Vacancies in hospitality are more than 100% higher than they were pre-Covid.
This fundamental shift in the labour market and the industry has left many businesses trying to address their hiring strategies, whilst also contending with a high level of competition from other hospitality businesses.
The hospitality industry has historically faced issues in not just finding talent, but also in keeping it – the emphasis on salary as a solution to hospitality hiring challenges is unlikely to provide sustainable results.
What is an employer brand, and how can it help your hospitality business to overcome hiring challenges?
What is an employer brand?
Put simply, an employer brand can encompass a company’s:
- Mission, values and goals
- Culture
- Employer Value Proposition (EVP)
- Differentiation from their competition
In other words, an employer brand is how your business is perceived by people, whether from a candidate or wider perspective.
With the competitive hiring market in hospitality, an employer brand is a vital component that can make your hiring and retention efforts more effective and efficient.
The best way to summarise an employer brand would be to think, ‘Why should a candidate choose my hospitality business over any other?’.
The importance of a strong EVP
If you’re looking to give candidates a reason to work for your organisation, that’s where your EVP comes in.
Your EVP conveys what you’re offering to your current employees and what you’ll offer to prospective employees in return for the skills they bring to your business.
This includes:
- Salary
- Flexibility
- Work-life balance
- Mental health and wellbeing support
- Culture
- Training and development opportunities
- Benefits
- Employee recognition
- Non-salary financial perks (e.g. commuter compensation, bonuses)
- Travel opportunities
These are all examples of the elements that can be a part of your EVP, but you should focus on creating your EVP by speaking to current employees first. Ask them what they value most about their job and why they applied for their role - this will give you insights into the areas of your EVP that employees value the most.
Secondly, it’s important to ensure that your EVP aligns with your company’s goals and values.
Are you looking to be a more diverse, ethical business in the future, for example? The goals of your company should be a reasonable expectation of where you expect to be in the future to best be able to match your EVP.
Once you’ve established this, it’s time to convey your EVP across all of your marketing collateral, including your job descriptions, social media channels and website, to make sure that your EVP is communicated clearly and consistently.
It’s never been more important to have a strong online presence, as candidates are researching and evaluating you just as much as you are evaluating them.
Go beyond salary
There is, without a doubt, a ‘war on wages’ taking place in hospitality.
We’ve even seen some businesses go as far as going into competitor restaurants to hand out business cards to staff – it goes without saying that salary is a key point of contention in the current hiring market.
This approach isn’t sustainable.
Even if you’re making the much-needed effort to align salaries to market rates, this alone is unlikely to be enough to differentiate you from your competitors.
Hospitality candidates will weigh up all elements of business and employer brand, meaning that salary is one element among many that are being assessed.
If salary insights are a key concern, specialist hospitality recruiters will be able to accurately guide you through salary expectations for each experience level and role.
Mental health and wellbeing support
Talent Hive as a recruitment agency is made up of individuals who all have a background in recruitment, and that’s why we believe so strongly in mental health and wellbeing support in the industry, with our partnership with The Burnt Chef Project (BCP) being part of our efforts towards this.
(Find out more about The Burnt Chef Project.)
One in five hospitality workers suffers from work-related mental health issues, which places mental health and wellbeing support very high on the agenda from both a candidate and employer perspective.
This also combines with other in-demand benefits such as work-life balance and flexibility, as many of the issues relating to workplace stress and triggers for poor mental health relate to long working hours, difficulty taking leave, and customer-related conflicts.
The overlap demonstrates how a strong employer brand will often address the areas that are most sought after by candidates, as there is significant overlap.
Mental health and wellbeing support is of significant importance, however, due to how tumultuous the last few years have been in hospitality.
Many candidates will have faced difficulties during the pandemic and may not have felt that they received the level of support they deserved, so your employer brand is your opportunity to convey that you care about the mental health of your employees.
Each business will be different
Employer branding and an EVP will differ from business to business, as they should.
Each business will have different values and goals, and therefore completely different approaches to its hiring process.
We’ve seen plenty of hospitality businesses successfully adopt a ‘4 days on, 4 days off’ approach to providing greater flexibility for their employees, whereas others may favour career progression opportunities more as part of attraction and retention efforts.
The most essential part of forming a strong employer brand is making sure that it suits your business (including its goals and mission), employees, and broader vision.
The better you can tailor your employer brand, the better the outcome will be in terms of recruitment and retention.
We’ve worked with some businesses who will take their chefs to Italy to meet suppliers, or businesses that offer wellness days – each hospitality business has a different approach that best meets its needs.
Get in touch
If you’re looking for an expert hospitality recruitment partner, Talent Hive can help.
Our team has in-depth knowledge of the ins and outs of hospitality, and we’re extremely passionate about helping hospitality businesses secure the best talent.
Get in touch today to find out more.