line cook

restaurant manager

restaurant general manager

kitchen team member

kitchen manager

Joes Crab Shack

Overall Rating: Would Not Recommend (under current leadership insights training group)

I truly believe that Job Corps in Cincinnati has the potential to flourish again under a different contractor, as other centers have successfully done. Unfortunately, my experience was heavily impacted by ongoing leadership and organizational issues.

There appeared to be significant conflicts of interest within corporate and center leadership. Human Resources positions were repeatedly left vacant due to concerns surrounding professionalism and pressure from upper management. I witnessed multiple HR manager and multiple assistants, managers, and leaders resign because of the unmanageable workload, lack of communication, and inadequate preparation provided to both employees and students.

One of the biggest challenges was the constant turnover. Although I loved my position, I was frequently pulled into supporting other departments because of staffing shortages. Training was minimal and primarily consisted of PowerPoint presentations. There were frequent, unplanned meetings—often lasting hours—which took time away from completing assigned responsibilities. Employees were then questioned about unfinished work despite the lack of proper training, support, and time management from leadership.

Success often depended entirely on whether your direct supervisor had an approachable and supportive leadership style.

The most difficult aspect of my experience was witnessing the treatment of students. There seemed to be pressure to increase enrollment without adequately assessing whether the program environment was truly appropriate for each young adult. I feel this will have a great effect on the students as a whole. Many caring and dedicated employees left because they became burned out and felt unheard. Accountability from management was always often lacking.

The best part of my job was the students. Being able to genuinely help young people, encourage them, and make a difference in their lives was incredibly rewarding and meaningful.

Unfortunately, this became one of the most mentally exhausting positions I have ever held in my 20 years of working non profit. It wasn’t the at risk youth either. Employees well-being, including the use of FMLA, PTO,  often felt discouraged rather than supported. 

I sincerely hope for future changes in leadership and contracting to bring positive transformation to the Cincinnati center because the students deserve a stable, supportive environment, and so do the employees who dedicate themselves to serving them. Until significant organizational changes occur, I fear that both employees and the vulnerable young adults this program aims to help will continue to experience the consequences of ineffective leadership and systemic shortcomings. The mission of Job Corps is too important for students to be placed in an environment that is not adequately supported.

In general, Joe's Crab shack is an excellent restaurant, and a very enjoyable place to work. The core values of the company are respectable and there is opportunity for advancement within the company. However, through transfers and observation, I discovered that, although the policies are well know and highly advertised, certain managerial staff were not acceptable role models, and the work moral of the staff showed to be low and underachieving in some cases. When I first began working for the company, I was very excited and full of high expectations. The company has a reputation for excellence and it shows in most cities. The staff are comprised of friendly, responsible, hard working, culturally diverse, unique individuals, from the kitchen crew to the management, and everyone in between. A typical day at work would be busy and fast paced, due to high customer volume. The most enjoyable part of my job was the teamwork and pride that came with daily events. Customers would regularly give members and management praise for a job well done, and leave happy. There were also many returning customers, as well as customers who came for the first time because our store was recommended. The hardest part of my job was coming to the realization that just because one store location displays all of the right qualities and practices, every store will not be the same. Some locations get little or know business at all, and some employees do not display the same level of excellence expressed in the company handbook.  I worked for three locations in three different states with the hopes learning all of the functions of the company and one day being a general manager myself. Although my first two stores gave me all of the skills, training, and confidence I needed to succeed in this endeavor, my third and final location gave me the exact opposite. It seemed as though no one there had the same high moral and pride for their jobs, including the management team. My coworkers were no longer full of pride and displaying teamwork, instead, everyone did there own thing and let the chips fall where they may. Despite my efforts and enthusiasm, I eventually parted ways with the company because I was unable to find the same spark in my new store as I had in my others.

