Skills
Restaurant Host Skills & Tools
The technical skills, people skills and tools employers look for in restaurant hosts, and how to build and show them.
What skills do restaurant hosts need?
Restaurant Hosts need technical skills such as reservation systems, waitlist management, and seating rotation, plus people skills like friendliness and calm. They also use tools such as OpenTable or Resy and Waitlist apps.
Technical (hard) skills
- Reservation systems
- Waitlist management
- Seating rotation
- Phone etiquette
- Takeout handling
- Floor plan knowledge
People (soft) skills
- Friendliness
- Calm
- Organization
- Communication
Tools, equipment and technology
- OpenTable or Resy
- Waitlist apps
- Phones
- Menus
- Pagers
- Seating charts
Skills in action: common tasks
These step-by-step guides show how restaurant hosts put their skills to work:
- How to quote an honest wait time
- How to balance servers with seating rotation
- How to calm a guest upset about the wait
How to show these skills on a resume
- Lead your skills section with the technical skills from the job posting, for example, “Reservation systems” and “Waitlist management.”
- Prove soft skills with results: instead of listing “friendliness,” describe a situation where you used it.
- List credentials such as Hospitality training near the top, with the issuing organization and date.
- Use the employer’s vocabulary. Our restaurant host glossary covers the terms hiring managers expect.
How to build these skills
Formal training, supervised practice and certification are the most direct routes. Our Restaurant Host training introduces each of these skills with plain-language lessons, procedures and a final knowledge check: a strong foundation before hands-on training or your first day.