94% of Restaurants Cut Zero Jobs to Technology

Everyone says restaurant tech means fewer jobs.

The data says 94% of operators actually cut zero.

We talked with the National Restaurant Association's chief

economist, Dr. Chad Moutray, about where technology actually helps restaurants

hire and train faster, and the one thing automation still can't replace.

Here's a hint.

Every person who walks into a restaurant, they came in to have a good time.

Hmm.

Stick around and watch the full episode and you'll understand.

Welcome back to season two of the Data Blades Podcast, part of

the Retail Razor Podcast Network, where we cut through the noise and get to the

numbers that move your business forward.

I'm Ricardo Belmar.

And I'm Casey Golden.

Welcome to episode 12, the finale of our three-part hiring and staffing miniseries.

We've covered the labor market, the cost of being short-staffed,

and how to keep your best people.

Today, we tackle the big question we're all asking: Where does technology fit?

That's right.

So once again, we are joined by Dr. Chad Moutray, chief economist and senior

vice president of Industry Research and Knowledge at the National Restaurant

Association for all the answers

This one's about using technology to hire and train

faster without losing the human touch that makes hospitality work.

Now, before we dive in with Chad, a quick word about the folks

who make this show and the Retail Razor Podcast Network possible, RetailClub.

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up to $1,250 in travel reimbursement.

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Casey and I will be there for the best conversations on how AI impacts

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All right.

With that out of the way, let's close out this miniseries.

Here's part three of our deep dive into how technology helps with hiring

and retaining staff with Dr. Chad Moutray, chief economist and SVP of

Industry Research and Knowledge at the National Restaurant Association.

Dr. Chad Moutray, welcome back to the Data Blades Podcast.

We're excited to have you back with us today to close out this fantastic

three-part series on hiring and staffing in restaurants based on your recent

research insight report, Hiring and Staffing: How Onboarding, Managers,

and Technology Drive Restaurant ROI

Great to be back.

Looking forward to the third segment here.

Today we're tackling the big question for restaurant operators.

It's all about technology, what it can and what it can't do for your

business and customer experience.

So Chad, you previously gave us the rundown on your role at the National

Restaurant Association as chief economist and head of industry research.

So everybody will have to tune back in to catch the background, and we're gonna

go ahead and dive into today's topic.

All right

That works.

So this is the big one, what we've been waiting for.

there is a real fear that automation in restaurants means fewer jobs and robots.

Yeah

What

does the data actually say?

Well, I think there's always been scary, scary

stories about how technology, the robots were taking our jobs away.

if you go back thirty-plus years, there was worries that spreadsheets

were gonna take accountants' jobs away, and it didn't, right?

And, and, back in again when I was in the manufacturing world,

there was worries about that.

I think one of the things that we typically find is that technology,

rather than displacing people, makes workers more productive, right?

and, and we, we live in a world where the math is very

difficult for restaurants, right?

The profit margins continue to get squeezed.

We know the typical full-service restaurant makes just two

point eight percent, right?

Now, that's, that's the typical profit margin.

That is tight.

limited service, it's four.

worse than beauty

number's probably continuing to shrink, right?

And so restaurants are looking at technology as, "How can I make my

workers more efficient? How can I make my operations more efficient?" So

whether that's using smarter purchasing power, whether it's improving overall

throughput in the kitchen, right?

Making sure that customer experience is improved through, through

technology, or the purpose of this paper, speeding up the hiring process.

I think all of that makes operations more efficient, helps the bottom line, but

it also hopefully helps improve both the customer and the employee experience.

And yes, there's a lot of scary stories out there about robots, but I think

what we have typically seen, and most, most restaurants tell us this, they,

they-- it simply makes the workers more, productive and efficient, right?

More than anything else.

Yeah, and I think just to, throw a stat out there from the paper

that kind of solidifies that and validates that is 94% of operators said their tech

investments over the past two to three years did not permanently eliminate jobs.

Yeah.

There you

go

you, you, you give the number from, my paper, which is great.

Which is not, which is not, yeah.

I took some notes because

There's a lot of information in

this paper is very impressive.

like I said, like the stats are so interesting and compelling

because you can take-- you can go down multiple rabbit holes.

You can look at what the take is on how the economy's doing, how, what's

gonna happen in commerce, what's happening in retail, what's happening,

in a lot of different aspects.

Yeah, if, if I had printed the report, it would've been

filled with yellow highlighter.

Exactly.

Exactly.

So in part one when we-- of the series when we talked about that hiring process

and what's happening there, we hinted at this, but w- Chad, w-where would you

say is technology delivering the, the clearest wins for restaurants right now?

Is it in that hiring process, or are there other areas around

staffing, retention, so forth, where there's a lot of wins to be had?

We've, we talked in earlier segments about the turnover rate, right?

