Hospitality Job Board

A hospitality job board should do more than provide a place to post a position and collect applications. Mis en Place syndicates job posts for independent restaurants every day, and I’ve helped design and build technology to strengthen the limited structure that job boards provide.

Posting a job is easy. However, managing everything that happens after that? Not so much. Technology has changed how candidates search, compare opportunities, apply, and communicate with employers, which I explored in Technology Changed Hiring.

Meanwhile, employers need to review applicants, determine who may be a fit, communicate with candidates, schedule interviews, keep track of where people are in the process, and make sure promising applicants don’t get lost along the way.

Too much of that work happens outside the job board or depends on systems employers build themselves, often from their cell phones, because time is a serious commodity most don’t have.

As we build and prepare to launch the Mis en Place Job Board, our vision extends far beyond another place where employers can post a position and spend a ton of money. You’re gonna love our freemium plan and pricing.

My focus is, and will remain, on improving the features and structure that make the hiring process easier to manage. This isn’t a one-and-done, build-it-and-walk-away project.

Because this is for the industry, I don’t want to build it around my recruiting experience alone. I recently asked restaurant job seekers what they want from a job board. Employers deserve the same opportunity to tell us what would make the process work better from their side.

I want to know what restaurant and hospitality employers need from a job board.

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What Should a Hospitality Job Board Make Easier?

Besides storing applications and costing a fortune, I want it to give employers enough structure to manage what happens after someone applies, including a built-in applicant tracking system (ATS). Job boards don’t need to be so expensive.

When I recruit for a position, I need to know which applicants I’ve reviewed, who I want to contact, who I’ve contacted, who responded, who is scheduled for an interview, and where each candidate stands in the process.

Keeping that information in a separate spreadsheet, notes on a cell phone, or relying on memory makes the hiring process almost impossible to track.

At the same time, I want it to provide employers with the ability to move an applicant forward, contact them, schedule an interview, and know what happens next without creating another separate process around the job board.

For an independent restaurant with or without a dedicated HR department, that structure matters. That structure starts before applications arrive. Our Restaurant Job Post Checklist outlines the information employers should define before a position goes live.

The question is how much of the hiring process should a hospitality job board help you manage?

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If You Had 3 Wishes…

Your hiring process may uncover problems I haven’t encountered. Building something for the industry requires input from the industry.

Seriously, almost every restaurant owner I’ve ever spoken with has complained about the job boards they use.

Fingers crossed this doesn’t trigger job board PTSD, but I want you to think about the job boards you use to hire:

• What are you doing manually that you want your job board to do?
• Do you use an app, spreadsheet, scheduler, or designated email or system to help?
• What is the biggest time suck?
• What feature is missing?
• What is difficult to organize or track?
• Do you wish you could do more from your phone besides make coffee?
• What are you paying for that doesn’t make hiring easier?

So, if I gave you three wishes:

What three things would you change about the job board you use?

Those are the wishes I want to know about.

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Modifications Wanted

The plan is for the Mis en Place Job Board to keep evolving after it launches. The features we start with aren’t the end of what we can build. Hiring isn’t static. Our recipe isn’t either.

We’re working to improve the hiring process for job seekers and employers and, in our own way, make the hospitality industry a better place to work. Hiring remains one of the industry’s significant challenges: Toast’s 2026 Voice of the Restaurant Industry Survey found hiring was the second-most-cited challenge among the restaurant operators it surveyed.

True, your three wishes might be something we’ve already considered or are working on. But they also might be something we haven’t thought of yet. That’s exactly why I’m asking.

Tell me what would make hiring easier for you and what you wish your current job board did better. Your feedback will help shape what we modify, improve, or build next.

Leave your three wishes here or email me directly at [email protected].