There continue to be workforce gaps in Northwest Arkansas as the population continues to increase. We've discussed health care, construction and tech job gaps on this program. Well, there's another: restaurants.
One restaurant insider in Northwest Arkansas estimates there are as many as 3,500 restaurant positions available in the region. And chefs will tell you that a Friday night rush in the kitchen is not an ideal place to not have enough experience or institutional knowledge.
“There's chaos, certainly.”
Chef Rafael Rios is a five-time James Beard nominee and founder of restaurants like Yeyo's. He says there is a comprehensive level of understanding needed in a kitchen.
"To know dietary restrictions, to know what it means to take care of someone that has allergies, to know and execute those tasks, knowing what the background of those kind of things are."
It's a challenging formula. There aren't enough people to fill the restaurant jobs here, and those vacancies are best filled by people with some food service knowledge or experience.
A new program at Brightwater: A Center for the Study of Food in Bentonville, a division of NorthWest Arkansas Community College, is intended to help fill the gaps. B Workforce is intended to give people interested in the food service industry the skills needed. Chef Marshall Shafkowitz, executive director at Brightwater, says the program is for people with a little experience or none at all.
"This is going to set them up to step into the plethora of restaurants we have in Northwest Arkansas and be productive from day one. So what we're trying to do is help chefs like Rafael and Jeremy, and I could list a number of chefs all across the region, with finding staff that can come in and be productive immediately. So chefs can have a more efficient system of bringing staff into their kitchens."
Chef Marshall says that means B Workforce covers so many basics, from proper knife technique to terminology, to the professionalism required in a kitchen.
"How do we talk to each other when we're walking with something hot? It's not the constant reminder, hot behind you or hot behind it. They know that walking in the door. So now it's teaching your menu. It's teaching how you want them to work in your operation and not those foundational skills."
Supported by a grant from the Walton Family Foundation, the program involves eight weeks of instruction from those foundational skills, as well as cooking methods for vegetables, protein, stocks, soup and basics of baking and bread making. Registration free. Chef Marshall says the 120 hours of instruction are informed by local chefs.
"We had a small advisory board that were individuals who are running hotel kitchens, self-operated kitchens like Rafael, corporate kitchens from our chain restaurants and some of our national partners. We asked input from them. And beyond that, we went to something called the Catalyst Kitchen Network, which is a network of training programs across the United States, and asked them, are we on the right path with what entry level, anyone in an entry level position needs from a skill set?
"And what was interesting is it's not just the fundamental skills, those foundational pieces. It's what Rafael was mentioning. And we built into the program learning the structure of a kitchen. Very important. Who's who, what is a CDC? What's the executive chef, all these new bits of terminology. We brought that into the program where I wouldn't have thought that was an important part unless Rafael or Matt McClure when he was here, because he was one of the chefs we had in the program, told me, hey, no, you need to go into the finite detail of what is the position title and what does that mean in a kitchen."
Classes will be taught by chefs like Simon Brown. He's the chef at Turnbuckle Farm in Bentonville. And Julie Wahl, adjunct chef instructor at Brightwater.
Chef Rafael says he thinks the B Workforce program is about more than stabilizing the current restaurant workforce. He thinks it's about helping create the next generation of chefs and restaurateurs who will create their own vision for eateries in the future.
"Then it allows them to start setting goals for themselves. So it's like, okay, I'm going to start here, but I'm going to make my way up to the top somehow because this is what I want to do. This is what I love. Or this is what I'm developing really true love for. So this is also going to be a way of mentoring these individuals to develop really like true love for the industry. And I think that's a critical part of this training, when they get those foundations, to develop them, not just put them back on the workforce, but to develop love for it."
There is more to this opportunity to build a career in the restaurant world than just the number of jobs available in Northwest Arkansas. Chef Marshall Shafkowitz says this program has no bar to participation, no registration cost, no previous experience required.
"So if you're coming out of incarceration, you're coming out of the military. You never had a job. If you're 18 years old, you can come in."
Again, Chef Rafael Rios.
"It's important to have their backs and for them to feel like there's an opportunity for a second chance, regardless of their backgrounds and stuff like that. So I think that's important."
Chef Marshall says he thinks it's a wonderful opportunity, but says it's not easy. It's 120 hours worth of training, three days a week, from 7 to noon. It's a commitment, he says.
"And it's the commitment to wanting to better oneself with the ultimate goal of finding employment. And that's really where we want to help change that, change life for that individual. But we also have a duty, being food studies program and part of the community college. I mean, that's part of the mission of NorthWest Arkansas Community College is to give people the opportunity to change their lives. Well, this program does that."
More information about the B Workforce program and other opportunities for students in community at Brightwater can be found at brightwater.nwacc.edu.
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