I was at a conference several months ago and sat in on a panel discussion about Employee Recruitment and Retention.
The panel participants included a couple of CEOs from Hotel Management companies along with some HR executives.
All the participants acknowledged that the Hospitality Industry is struggling to attract and retain employees. We find ourselves in competition with both Gig employers such as Uber and DoorDash, and organizations such as Amazon and other retailers.
The participants cited various approaches to recruiting but I was most interested in their approaches to retaining employees. There were comments about the value of ongoing training and providing a career path for hourly employees. One executive noted that his department heads were authorized to give small bonus payments to employees who were "caught doing something right." I was struck by the sense that these organizations were promoting a variety of tactics that would help, but no one seemed to be rethinking the very nature of the relationship between employer and employee.
I am sure that people like getting some extra dollars when they are "caught" doing something right, but that payment is dependent on the momentary focus and mood of the manager and still, ultimately, does nothing to change the dynamic between employer and employee. The employee is still depending on the manager's perception at any given time. Being well-trained clearly makes a difference between employees who are often frustrated by a lack of clarity and employees who are confident that they know what is expected of them.
Nonetheless, most organizations recognize that well-trained, well-paid employees are not necessarily motivated employees. They're just not dissatisfied employees. And while I don't intend to turn this into a discussion about motivation, it is important to note that simply delivering on basic needs is unlikely to generate significantly improved retention. Will employees stay with you if the hotel down the street offers a higher hourly wage? Will they stay with you if another company offers better training?
There are more comprehensive and viable approaches to employee retention and organizations need to get beyond simply doing a better job at what they already do (to some degree) and easy tactics like cash bonuses. New approaches to employee retention require new strategies and new tactics. One of the key strategies has actually been around for many years in many Collective Bargaining Agreements and, more and more, in municipal statutes in a number of large cities. Whether referred to as Predictive Scheduling or Fair Work Week statutes, these statutes/laws are primarily aimed at addressing the scheduling practices in industries with high levels of part-time, temporary, and hourly workers, such as retail, fast food, and hospitality. The core idea is that employees are entitled to know when they are going to work with substantial advance notice.
I believe this is an approach that the hotel industry should embrace, both for the direct benefit to the employer/ employee relationship and the ancillary benefits to the organization. For the purpose of this discussion, I will use Fair Work Week to describe this approach, understanding that it is synonymous with Predictive Scheduling. Fair Work Week statutes are a set of employment regulations designed to ensure that workers have more predictable and stable work schedules.
The basic components of a Fair Work Week Approach are:
Advance Notice: employers are required to provide employees with a certain amount of advance notice regarding their work schedules. This notice period varies by jurisdiction but typically requires two weeks.
Right to Rest Between Shifts: Employees are entitled to a minimum rest period between shifts to prevent overwork and fatigue.
Predictable Pay: If employers make last-minute changes to an employee's schedule or ask them to work additional hours without adequate notice, they may be required to pay additional compensation as a penalty.
Opportunity for Full-Time Employment: Some laws require employers to offer additional hours to existing part-time employees before hiring new staff, which can provide more opportunities for advancement.
Post-pandemic, employees have a different perception about suitable working hours, regardless of industry. Employers are finding that more of their staff members or potential job candidates are unable or unwilling to work rigid or unpredictable schedules due to other commitments that may include taking care of children, study, or working at another job. The days of telling an employee when he will work tomorrow are ending. And the days of telling an employee to call in and find out if he is scheduled need to end too (unless it is the specific instance of an on-call list).
As a result, both scheduling predictability and flexibility are among the leading benefits that prospective employees seek out when considering employment options. While hospitality professionals have traditionally felt constrained in the ability to provide such benefits because of the hectic and fast-paced nature of the industry, there is simply no other alternative for organizations wishing to maintain an appropriately sized workforce and deliver high-quality service.
Some statutes in various municipalities also have additional requirements. For example, California does require ten hours between shifts. And the penalties for violations (changing an employee's schedule within a certain time frame) vary widely. It is also common for these laws to allow an employee to turn down a request to work a shift for which the employee was not originally scheduled.
My conversations with hoteliers over the last several years have indicated a strong distaste for these statutes. Nonetheless, they are now in place in 2 states - CA and OR, and a number of cities (NY, Chicago, Seattle and Philadelphia, among others). I should also note that several states have banned any municipality from implementing workplace laws that are more stringent than state labor laws (KY, IA, AR, GA, TN).
Although hotel managers may worry that adopting Fair Work Week type practices may limit their ability to schedule according to fluctuations in service demand and make last-minute changes, they should more fully appreciate why these statutes are becoming more common. After all, one of the main challenges hotel managers face in keeping employees from leaving has been the industry's difficulties in helping employees achieve a reasonable work/life balance. So imagine how appealing it would be to an employee to know that schedules would be posted (or made available) two weeks in advance so they could plan for child care, coordinate travel, coordinate family activities with a spouse or partner, etc. Adopting Fair Work Week practices would make it easier for organizations to retain employees.
Moving to a Fair Work Week practice doesn't require that you impose all of the components found in the statutes currently in place. There is no need to absorb new penalties within the organization. Certainly, one would be hard-pressed to add pay to an employee if a schedule is changed. Therefore, I am not suggesting that organizations mimic any of the current statutes in place. I am suggesting that the overall principle be embraced and that organizations promote the approach to the employee population and do their best to abide by the basic premises. Of course, moving to a Fair Work Week practice is best accomplished by making several key operational changes, some obvious, some perhaps less so.
First, the hotel needs to take a good look at its forecasting processes. A select service property should be able to rapidly adjust the Rooms Forecast to move out an additional week. While a full-service property should be able to make a comparable adjustment, modifying the F&B forecast process may take some more work as any historical data that is used to forecast next week may need to be revisited, unless the property is using a fixed capture ratio (which has limited effectiveness). This approach also puts more pressure on the Banquet / Catering department as they are now being asked to project Banquet activity farther out than before. And while some operations allow more flexibility for scheduling banquet staff to accommodate pop-ups and last-minute changes, the overall F&B forecast also impacts Prep and Stewarding, both departments which will benefit from this change.
The most challenging steps then involve developing a labor plan and communicating the schedule to employees. There are labor management systems available to help determine staffing needs 2 and 3 weeks out based on the forecasts for the period. But, more importantly, this is also an opportunity to further engage employees by using scheduling technology that allows them to manage their availability and preferences. Mobile technology which allows employees to manage their availability and preferences makes it easier for the organization to employ a Fair Work Week approach as managers won't have to ask employees when their availability changes (common for students).
Additionally, mobile technology makes it easier for employees to swap shifts (with manager approval) making it easier to modify schedules when needed. Overall, modern scheduling technology makes it easier to cross-utilize employees which has the benefit of helping employees get full-time work while allowing the organization to use fewer temp or contract workers.
By combining a Fair Work Week approach with technology that makes it easier for employees to balance work and personal time, hotel organizations will be in a superior position to retain employees.
Originally Published in Hotel Business Review - Hotel Executive