A hundred and twenty-two percent is the average.

We-- But what we didn't talk about is just how many people, how easy

it is to apply for jobs, right?

Not only is it easier, technology make it easier for, for employers to

hire, it's also very easy to apply for just a ton of positions, right?

And so there's a lot of competition out there when it comes to finding

workers and speeding up that process.

There was a stat that we did in, in the first paper we wrote that the,

that the typical person applies to at least fifteen jobs, right?

And that, that's pro- again, very easy to apply for jobs using technology.

And you want to get that person fast, right?

Because the last thing you want is, uh, I, I take my time and, and

they're already across the street

yeah, exactly.

Yeah, they take somebody else's offer

you want to speed that process up, but you're also

dealing with the sheer, the sheer volume of resumes coming your way

and applications coming your way.

And so that could take hours or days of time for managers, right?

And so what, I think what technology has done is it's sped

up that process, but it's also made it easier for, for managers.

And that the bottom line is you hired managers to run the restaurant, right?

and it-- the more time they're taking in processing resumes, interviewing,

that's less time that they're doing to running their restaurant.

So I think technology has sped that up.

So I think in the first or second segment, we talked about how, manually processing

all of this could take weeks, right?

And we've seen examples for where operators, from the time you post that

position to actually hiring them is, is a matter of just a few days, right?

And so that speeds up.

You eliminate some of that understaffing.

But it also, I think, think of how people apply for jobs, right?

I, You might be applying and maybe you're working all day long, and you're

applying after the kids go to bed, right?

So you're applying at one, two, three in the morning or whenever you go to bed.

There's not normally a a manager processing that.

But you could have, using technology, some type of a chatbot

or something that would s- maybe ask you a set of questions, right?

that again, they're not really doing major screening, but maybe just

making sure that you really are up-- qualified to apply for this role.

And then, it, it might even set up, a-an interview for you, right?

So you're already, already knows the manager's schedule, and you sim-simply can

place yourself on that person's calendar.

And you, you still have the human touch, right?

A manager is still looking at the application.

A manager is still doing the hiring, but you've… using technology to

help that process along to, to meet, possible employees where they are.

And I think that's a large part of why that has helped

Yeah.

Yeah.

What, what about in areas like, 'cause you, you mentioned, we keep coming

back to this theme that, hospitality, it's fundamentally high touch.

So yes, you, you can benefit from technology and things like the

hiring process, and that's amazing.

You can cut the time down from weeks to a few days.

What about in areas like, once you've hired someone, you're onboarding

them, there's training, 'cause ultimately you want that person

out on the restaurant floor, right?

So are, is, is technology helping you do those processes

faster, get more efficiency without losing this human touch?

You still have a little bit of human touch in the interview

process, and I think at the end of the day, you also wanna make sure that

that person that's interviewing for your job fits into the culture, right?

And they're a great fit, right?

And you've c- you've clearly sold them on what are the expectations,

and they're gonna match.

Once, once that has… That decision's been made, right?

you can have your… And I did this even for this job, right?

You, you do a lot of the paperwork using technology before you ever start, right?

You might have some additional resources about the company or,

about the overall operations that can, can give you some guides.

So that orientation or onboarding process, some of that uses

a little bit of technology.

And I think even after the hire, even after that, I think you're seeing a

lot of, of communication tools that, can, maybe do some surveying or ask

you after a few weeks, "How's it going? Is there things we can improve

on?" So there's ways that you can use technology to make sure that you can

help that retention conversation as well.

so I think all of those things matter.

Maybe there's videos, right?

that they can watch, right?

To show them some of the operations.

And so there's a lot of th- a lot of ways that you can use

technology in that process from interview to actually starting.

Yeah.

Yeah

We-- in, in retail we talk a lot about customer

service, customer support.

They g- often are used, interchangeably, and I don't believe customer

support and customer service are the very thing, th- very same thing.

And customer experience can be good or bad.

Oh, yeah.

yeah

I think it is interesting, like 80% of people who like open up

a chat company or a business, they're not coming there to have a good time.

They're frustrated already.

Where in the restaurant industry, everybody's walking through

that door to have a good time.

Yeah.

Yeah

And that's something that, not necessarily gonna be that,

that, that welcome that, that keeps them on the, the journey to have a good

time, to get that customer experience at the end that your, your goal is.

There's that push and pull between we're in the hospitality

business, but we wanna have some technology that makes us more efficient

and productive and hopefully people happy.

And so you have to find what is, what is that line for you, right?

If you're a high-touch, fancy restaurant, you wanna make sure that

y- yes, you can use some technology maybe to help with throughput and

maybe some other a- aspects, but you can't forget why people are coming in.

Other occasions, again, I, I gave an example I think in the first, in the

first segment where I, I'm going to lunch, I'm ordering on the app, I'm going in.

