It is tricky to find good hospitality staff! The company needs to strike the right balance between friendly and firm. You want to hire staff that helps maintain the organization’s good standing and elevate it.  

With the current economy and worldwide landscape, employee turnover is fast, and many industries are seeing fluctuating numbers. You may lose your best candidates far too soon due to fast turnover and seasonal fluctuations. 

Thankfully, there are ways to avoid putting your company in a bad situation. You can hire and retain the best staff if you follow some of these guidelines. 

Here is some data and proven ways to help you find and keep the best hospitality staff. 

Set Up Hiring Events 

A hiring event, or career expo, is a great way to engage with candidates, especially for a hospitality position. These events allow for initial thoughts and screening of candidates in a more relaxed setting. Getting a read on a potential employee is a great way to see how they perform their job.  

Hiring events are great for both job seekers and employers. They provide a space for potential employees to come and get a general run-through of the organization and the roles available. 

With a hiring event, the organization can conduct initial interviews with relevant job seekers, expediting the interview and hiring process.  

Get Help Making Professional Job Ads 

You can’t find the right staff without the right job advertisement. It has to be professional, targeted, and easy to understand. You then have to place the ad on a platform with good traffic that will guarantee a good number of candidates to sift through.  

A platform like Talroo is perfect for this. Talroo will allow you access to the best candidates available in the market. You can track the job campaign, edit the job description and manage the budget. Your organization has the power to select and vet candidates from the very beginning.  

You can use recruitment analytics to check the number of people reached and the best-performing job titles and descriptions. This option gives you all the power to ensure you find the best-suited staff for your organization. 

Leverage Programmatic Advertising  

If you have seen a job ad that matches your career or job description while watching YouTube videos, you’ve seen an example of a successful programmatic advertising campaign.  

Programmatic recruitment advertising allows organizations to deliver ads to potential candidates across different digital channels. This can capture the attention of potential candidates and leverage it to encourage them to apply for a role at your organization. This process can be fine-tuned and reduce your hiring time significantly.  

It is especially essential when you need a large amount of staff in a short time. Programmatic recruitment advertising is targeted advertising at its finest. You will only receive interested candidates that, more often than not, fit 90% or more of the criteria. With a better candidate pool, you will have a higher chance of having the best hospitality staff.  

Offer Incentives 

With the current competitive job market, many people are looking for a better work-life balance and benefits. To get the best hospitality staff, you have to show that you are the better option out of the thousands available.  

Common incentives are better medical coverage, minimum PTO, sick days, parental leave, bonuses, and shift structures. Showcase the benefits of working for your company over working for another. You will attract candidates who want to work for such an organization. 

Use Referrals  

Referrals from your existing employees are the best way to get new employees. Have an environment where employees feel comfortable vouching for someone else to take a job.  

The hospitality industry can be draining, but a great company makes it easier for employees to recommend friends and family for roles. Setting referral incentives or making it easier for current employees to refer their family and friends can significantly boost employee morale. 

Offer Better Wages 

The hospitality industry in the USA is notorious for making workers survive off tips, which is why many hospitality workers “job hop.” They are simply looking for better wages and tips.  

To stand out and attract quality candidates, you need to offer what other organizations do not. Higher wages are vital in finding and retaining hospitality staff. If candidates feel like they won’t have to scour for tips to pay next month’s rent, they are more likely to apply, take the interview seriously, and stay with the company for a long time. 

Take Employee Surveys Seriously 

End-of-year reviews and surveys of the company are great opportunities to find where to improve. Improvement makes the company a better place for employees. A better environment means they stay on longer, refer more people, and the company gets better hospitality staff.  

Also, ask departing employees for their honest reviews. Make it easy for them to give it without judgment or fear of their careers. Take these reviews and improve working conditions for the remaining and future employees. This will help you find hospitality staff faster when you need them. 

Have Clear Job Expectations 

During the interview, realistic descriptions of the job will help you find the right staff in the hospitality industry. Describe the average day and what stressful days will probably entail. Additionally, have someone who previously occupied the role share details on the day-to-day tasks and expectations. This will prevent any false expectations from taking root in potential new hires.  

Knowing how the organization runs and what average days entail will help candidates decide if the role suits them or not. By sharing this information, you’re more likely to find and retain quality employees. 

Hire People, Not Skills 

Getting caught up in the hard skills needed for the job is easy, but skills are not the building block of the hospitality industry. In the end, the hospitality industry is a people industry and relies heavily on human interaction and keeping customers content and returning. Getting the right person for the job is less about skills and experience and more about how they fit into the industry.    

• Are they respectful, even under pressure?  
• Do they respond well to criticism?  
• Can they keep their emotions in check during times of crisis to help patrons?  
• Can they stand for long hours? 
• How do they handle stress?  
• Can they engage in small talk?

These are some of the questions the hiring team should consider as they interview potential staff.  

Keep a Fast Pace 

The entire interview process should not drag on. The hospitality industry in the USA has the highest turnover rate, two times higher than any other industry. There are often more jobs than applicants, meaning you have to move faster than the competition.  

If you find a candidate who meets most of your criteria, reach out to them as quickly as possible with your best offer. Make onboarding easy; from paperwork to training, each part of the process should be seamless and quick. There is no need to make an already hard job harder by dragging out the hiring process.  

Use a Specialist Hiring Agency 

It may be easier to outsource when recruiting a large amount of staff. Specialist agencies can do all the heavy lifting and then provide you with the best candidates for the position for you to hire.  

A hiring agency acquires knowledge of each industry and uses it to provide organizations with the best candidates available. They take on the advertisement, vetting, and even initial interviewing for you. 

 Hiring agencies use psychology, research, current market data, data analytics, and behavior analysis to select candidates for each job. They focus on reaching out to the best-performing applicants only and sifting through thousands of applications to land the top few. If you have many open roles with stricter requirements, a hiring agency will make it very easy to find the right staff. 

Final Thoughts 

Employees make or break an organization. This is especially true in the hospitality industry. It is vital to hire employees that will build the company and help you expand. The only way this is possible is by keeping current employees’ content.  

Generous benefits and incredible work culture are two ways to retain good staff. They make it easy to find new employees when you advertise a job. Word of mouth is still one of the best ways to get new employees, but company reputations usually precede job advertisements.  

If your organization has the fame to be a remarkable place to work, filling open roles will be fast and easy.