This episode of the Hospitality Solutions Podcast features the analysis of some key metrics in the hospitality industry from Tim McPherson, president of HSS. McPherson looks at some of the labor trends that will shape how the industry grows in 2022 and beyond and speaks to some of the strategies hospitality leaders can employ moving ahead.  You can watch more episodes of Hospitality Solutions here.

From Tim McPherson:

Everybody knows it’s a fight every day to get candidates in the door. And when you do get someone in the door, you need to evaluate and move quickly on a hire being that most new candidates coming into the market are fresh job seekers looking to change industries or improve their lot will certainly face multiple job offers very quickly. A quality employee is not sitting on the shelf very long, so really puts us in a position and our clients in a position that we need to move very quickly when we find qualified candidates looking for work in the hospitality industry.

McPherson points out that the pandemic didn’t just hit the hospitality industry particularly hard; it also lingered much longer than other industries:

Over the past 18 months, it’s been a very long slog to get back to where the hotel industry is now. While other industries like health care and restaurants have seen a quicker rebound in the number of employees, overall. There are a couple of operational aspects to that that can’t be ignored. The fact that hotels are operating with skeleton crews cleaning is only happening at checkout and of daily cleaning with the exception of luxury sector. So some of those things that are lingering impacts from COVID19 pandemic are certainly things to keep an eye on as we go into 2022, being that there is some expectation of normalization of operations, which will certainly draw the hotel industry up closer to pre-pandemic levels for labor

HSS uses data like this to work with clients to help in long term planning and also as a way to anticipate labor needs and supply solutions such as contract labor, direct hire, and an array of services that can help alleviate labor burdens.

McPherson points out that, as hospitality emerges from the pandemic, they need to look at labor in a new light.

I think that one of the big takeaways is that the landscape of the hospitality industry really has changed in a significant way, not only due to requirements in the hotel, but also how you manage your staff. Certainly, it’s going to take hotel operators and management teams, whether it’s food and beverage management, whether it’s back of house management, really need to take a look at their utilization of talent. You know, whether it’s internal staff and full time equivalents or contingent and contract labor, which certainly has proven to help hotels meet the up and down demand with the heavy weekend travel and not so much during the week with business travelers coming in.