Heading into a new year, hoteliers say the labor environment remains challenging, albeit not to the levels seen in recent years.
Hiring has long been a challenge in hospitality, well before the COVID-19 pandemic, said Rick Badgley, chief human resources officer at Remington Hospitality.
Dallas-based Remington, which counts more than 100 hotels in its portfolio across the U.S., is far from alone in this challenge.
In June 2023, the American Hotel & Lodging Association shared the results of a survey on the labor market in the industry. The bottom line? More than 80% of respondents said they were facing a labor shortage and about a quarter of them said that shortage was severe enough to affect their business.
Gabriel Perez, chief operating officer at Charleston, South Carolina-based Indigo Road Hospitality Group, said hiring has always been tough in hospitality. Indigo Road has expanded into hotels in recent years by building on its restaurant foundation.
“It is not easy,” Perez said. “But it’s not more difficult than what it’s always been.”
In hospitality, it’s all about people. The experiences created by employees are what make customers want to return to a hotel or a restaurant, Perez said, and Indigo Road tries to go beyond the “transactional.” The company takes the approach of hiring for the right personality and then training those people with the necessary skills. The company wants people who are kind, attentive and empathetic, Perez said.
“That’s where we drive our efforts,” Perez said.
The fundamentals and technical skills are important, but they can be taught. And they are taught in a comprehensive, broad-based approach to training. For example, since flexibility is critical, Indigo Road has new hires train in areas outside their expertise. That might look like putting someone with resort experience in an urban or remote lodging environment to see how they adapt, Perez said.
Aligned Hospitality Management in Arizona, a relatively new entry to the hotel management space, has put a strong focus on retention. The company looks to train existing employees, offer incentives such as outings and make use of technology to improve the employee experience. For example, Aligned Hospitality has put QR codes in their rooms to make it easier for housekeeping to get tips, founder and CEO Bryan Tubaugh said.
Founded in 2021, Aligned Hospitality, has 23 hotels in its portfolio primarily in the economy class. Tubaugh said he sees the labor gap as a numbers problem, as hospitality has long been an industry where people can learn the skills they need.
“Show me the will; we can teach the skill,” he said.
But hotels are in a tougher spot than they were prior to the pandemic, Badgley said. Technology and the gig economy have been driving the younger generations into other industries over time and the pandemic highlighted how important flexibility is to today’s employees. That can be a challenge for hotels, which are, by the nature of the business, open 24/7.
“You can’t work from home at a hotel,” Badgley said. “You have to be there, checking people in and cleaning rooms and cooking meals.”
To improve flexibility as much as possible, Remington has leaned into technology solutions, finding ways to make it easier for employees to talk to each other and trade shifts. And Remington is looking for ways to promote employees from within, introducing an apprenticeship program to help employees move from maintenance or housekeeping to a general manager position. Training is critical in this hiring environment, as many new employees are coming in without hospitality experience, Badgley said.
Plano, Texas-based Aimbridge Hospitality also has made training and flexibility priorities, adopting “flex scheduling, shift-sharing, and daily pay,” Vice President of Talent Kymberly Kuebler said in an email interview.
“Because we’re listening so closely to our associates and monitoring societal trends, we recognize that flexibility in work location, hours, pay and benefits are all priorities for workers today,” she said.
A focus on training and retention are critical in today’s “tight and intensely competitive” labor market, said Carl Meyers, vice president of learning and organizational development for the Davidson Hospitality Group in Atlanta.
He added the labor problem isn't unique to hotels.
“We are seeing much of the same that we've experienced over the last two years when it comes to job openings, hiring and churn within the industry," he said in an email interview. "Though we have observed marginal improvements across these areas and an uptick in workers rejoining the industry, the reality is as of last November there were only seven unemployed workers for every 10 available jobs in the United States. This statistic underscores a critical shortfall in the readily available supply of talent to meet hiring demands across all industries.”
Meyers did note there are positive labor trends for the hotel industry.
“This ratio did increase year-over-year between 2022 and 2023, so we are continuing to trend in the [right direction]. Traditionally, we would seek to bridge this gap by recruiting actively employed talent," he said. "However, a notable decline in industry turnover year-over-year suggests a reduced likelihood of talent transitioning between employers or roles compared to previous years. This shift in sentiment translates to a more challenging recruiting environment for open positions, while conversely, we are enjoying the benefits of stronger retention across our organization.”
The challenges aren’t going away any time soon. Meyers said the hotel industry will have to make long-term changes to attract workers. He suggested looking at benefits in areas such as childcare and family leave to make the industry more attractive to people growing their families.
Remington has been working to help its operators get ahead of workforce needs, Badgley said, giving them data to support their hiring plans. That data encompasses a variety of factors, including the tenure of a workforce and its full-time and part-time make-up, as well as forecast business needs.
“It’s at this time more of an art than a science, but these type of tools will help us be better at anticipating all of those needs,” Badgley said.