Ahh, summer vacation. The chance to get away from it all… unless you work in the hospitality industry.

Consider Sandra, struggling to manage the check-out rush from her position alone behind the front desk of a popular beachfront hotel. With piles of luggage everywhere, travelers waving their arms and phones to get help and attention, and a wailing toddler, Sandra is stranded. The colleague who’s supposed to be working beside her has stepped away “for a minute”, so it’s up to Sandra to do something.

Quickly mentally triaging to figure out what she can fix fastest, Sandra grabs a box of the hotel’s signature chocolates and offers them to the toddler. Proud of her resourcefulness, she glances up at the child’s parents… only to find them glaring at her. As the mother loudly reprimands Sandra for such thoughtfulness — Imagine feeding sugar to a two-year-old! — the fathers grabs the chocolate box from Sandra’s hands. Humiliated before the staring crowd, Sandra slinks back behind the counter, where she can’t help but reflect on the fact that the father has held onto the chocolate…

The instance was a tipping point for Sandra. Managing fast-evolving guest expectations is a top cause of employee turnover in the hospitality industry. Already, post-pandemic industry challenges have added to their jobs’ complexities. The threat of losing their jobs to AI, the rise of flexible work in other industries, and the constant pressure of offering service that wins on social media are causing serious job fatigue. In the U.S. alone, employee churn in the hospitality industry is at 73.8%. Employee discontent in other markets, where labor laws are less stringent, is only a guess.

Challenges for HR leaders in the hospitality industry

Human Resources leaders in hospitality are already familiar with the top industry challenges that result in employee churn. However, the impact of guest expectations on employee turnover in hospitality is relentless. These stressors impact top performers all the time. Guest interactions play on their minds every working minute of their shift.

This makes it critical that you know:

• the top factors leading up to such guest expectations
• impact on employee experience (EX)
• how you can reduce employee turnover in hospitality

Here’s the lowdown: Failing to retain employees in the hospitality industry increases the risk of poor guest experiences, low ratings, and overall revenue loss. While budgeting priorities are most often directed toward paying customers, it takes plenty of resources to ensure your employees have the preparation and support they need to provide great experiences to guests.

Below, we’ll cover three important ways that you as an HR leader can work to support employees through the continuously increasing expectations of tomorrow’s guests.

1. Create job descriptions that align with evolving roles

Delighting guests remains the top KPI for hospitality employees. But the path to getting there is often lonely for most professionals. Guest expectations around turnaround time, service intuitiveness, and knowledge expertise are only growing. And employees are at a loss on how to deliver. A set of endless job responsibilities and overwhelming tech don’t make it any easier.

As an HR leader in hospitality, here’s what you can do – interact regularly with employees. Understand the gap between their current job description and what employees identify as their true role. Additionally, build a role progression path together. For instance, with the integration of AI, a concierge’s role may evolve into one of an experience officer. Similarly, as housekeeping professionals work with AI to predict maintenance and customization, their titles should reflect their new role. Room managers, perhaps? Support this with the right training, tools, performance discussions, and employee engagement surveys.

2. Fix the gap between personalization and ‘personal service’

Guests across segments – from fine dining to hotels – are fast confusing tech-led personalization for the personal, warm service that is typical of owner-run establishments. As an HR professional in hospitality, you already know why mid and large-sized hospitality businesses cannot recreate such personalized service. Training talent and building structures that enable such personal service has long remained a wrong but top HR challenge in the hospitality industry.

Take for example a guest encounter that came up for a sommelier at a budget business hotel. On recommending a wine, the guest questioned him on the impact of the climate crisis on its terroir. For a competitively priced wine, the sommelier didn’t have a fascinating narrative to share.

This shouldn’t be a problem. The personalization-led experiences your brand can offer are unique. They are also key to unlocking profitability in an increasingly CX-aligned business universe. Wondering how you can influence guest expectations and revenues? Leverage anecdotes from the ground to inform senior management about the cost of misplaced guest expectations. Irate guests harboring unfair expectations are a top cause for employee turnover in hospitality as well as customer churn.

3. Celebrate the fact that your people are human

A top reason for employee churn in hospitality is limited room to show up as their authentic selves. Other industries are embracing inclusion and creating safe spaces for mental health conversations. The hospitality industry must keep space. Initiatives such as the Burnt Chef Project are a step in the right direction. As an HR leader in hospitality, seek to collaborate on such projects. Acknowledge and address the high stress experienced across functions.

To minimize employee churn in hospitality, build performance ecosystems that encourage boundaries. Trying to exceed unfair guest expectations should not be a pursuit for any of your employees. At the same time, guest service policies should be upfront about your values. This can go a long way in making employees feel more confident about their human limitations. It can also address a growing HR challenge in the hospitality industry – employee mental health.

Looking ahead

Forge stronger, authentic relationships with your employees to manage employee turnover in hospitality. This demands that you invest in end-to-end Employee Experience (EX) management. This can help you:

• Develop a culture of continuous, intent-led listening to resolve critical employee challenges
• Automate regular outreach and analytics to let employees know you care
• Monitor and address top employees’ evolving sentiment to minimize employee churn
• Engage employees effectively to mitigate the impact of rising guest expectations

Worried about the cost? The good news is that HR leaders in hospitality find that an investment in employee experience can literally pay off! If you can reduce employee turnover in hospitality, you can save plenty — and even see revenue growth.

When making a case for an end-to-end EX management platform such as Employee Experience (EX) management, calculate your annual hiring and training costs. Now, imagine the cost savings if you could reduce employee churn by even 25%… or more! Invest in employee success and you’ll see happier, more engaged team members and more satisfied loyal guests.

Ready to get started? Connect with our team to learn more about SogoEX today!