Filling hourly and managerial unit slots is a constant duty in a difficult labor market. Yet given the growing demands for workers from other industries, particularly health care, which will need twice as many workers as restaurants by 2016, employment experts warn that restaurant executives must grasp the necessity of a long-term view toward identifying tomorrow's employees and planning strategies to attract them.

The battle for workers is already on. “Applebee's casts a wide net when it comes to searching existing labor pools in order to find the type of top-line people we want to serve our guests,” says Vice President of Human Resources John Prutsman. “The fact there isn't one 'magic' pool or source to rely on is our biggest challenge.”

So where will restaurant employees come from?

Many operators are counting on Millennials, the 11- to 29-year-olds who make up about 23 percent of the population. “This is the largest and most ethnically diverse generation in U.S. history,” marvels Red Lobster President Kim Lopdrup, citing parent Darden Restaurants research that shows the group will make up the bulk of restaurant employees in the coming years.

Other industries intend to grab these workers, too. “A migration of talent from foodservice to retail, grocery, banking and health care is occurring as those industries actively recruit our best and brightest,” warns The People Report, a Dallas-based consultancy specializing in human resources, in its “2006 Workforce Report.” In its current Workforce Index, a quarterly comparison of leading employment measures, no restaurant company reported an increase in the ability to recruit hourly employees and only a handful acknowledged finding more candidates to fill managerial slots.

Stay-at-home moms are a group worth watching because their numbers may be growing. The Bureau of Labor Statistics show the number of women entering the work force dipped about 1 percent in 2003 and has yet to rise.

Last year a Pew Research Center study showed mothers working full time gave themselves slightly lower ratings as parents, on average, than did at-home mothers or mothers employed part time. When Pew researchers asked mothers with children under 18 what working situation would be ideal for them, six out of 10 said part-time work; just one in five said full-time.

Chris Muller, director of the Center for Multi-Unit Restaurant Management at the University of Central Florida, encourages operators to recruit such women because they are likely to be well-educated and already your customer, especially in the bakery-cafe segment. He advises posting ads in school newsletters and using social-networking sites like Facebook and MySpace to attract them. “Tell them they can write their own schedules, work three days a week and still see all their friends,” Muller says.

Retiring baby boomers have attracted recent attention as a promising labor source. Their numbers are huge. The U.S. Census Bureau predicts that by 2010, people aged 55 or older will make up approximately 25 percent of the U.S. population, and by 2050, their portion will grow to 32 percent.

Their attraction is obvious: Many baby boomers have supervisory and financial skills and may want to delay collecting their Social Security payments given increased longevity. Yet experts caution that managers could find it difficult to cope with such experienced workers at the restaurant level and above.

After President George H.W. Bush signed the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990, many chains—especially fast-feeders—began hiring mentally and physically disabled workers to fill the labor gap left by baby boomers. Since then, the disabled population, now estimated to number some 50 million people, has become an important pool for restaurants to draw from.

Experts predict the disabled population will double by 2030, good news for labor-strapped operators who can comply with the ADA rules. Yet challenges remain, including greater enforcement of the aforementioned rules.

Another group is coming to the fore: ex-offenders. Some 2.3 million criminals are now behind bars in the United States, the most of any country, according to the International Center for Prison Studies at King's College in London. Many are nonviolent substance abusers locked up because of strict federal and state drug laws. According to Multicultural Foodservice & Hospitality Alliance President Gerry Fernandez, ex-offenders are a viable labor pool for restaurants, if a controversial one. “I'm aware of several [chains] that have programs to hire ex-offenders, though they do not want publicity,” he claims. “Who do you think works third shift, where they don't come in contact with customers?”

Immigration reform could also ease future hiring shortages. So far Congress hasn't agreed on solutions to this complicated and controversial issue. Nonetheless, immigrants—documented or otherwise—remain a fertile source for restaurants. Au Bon Pain, for example, employs 24 nationalities. Says Vice President of Human Resources Susie Gorsline: “We expect that will continue.”