How restaurant technology can help with labor shortages

How restaurant technology can help with labor shortages

Restaurants are struggling, especially our mom-n-pops down the street. That’s no secret. First the government restrictions with the COVID-19 epidemic put a strangle hold on revenue, and then the following labor shortage after 18 months of no customers. So, how can restaurant technology help with these problems?

In-house restaurant technology

Let’s start with QR Codes which have been around for years. As a matter of a fact, QR Codes were on the way out when 2020 rolled in with the need for touchless processes. Now we are all experts on popping out our phone, scanning the QR Code for the food menu or beer list, and never questioning that the host didn’t drop off printed menus for us. Now, this doesn’t specifically help with our labor shortage, but it does lead our customers down the path of digital which will help us for sure.

Front-of-house technology

Mobile ordering sounds scary for restaurant owners. Software system migrations or altering the way we do business every day makes us tremble. But this shouldn’t . It’s down-right easy. The mobile ordering software of today amazingly integrates with our existing POS which makes staff training relatively simple. And since our customers have become accustom to QR Codes leading them into digital screens, the obvious next step is online ordering.

Back-of-house technology

We don’t dare forget about our kitchen and prep teams. We can make their lives more simple also by integrating our new mobile ordering, delivery services, and traditional POS orders from wait staff into their Kitchen Display Systems. And for those smaller restaurants that do not run displays, fret not because there are integrations into kitchen orders printers that help with keeping order sequential and efficient.

Restaurant technology to the rescue

Now that we’ve started down the road of training our customers with new processes, we can take this opportunity to use it to our benefit. To help with combatting our restaurant labor shortage, technology doesn’t have to be scary. Let’s let it work for us.

Want to hear more? Let’s talk.

Anyone can reach out to me and get my help. DM me at @keithparnell

Keith is an accomplished keynote speaker, educator, and business consultant. His blog, KP Talks, at keithparnell.com is praised as one of the top marketing and technology blogs in the industry.