Developing a framework for understanding the impact of deskilling and standardisation on the turnover and attrition of chefs

The occupation of cookery has been identified as one sharing a shortage of skilled employees. While the trade attracts moderate numbers of new recruits, the attrition or wastage rate, either before completion of an apprenticeship or soon after, is high. While chefs share many of the traditionally perceived poor working conditions of their hospitality colleagues, well documented in the literature, this paper presents an alternative explanation for their high mobility. It will be argued that labour mobility and attrition rates partly result from deskilling and standardisation. These are often consequences of technological applications in the kitchen, business operators seeking outsourced means of production and the controlled production of menus and recipes. This paper will examine the processes of deskilling and standardisation in the contemporary professional kitchen and their relationship with labour mobility, primarily through intention of labour turnover models. Particular attention will be given to occupational communities in this relationship, since it is widely accepted that creativity and skill are defining features of chefs’ occupational culture. Finally, a model will be proposed that reconciles the unique occupational experiences of chefs with generic, and hospitality specific, intention of labour turnover models.