It's a ghost kitchen essentially, right?

I don't really need as much, high touch, in that moment.

And so finding what kind of an occasion, why are people coming to you, and what

kind of technology do they need, right?

And so there is that push and pull I think sometimes, in how much technology

is the right amount of technology that you don't lose that overall experience.

Yeah.

The report flags that leaders have to watch how employees receive these tools.

so technology complements the work rather than diminishes it or displaces it.

What separates the operators who get that balance right?

They listen to their-- They-- You have to

listen to your employees, right?

I, I think I s- I talked a lot about this in the retention segment.

Communication is key, right?

Knowing, knowing your employees, knowing what, what their strengths and

weaknesses are, and making sure that there's buy-in is, is, is key to that.

I think the other part of it is communicating, going back

to your very first question, why are you doing this, right?

Because there is gonna be that fear that, "Hey, they're just doing

this so they can eliminate my job," or they're doing whatever else.

And if you-- when you explain it in the right way to say, "We're

implementing this technology to hopefully make you more productive," right?

To help you, right?

To, to make the overall customer experience more pleasant, right?

That I think it-- when you see that rationale and it's communicated in the

right way, it's not something that's a negative, it can be a positive.

And so I think it all comes down to how are you communicating it

and making sure the employees get that buy-in, as much as possible.

new technology is more, is adding more work initially

to reduce work in the long run.

And with quick turnovers, I'm sure that that, that narrative is, is a challenge.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And I think, the other part of it is when you have a lot of

technology, that also might change how you're orienting people, right?

And so that training process might be for the new technology, or you

might need to be reskilling some of your current workers, o-on it.

So training and development might change as well as part

of that, that overall process.

Yeah.

No, that's true.

That's true.

So if we tie the whole series together, all, all three parts here, we started

out with a, a cooling labor market.

we, we talked about the cost of being short-staffed, and then there's the,

the challenge of keeping the people.

I, I keep sticking, coming back in my head, and you mentioned

the 122% annual turnover.

It's just amazing.

And, and now we've looked at, the, the technology aspect and how are the

right ways to lean on the technology to help enhance, make things more

efficient and productive, but not from a perspective of replacing anyone.

what would you say is the big takeaway for operators heading

into the back half of 2026 from everything that we've talked about?

The good news that I think, we, and we talked a little bit about

this in the first segment, the labor market has been pretty resilient, right?

And so that doesn't mean we aren't facing economic challenges, but

that, that's a good sign, right?

If you're a restaurant operator, you, you, you want a labor

market that's solid, right?

Because people who have jobs, who are getting solid wages

are going out to eat , right?

and, and it, and it also, quite frankly, when the job market is

good, you might start seeing people starting to look around, right?

So it also might help, maybe not good for you if you're losing a worker, but

it's good that means you've increased the overall pool of people who are applying.

And so that, that, those are all positives of things that could happen,

at, at, at, at the end of this year.

As we learned earlier, understaffing is gonna be a challenge regardless, right?

And so finding some ways that you can, whatever that overall economic environment

the second half of this year ends up being, that you can staff, appropriately

and, and quickly and, and, and make sure you get the right people in the

door is gonna be, is gonna be key.

Thank you, Chad, for an incredible series.

I'm loving these discussions.

We went from labor market challenges to all the cost operators

need to think about, for short staffing, hiring, retention, and

how tech can help or hurt you.

I hope our audience has been enjoying the conversation as much

as I am, but I loved the stats.

You guys got to download the report.

Oh, there is so

be in there for half the afternoon

Yeah.

Oh,

absolutely

you are, you are an economist and, and maybe

you didn't know it, I guess.

Maybe

There you go.

There you go.

Yeah, and I, I keep coming back to, what, what I'm gonna, think of it

as one of our big takeaways that, hospitality is a people business, right?

That, that human side is what drives success for every operator, and

technology, automation, all these things are great at augmenting

capabilities, but they're not really designed to replace that human touch.

It's still a people-first industry, and I think that's

what, that's what makes it work.

Well said

Yeah.

So Chet, if anyone wants to get, more information, I think, like Casey's

super enthusiastic about the data in the report because she's our resident

data junkie, an economist at heart.

Where, where would you tell people to go if they wanna really dig

into the report and learn more?

You can go to the National Restaurant Association's website,

which is www.restaurant.org, or you can always go to LinkedIn and Twitter,

either on the NRA's page or myself

All right, great

Amazing.

And we'll also include it to our show notes, and have links to that report.

such a pleasure, and we'll be looking forward to having

you back in the near future.

That sounds fun.

I've enjoyed it

We're a wrap

All right

Great

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For transcripts and guest info, visit retailrazor.com.

I'm Ricardo Belmar.

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