 37,000 new jobs for hospitality workers ready for the taking in the five years to November , 2020 . And there ’ s a big shortage of good staff .”
1 . The SME Index is computed as the average of two subindexes based on responses to questions about “ general business conditions over the last 3 months ” and “ expectations for business conditions in 3 months ’ time ”. Indexes are computed using the net balance approach , i . e . percentage reporting ‘ improve ’ less the percentage reporting ‘ deteriorate ’ plus 100 ). An Index value greater ( less ) than 100 indicates that there were more ‘ improve ’ (‘ deteriorate ’) responses in the sample . www . westpac . com . au