The pay for a host is great. I averaged about $800 per paycheck working 30ish hours per week because of tip share. Management plays favorites and experienced employees are not too kind to newbies. Hosting is incredibly difficult and stressful on busy nights (Friday’s and Saturday’s) but quite relaxed on weekdays. They tell you when to show up but you have no idea what time you get to leave until manager tells you to go home. Sometimes I would show up at noon and get sent home at 1:30pm, other times I would show up at noon and not get sent home till 10pm. The food there was amazing and the employee discounts were fantastic (total cost of $60 for me and 4 friends). In order to move up from host to server you have to sell 5 rewards memberships, and even then they make you wait for months before moving you up. Left for several reasons. The commute was too far and I was tired of waiting to become a server after selling 20 plus memberships in my first few weeks and not getting moved up to server after 5ish months. Also I am in college and they would schedule me or keep me past my availability.  Work/life balance is horrible because you never know how long your shifts will be. If you aren’t in school and don’t have any other commitments then this is a great job for you. If you are in school or have kids/family then this job will not be good for you. Otherwise the pay is great for an entry level host position.

I have been an employee for years and feel that I have given this place a good run and have the experience to speak on this establishment.
Expect to either work hard and never get appreciated for the work you do or slack off miserably while you watch the very few servers do their job and yours for you. Management has let this restaurant slowly deteriorate. In the past there were many servers and host who helped each other and we all made money. Now there are servers who don't even know their basic jobs and can't be expected to pull their weight. When it comes to advancement the general manager would rather advance people based on favoritism and not work ethic. I know of a few employees who were actually good workers who expressed their interest to advance on multiple occasions and were never promoted. Some ended up finding new jobs. On top of everything else there are too many servers on the floor at one time most of the time. It's hard to make money off of only a few tables because we have to split 20 tables between 12 or 13 servers. To the restaurants defense I understand why there are soooo many servers. They feel like any less than that we would not be able to take care of our tables but in all honesty that's only half true. If management spent more time hiring competent HARD WORKING people they wouldn't need so many on the floor because those people would be able to make decent money while helping each other.

Overall I enjoyed my time working at Joe's Crab Shack. The pros: usually good tips. Averaged at least a hundred a night. Enjoyed wearing jeans and a t-shirt as my uniform. Co-workers were easy to get along with. Management was helpful (for the most part). Customers were all typically in good spirits (a lot of birthday celebrations so get used to singing the birthday song.) 50% discount on food for you and up to 5 guests (but you have to buy in, 9 a month comes out of your paycheck, but it was worth it.) No late nights (closed by 11 on weekends). The cons: Doubles were often 10 to 12 hour shifts, and not always worth the money (I often made what I would when I was doubling whenever I had a night-only shift.). It could get busy quickly, making it difficult to keep up with your own side-work. If that was not the case, then you'd find yourself doing other people's side work (either they were too busy or just plain lazy). Some petty gossip but that is typical of any job I suppose. They never put a wait on the door (which they should have) so being double or triple sat was typical when the rush happened, and it made it difficult to give the best service possible. With up to 5-6 hosts on a busy night, I found it ridiculous when I was not told I had been sat (and I was always busy taking care of other customers when this happened) so you have to pay close attention to your section. 

I would recommend Joe's for anyone who is interested in making money, who appreciates an often fast-paced and sometimes stressful environment.

The starting pay for a prep/line cook wis nice at $12 w/ less than a year experience. Joe's gives some pretty hefty raises compared to many other companies I've worked at or heard of (.25-$1 per year). The Joe's I work at has "performance based scheduling", which means if you start slacking off, you stop getting hours pretty quickly. This works out very well for me due to my highly motivated personality and great work ethic in general. I get overtime hours roughly 2/5 weeks (averaged 38 hours/week), but this will suck if you are a slacker or low motivated person, your hours will get cut super quick.

The GM was awesome, I'd marry her if she would let me. I get a lot of special treatment by management, again because I work very hard, and put a lot of effort into improving workplace efficiency. I'm currently the top pick for an open culinary expert (kitchen shift lead) position, but I've only been here for 3 months so I need more development and training before they can give me a leadership position. On that note, the advancement definitely will happen if you show that you are capable. 

Overall, a fun place to work with generally friendly staff. It's soured by a few bad apples in both FOH and BOH, but management assures me that they will be gone once we get new enough new hires to restaff the place.

