Last week in Chicago I placed a sous at $78k because his portfolio opened with a costed tasting menu, yield tests, and two 20-second plating clips; hiring teams give you about 90 seconds, so front-load the strongest work and bring a clean comp sheet to anchor your ask. What else are you adding to consistently push a 5–12% bump — recent P&L wins, food cost per cover, or vendor renegotiations?
Been getting 8–12% by leading with a one-page ‘90-day plan’ and one before/after: took prime cost from 60.9% to 55.7% in 7 weeks at a 140-cover brasserie, plus a 20-sec expo clip to show ticket flow — think trailer, not full movie. Small caveat: keep it to two numbers you can defend with a clean comp sheet, or you’ll spend the interview defending spreadsheets instead of your food.
I open with a 2-week waste log chart — ‘90 seconds’ loves visuals; include SKU-level notes.