I came across an interesting article yesterday touching on employment trends in foodservice, from fastcasual.com. They've quoted senior executives in the industry as seeing improved revenue and profitability in this year and next but that job seekers will only see gradual improvements in opportunities into 2011.
Many see a full recovery over the next couple years and suggest new product innovations and merchanising schemes to be the driving factors. They also found that increasing their outsourcing of technical and business procedures - yeah, recruiters! - will spur along the recovery.
Some are suprised that outsourcing recruitment will accelerate the recovery, but to a long-term recruiter in the hospitality industry, it seems quite obvious. A recruiter can take on much of the HR function for a client company, and a good recruiter will lighten the finanaical investment for executives tapping into their established networks and resources. Let's face it, an executive has an important role that largely does not include recruitment or the time to develop the resources a good recruiter will have secured.
The overall outlook, according to the majority of executive respondents in the KPMG survey: revenue and profitability is better now than a year ago. That’s in marked contrast to KPMG's survey of the sector last summer, when less than one-third thought these business measures were better than the previous year.
For those who are looking for work or planning on making a move, "39 percent of respondents were more optimistic about employment in their sector over the next year, which is seven percentage points higher than last summer's survey."
The executives that noted an increase in planned hiring, a mere 23% of respondents, marking a tough market for prospective employees that will need to be well prepared for interviews and scrutinizing of their references and credentials, not to mention their social networking behaviour!
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
Your Attitude and Your Energy
The hospitality industry is very much a people focussed career and requires much of your personal energy to service customers and care for staff that also do so on the front line each day. Your personal energy is an important component productivity. Most people cycle between positive and negative energy states during the work week. But the percentage of time spent in positive and negative moods varies significantly. Some people seem to be overwhelmingly negative, which makes to tough for them to work in hospitality! Others in similar circumstances can remain much more positive.
Therefore, to increasing the time spent in a positive state will improve your personal productivity. Here are a few suggestions to be mindful of that will not only support your working conditions and those around you but also your personal life:
1. Work first on your relationships.
A simple yet prime issue, relationships are both our best sources of happiness and our biggest sources of problems and frustrations. Developing good relationships and improving or ending the poor relationships in your life will increase your personal energy. An effective tactic to start improving your relationships is to develop better personal boundaries and standards and work on reducing tolerations.
2. Develop a routine to start every day in a positive mental state.
It is very helpful to start the day with a routine that creates positive energy. Many people find activities like an early morning walk, exercise, meditation, quiet time, etc., effective in getting their day off to a positive start. It is easier to stay positive, if you can start with a positive attitude.
3. Learn how to monitor your current mental state and changes to it.
This is a complex area, but if you can link negative mood changes to a source or cause, then you are frequently in a position to quickly change back. The important point here is once you are in a negative state, get the message or value from the situation, then take some action to return to a positive state.
4. Create an energizing physical environment.
Invest some time and money to make your personal surroundings pleasing and energizing to you. Some small items may make a big difference to how your personal space affects your moods. Poor lighting can lower your mental state, especially in the winter in rainy Vancouver! Some people report a big improvement in their mood just by cleaning up their bedroom and making the bed before leaving for work. Clutter is de-energizing to many people. A sink full of dirty dishes is de-energizing to some. A small water fountain can create a feeling of energy.
5. Carefully monitor your self-talk.
Negative self talk is a common source of low moods. When you are hearing negative self talk, be alert to the unrealistic, overly negative messages. Focus on getting any truthful message, then shifting out of overly self-defeating criticism. It is true that we are usually our own worst critic.
6. Deal with problems effectively.
Problems are a part of life. Few people enjoy problems. But, in many cases we can learn from them and it may help to ask yourself several questions, such as:
•What am I contributing to this problem?
•What Life Lesson have I been missing here?
•What is the worst that can happen and how can I improve on that?
•What am I doing right?
•What am I going to do differently?
7. Focus your energy on attracting more of what you want.
Time and energy spent dwelling on problems is frequently better spent pursuing desirable goals. It helps to examine your own contribution to any difficulties and understand how you may need to change. Then be sure to ask others directly for what you want from them; don't fall into the trap of under communicating. In this way, you are always making course corrections and moving forward.
8 Be a positive energy source with others.
Negative energy seems to attract negative results. Keeping your own mood positive can encourage positive moods and suppress negative behaviour in others.
9 Avoid using negative energy as an energy source.
Many people have a shortage of positive energy in their lives and use negative energy as their energy source. They create busyness, use deadlines, crises, and problems to keep them going. In many cases, their motivation patterns shift entirely from seeking pleasure to avoiding pain. In most cases, serious burnout is the eventual result of becoming dependent on negative energy sources.
Therefore, to increasing the time spent in a positive state will improve your personal productivity. Here are a few suggestions to be mindful of that will not only support your working conditions and those around you but also your personal life:
1. Work first on your relationships.
A simple yet prime issue, relationships are both our best sources of happiness and our biggest sources of problems and frustrations. Developing good relationships and improving or ending the poor relationships in your life will increase your personal energy. An effective tactic to start improving your relationships is to develop better personal boundaries and standards and work on reducing tolerations.
2. Develop a routine to start every day in a positive mental state.
It is very helpful to start the day with a routine that creates positive energy. Many people find activities like an early morning walk, exercise, meditation, quiet time, etc., effective in getting their day off to a positive start. It is easier to stay positive, if you can start with a positive attitude.
