I’d like to speak to the manager!!!

I love talking to people at work.

I love, love, love it.

Which comes in handy when you are conducting interviews.

I like to just have a conversation with the person, peppering the chat with the questions I like to ask.

However, when you need to hire someone, especially more than one someone, it can make for long days going through the process.

Especially, when you have put aside the day to do so.

Yesterday, our restaurant manager, and I had interviews set up from 11:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.

One interview every half hour.

And miracle of miracles they all showed.

Which never, ever, ever happens.

At least not in the last 10 years.

The interview at 11:00 was great. The conversation flowed, the person was normal. Great experience. We laughed a lot.

Such was the case for all 8 (6 servers, 2 hosts) interviews. It’s the most successful day of interviews I’ve had since 2013.

However, by 3:00, when the last interviewed finished up, I was exhausted.

It’s literally ground hog day.

Hi. Tell me about yourself.

Where are you from?

What do you do for fun?

Why do you want to work here?

Why did you leave your last job?

You get the gist.

Actually, I didn’t even ask any of these questions yesterday.

By 3:00 the manager and I couldn’t remember who was who. Who said they had open availability? Who was a sommelier? Who was a psychology student? Who moved here from Boston? Who moved here from L.A.?

Yes, we had notes, and resumes, and we had to look at them to remember the details.

And then the appointments wind down, and you realize that the emails have kept coming, the voicemails is full and you are now behind a day.

I actually look forward to the first day of interviews in the spring. Which was yesterday.

It means that spring is approaching. That winter will be winding down around the time everyone is trained. It’s kind of like seeing the buds on the trees, or a crocus peaking through the ground.

However.

We have the same schedule tomorrow. And oh, my, god. I’m already stressed about all the work I need to get accomplished besides 8 interviews.

AHHHHHHH!!!!

Whew. I feel better.

I’ll get off my poor, poor me soap box.

It’s great to have people apply.

It’s great to have people show up.

It’s great to have people qualified for the position to interview.

It’s nice to have choices.

The real stress from yesterday, and probably tomorrow is who we’ll have to disappoint because so far, we have 6 great serving candidates, and only have 1.5 positions available.

It’s the first time I’ve been able to make decisions like this since 2017.

Let’s hope the trend continues.