Hiring for hospitality's Great Reopening.

In my last post, I spoke in part about how hospitality workers might, off the back of Covid, be deciding to leave the industry. It seems only logical – and not too early, despite what some think – to prepare for a scaling up of workforce as we keep everything crossed for a gradual relaxation of restrictions in the spring or early summer.

There are three main challenges. The first one is not new; in that the hospitality sector seems locked into a talent war where many companies compete for a small pool of skilled or experienced workers. Whereas there may have been a pandemic-brokered cease-fire over the past year, this war will continue, due to inherent understaffing in the industry and upcoming new openings and expansion, undeterred by the events of 2020.

Connected to this is the perception of hospitality being an unattractive and insecure industry to work in. There is not much that can be done in the medium term other than for industry leaders and trade bodies to work to prove the naysayers wrong, but it would be morally and fundamentally wrong to assume that filling vacancies based on the desperation of long-term jobseekers is a solution, or even an adequate approach.

Finally, the B-word. Brexit, amongst all the other unnecessary hurdles it’s created, means the end to freedom of movement and is connected in no small part to the U.K.’s blanket ‘points-based’ immigration system.

So, what – seeing as we have this wonderfully perfect storm of events – can hospitality recruiters do to prepare?

Get a sponsorship license.

This one might be quite important if you intend to hire from overseas. Most European hospitality employees – which, last March made up around 40% of all workers in the sector – have received their Settled or Pre-settled statuses, but you can be sure that even if they are looking for work right now, they will not be on the job market for long. With uncertainty around the pickup of British nationals who are willing or able to fill vacancies, a license is nothing other than a necessity to leverage all hiring options available.

Get in there early.

Even if we are in the endgame of the pandemic, no-one knows for sure how it will pan out, or how long it will take. A likely scenario is that the combination of push factors leading hospitality workers to move, and a swift bounce back in trade (a hope and a prayer, not a certainty!) would mean that there could be a mad scramble for the best talent. Get budgeting, get planning, get advertising and get in there early.

To redesign or… redesign?

To be clear, you must redesign roles. Many elements of hospitality jobs have changed since last March. The renewed focus on hygiene and safety is obvious, but structures, reporting lines and organisational responsibilities may have changed too. In my hotel alone we have seen, for example, line staff and supervisory roles merged into one, and three food and beverage teams becoming a singular unit. Reflecting these changes in job descriptions and recruitment marketing goes beyond accurate representation, it will also ensure that you get the best and most aligned people applying for your roles.

Values-based hiring

One of hospitality’s favourite mantras, “hire attitude and train skill” is very much alive and well, but does it go far enough? Values-based hiring can be a combination of two enormously powerful approaches. You can recruit individuals whose values align with those of your business, or curating adverts reflect specific values that would resonate with certain types of people and encourage them to join your team. The former is great to align talent with the brand but the latter, if executed correctly, could be hospitality’s secret weapon in a post-Covid world. The pandemic has brought out the best in people. Using a job advert to appeal to an individual’s sense of benevolence, duty, empathy, or tolerance – to name but four values – is in essence an impassioned call to action and will encourage wonderful people to join a wonderful industry.

Interview training

Many hospitality businesses have not conducted much recruiting for going on a year now, so it makes sense for you to ensure that your HR teams and hiring managers are up to speed with what to do and how to do it. Yes, I know, interviewing is a little like riding a bike, but for sure a few things have changed. Online interviews will be prevalent, candidate profiles may be different to before and jobs have been updated. A quick ‘dress rehearsal’ is certainly recommended and you might have also updated your own recruiting processes, which the team would need training on as well.

For hospitality, recruitment might seem to be the furthest thing from people’s minds right now, but it will become a priority very quickly, especially if the Great Reopening goes according to plan. A lot of things which can be done to prepare for this do not eat up too much time or cash at all, so it makes sense to get ready, to be at the head of the queue for the best talent.