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Friday, February 22, 2008

Random Dumb Sh*t Education or experience ... what's worth more?

Posted By on Fri, Feb 22, 2008 at 4:51 PM

When Johnston and Wales first came to Charlotte in 2004, those working in the service industry at the time seemed to have mixed feelings. On the one hand, there would be a wealth of young, new talent coming to the city looking to learn and work in their respective fields; on the other hand, this new talent would be well-educated, less experienced, and would perhaps work harder for less money, which is appealing to a restaurant chef or hotel manager and nerve-racking to a sous chef with no formal education.

Now that the unemployment rate has gone up and the job market has gone downhill, employers have some difficult decisions to make. When the economy is not at its best, luxuries like dining out usually go to the bottom of the to do list. Restaurants and hotels may tighten their budgets a bit and look to fill any job openings with cheaper help — meaning younger, less experienced employees. Many of the recent graduates are looking to get their foot in the door any way they can. But longtime veterans of the service industry will say book smarts will only get you so far. Maybe the new guy makes the perfect by-the-book burre blanc, but can he keep it from separating on Valentine's weekend, feeding over 300 people a night? Sometimes shortcuts are important ... and they don't teach shortcuts in school.

Now, on the other side of the coin, we have the highly experienced but uneducated employees and employers who perhaps only know the shortcuts. Perhaps a special guest comes into their restaurant and asks for a particular French dish that requires specific and well rounded knowledge about many different ingredients. Our veteran chef may not be able to perform because his knowledge is specific to where he has worked, and it wasn't at a French place. So during a time when there are few jobs and 10 times as many people going after them, who gets the job, the experienced candidate or the educated one?

There are definitely positives and negatives in both. Hopefully someone will walk through the door with a little bit of everything, but if not, maybe he will be smart enough to go back to school or hardworking and hungry enough to get some great experience under his belt.

Full disclosure: The writer works in the service industry.

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