•Greet all guests immediately and arrange for beverage order within one minute
•Gathered marketing information by asking every customer how they heard about the restaurant
•Suggestive selling, and up selling techniques are used to improve average sales by 18%
•Ensure that all orders taken are written down and read back to the guest.
•Prepare and deliver all beverages in a timely manor and make wine recommendations
•Responsible for running food to tables, doing quality checks on presentation and preparation
•Gather customer feedback with specific questions about how the dish was prepared, taste, etc.
•Present feature dishes, making recommendations on soups, salads, entrees, etc.
•Always keeping busy with stocking items like rollups, pockets, polish cutlery, or setting up the brunch or buffet.
•Ensured accurate cash handling and room post procedures are followed.
•Enter all orders accurately and ensure vouchers and coupons handed in with cash outs and clearing tables and reset them during shift.
•Assist in refilling and maintaining cleanliness standards for breakfast buffet of brunch.
•Thank the guest as they are leaving and ask them how there meal was with direct questions about the food and service.
•Escalate customer complaints quickly to the Restaurant Manager

Typical Day:  Rather standard restaurant duties- line checks, safe counts, rosters, etc.  Lots of electronic resources to speed things up.  Which is good- there's lots of checklists too!  

I've Learned:  Pretty much... Everything.  I originally started as a host (greeter).  Every position is achievable for those with work ethic and critical thinking skills.  The transition from completely FOH to the BOH manager had bumps, but there were lots of good resources to fall back on.  Financials, contracts, budgeting, etc. were the much easier parts to learn.

Management:  Upper management is excellent.  VP is a class act all around, DO is a great resource.  Store level management isn't always on the same page; staff struggles with (sometimes vastly) different expectation levels.

Workplace Culture: In flux.

Hardest Part of the Job:  Staffing.  It's extremely difficult to get quality candidates to apply.  This has led to some less than optimal hires and frustrations on multiple levels.

Most Enjoyable Part:  Some of the staff there are the best employees I've ever worked with, whether is be skill levels, attitude or general competence.

This place had the best employees and managers I've had the pleasure to work with. It's now been closed down and turned into another restaurant due to Franchise's choice. The management knew how to connect with their employees on a level I've still personally not seen in my work experience since. Management wen't even as far as to make a position for those who wanted to learn, even if there wasn't one to begin with. I learned to tend bar, because of this, and I have yet to see another employer give an employee that opportunity. The employees were probably the best part of this restaurant, they knew how to have a good time and create joy. If a bad day walked into this restaurant; employee or guests, it never ended up being a bad day. The hardest part of the job in fact, was the worst, yet most rewarding part; that bitter sweet Summer season, when the flow of the restaurant couldn't even be calculated to the hard pressed low flow of the winter seasons. The location is still there, but there's new management and the environment has changed after the re-opening.

management is all over the place, constantly bickering with each other which causes extreme disfunction. a specific manager will only stand by the bar well and yell at you for going into a door into the kitchen, other than that he won't do anything for you besides yell at you to bus your own tables that you are already paying someone else to clean up for you too. servers are given no respect and no trust, we needed a manager swipe for just about everything, and even then the managers would take forever to do anything. the average tip percentage is about 10% because the area is so ghetto and poor. families come in with 300 dollar tickets, don't tip and then the server is stuck tipping out a host 3% who stood there at the door  and a bartender who MAYBE poured a 1.25 oz drink for them. you also are required to sell 25 dollar Landrys cards and if you can't sell them, you are given less tables than other servers. I only recommend working here if you literally can not find a job anywhere else. i felt pressure from this job even when i wasn't there which is something that a SERVER should never feel outside of their work. horrible horrible horrible place to work at i wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy to come and work here.

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Line cook 2 salaries reported	$19.25 per hour
Restaurant manager 2 salaries reported	$87,500 per year
Restaurant general manager 4 salaries reported	$85,000 per year
Kitchen team member 8 salaries reported	$17.88 per hour
Kitchen manager 2 salaries reported	$63,750 per year

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