3. Learn how to monitor your current mental state and changes to it.
This is a complex area, but if you can link negative mood changes to a source or cause, then you are frequently in a position to quickly change back. The important point here is once you are in a negative state, get the message or value from the situation, then take some action to return to a positive state.
4. Create an energizing physical environment.
Invest some time and money to make your personal surroundings pleasing and energizing to you. Some small items may make a big difference to how your personal space affects your moods. Poor lighting can lower your mental state, especially in the winter in rainy Vancouver! Some people report a big improvement in their mood just by cleaning up their bedroom and making the bed before leaving for work. Clutter is de-energizing to many people. A sink full of dirty dishes is de-energizing to some. A small water fountain can create a feeling of energy.
5. Carefully monitor your self-talk.
Negative self talk is a common source of low moods. When you are hearing negative self talk, be alert to the unrealistic, overly negative messages. Focus on getting any truthful message, then shifting out of overly self-defeating criticism. It is true that we are usually our own worst critic.
6. Deal with problems effectively.
Problems are a part of life. Few people enjoy problems. But, in many cases we can learn from them and it may help to ask yourself several questions, such as:
•What am I contributing to this problem?
•What Life Lesson have I been missing here?
•What is the worst that can happen and how can I improve on that?
•What am I doing right?
•What am I going to do differently?
7. Focus your energy on attracting more of what you want.
Time and energy spent dwelling on problems is frequently better spent pursuing desirable goals. It helps to examine your own contribution to any difficulties and understand how you may need to change. Then be sure to ask others directly for what you want from them; don't fall into the trap of under communicating. In this way, you are always making course corrections and moving forward.
8 Be a positive energy source with others.
Negative energy seems to attract negative results. Keeping your own mood positive can encourage positive moods and suppress negative behaviour in others.
9 Avoid using negative energy as an energy source.
Many people have a shortage of positive energy in their lives and use negative energy as their energy source. They create busyness, use deadlines, crises, and problems to keep them going. In many cases, their motivation patterns shift entirely from seeking pleasure to avoiding pain. In most cases, serious burnout is the eventual result of becoming dependent on negative energy sources.
Tuesday, July 06, 2010
Leadership Today
The failings of leadership have been cited as a cause of the global financial crisis. Perhaps this can be said of any significant crisis. So what does it take to be a successful leader in today's economy? Below is what industry leaders identify as the six essential characteristics of today's rising leaders.
What seems to be missing from this list below, obtained from industry leaders themselves, is ethics and morals. I think that is the biggest contributing factor to the various economic, political, social and environmental problems we face.
Their list:
1. Ambitious. Emerging executives are highly ambitious, but retain a balance between their ambition and arrogance. They are comfortable with their assessment of a situation.
2. Decisive. They aren't afraid of making decisions at an operational, tactical and strategic level. They don't hesitate to take action and responsibility for driving change, and can handle lots of information from a variety of perspectives to make effective, strong decisions.
3. Brave. They should be able to walk into a boardroom and hold their own. They need to be flexible, knowledgeable and have impact. A good emerging leader remains clam, in control, garnering respect by they way they hold themselves and delivering messages with confidence.
4. Empowering. They have the ability to empower other people in an organisation. They are happy to push decision-making downwards and don't need to hold onto a lot of the nitty-gritty work. They promote other people's ownership while still providing guidance and support to their team.
5. Entrepreneurial. They tend to be entrepreneurial, looking outside to see what's going on in the marketplace. They seek out innovative solutions to problems, challenge set paradigms, and reject the status quo. They focus on external drivers rather than just internal ones.
6. Visionary. They are able to set strategic direction, seeing where a business is heading and understanding the short- and long-term issues. They tend to be quite innovative, stepping outside the box and are able to put guidelines in place to set the pace of change and make things happen.
[Source: Human Resources Leader, 15 September 2009]
What seems to be missing from this list below, obtained from industry leaders themselves, is ethics and morals. I think that is the biggest contributing factor to the various economic, political, social and environmental problems we face.
Their list:
1. Ambitious. Emerging executives are highly ambitious, but retain a balance between their ambition and arrogance. They are comfortable with their assessment of a situation.
2. Decisive. They aren't afraid of making decisions at an operational, tactical and strategic level. They don't hesitate to take action and responsibility for driving change, and can handle lots of information from a variety of perspectives to make effective, strong decisions.
3. Brave. They should be able to walk into a boardroom and hold their own. They need to be flexible, knowledgeable and have impact. A good emerging leader remains clam, in control, garnering respect by they way they hold themselves and delivering messages with confidence.
4. Empowering. They have the ability to empower other people in an organisation. They are happy to push decision-making downwards and don't need to hold onto a lot of the nitty-gritty work. They promote other people's ownership while still providing guidance and support to their team.
5. Entrepreneurial. They tend to be entrepreneurial, looking outside to see what's going on in the marketplace. They seek out innovative solutions to problems, challenge set paradigms, and reject the status quo. They focus on external drivers rather than just internal ones.
6. Visionary. They are able to set strategic direction, seeing where a business is heading and understanding the short- and long-term issues. They tend to be quite innovative, stepping outside the box and are able to put guidelines in place to set the pace of change and make things happen.
[Source: Human Resources Leader, 15 September 2009]
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