Server: What is the cost of hiring?

What is a restaurant server?

A restaurant server is a hospitality professional responsible for welcoming guests, taking food and drink orders, serving meals and ensuring customer satisfaction throughout the dining experience. They act as the primary point of contact between the guest and the kitchen or bar staff, helping to create a smooth and enjoyable service experience.

Why hire a restaurant server?

Restaurant servers play a critical role in creating memorable guest experiences and driving repeat business. Hiring a skilled server is essential if your restaurant needs consistent customer service, accurate order handling or stronger upselling of menu items. Signs that you may need to hire include longer wait times for guests, complaints about service quality or high staff turnover that affects dining satisfaction.

Contributions of a great restaurant server:

• delivering excellent customer service and hospitality
• ensuring accurate and timely order taking and delivery
• promoting specials and upselling food and beverage items
• resolving guest issues with professionalism and care

Defining your hiring needs for a restaurant server

Start by evaluating your restaurant’s service style, hours of operation and customer traffic patterns. Determine whether you require full-time servers, part-time staff or seasonal hires. Select the appropriate title, such as server, food and beverage server or banquet server, and budget for competitive wages and tips. Compare related roles, like host/hostess or bartender, to ensure you’re recruiting for the correct position.

What are the types of restaurant servers?

Restaurant servers may specialize in different service environments or adapt to various dining formats depending on your establishment’s needs.

Common types of restaurant servers include:

• casual dining server: works in family-style or mid-range restaurants, focusing on quick service and friendly interactions
• fine dining server: provides high-end service with detailed menu knowledge, wine pairing suggestions, and formal etiquette
• banquet server: serves large groups at catered events, weddings, or conferences, often handling preset menus and timed service
• buffet server: assists with restocking buffet stations, clearing tables, and helping guests with food selections
• room service server: delivers meals directly to hotel guests’ rooms, ensuring accuracy and discretion

When writing your restaurant server job description, consider including some or all of the following keywords to improve the visibility of your job posting. These are the most popular search terms leading to clicks on restaurant server jobs, according to Indeed data:

• server
• restaurant
• waitress
• restaurant server
• waiter
• breakfast server
• food service
• barista
• serving
• hotel

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Where to find restaurant servers?

You can find restaurant servers across Canada by connecting with hospitality schools, attending job fairs and networking within the restaurant industry. Consider recruiting from nearby colleges, culinary programs or promoting internally from host or busser roles.

To find the right restaurant server for your business, consider trying out a few different recruiting strategies:

• Hospitality schools and colleges: Programs like George Brown College or SAIT offer strong pipelines of hospitality-trained candidates.
• Job boards and associations: Organizations like Restaurants Canada provide job boards and career resources.
• Community job fairs: Local hiring events often attract enthusiastic candidates seeking part-time or entry-level roles.
• Internal promotions: Bussers, hosts or barbacks with a proven work ethic may be ready to move into serving roles.
• Adjacent industries: Candidates with retail or customer service experience often adapt well to restaurant service.
• Post your job online: Try posting your restaurant server job on Indeed to find and attract quality restaurant server candidates.

Skills to look for in a restaurant server

A successful restaurant server candidate will typically have the following skills and competencies, which may be gained through a variety of experiences, training, or education:

• strong customer service and interpersonal skills
• ability to multitask in fast-paced environments
• knowledge of food safety and handling standards
• cash handling or POS system experience
• problem-solving and conflict resolution skills
• teamwork and communication with the kitchen and bar staff
• professionalism and a positive attitude under pressure

Writing a restaurant server job description

Now that you know the key skills, salary expectations, popular job-seeker search terms and hiring insights for a restaurant server, you’re ready to write a job description.

A restaurant server job description typically includes a compelling summary of the role, a detailed list of duties and responsibilities, and the required and preferred skills for the position. You may also want to include information about your company culture, benefits and perks to attract candidates to your open role.

Ready to get started? See our full guide for writing restaurant server job descriptions.