The hospitality hiring crunch has become an everyday challenge for HR pros.
After losing 23% of job roles since February 2020, the industry is racing to fill empty positions — but finding the right people has never been harder.
With many workers fearful of heading back into in-person work, and experienced hospitality pros choosing new careers post-lockdown, candidate numbers are way down. Add in increasing customer demand and on-again-off-again lockdowns, and it’s easy to see how today’s hotels, restaurants and F&B companies now need more employees and better hiring flexibility than ever before.
But it’s not all doom and gloom.
Many hospitality brands are trying out new creative approaches to sourcing and retaining top-quality workers — and their out-of-the-box recruitment campaigns are working wonders to boost their numbers of qualified employees.
We dove deep into the latest industry news to reveal some of the top hospitality brands that are acing their hiring plans. Today, we’ll show you how (with a little help from Breezy 😉) you can do the same.
Hospitality recruitment strategy #1: Chipotle’s social approach to hiring
Burrito megabrand Chipotle knows how to wrap up a great hiring event.
But after being hit by the latest talent crunch, Chipotle’s recruitment team realized they needed a new approach to getting workers through the door.
The solution? Run a virtual event through the group-chatting Discord app.
The idea behind the move was to build brand awareness, head straight to where they knew Chipotle fans already hang out, and share links to application forms with potential candidates.
Genius. 👌🏻
Three days after announcing a wage hike in May, the recruitment team welcomed over 3,000 attendees to their first Discord event and stayed on hand to answer direct messages from potential candidates.
So, how’d they do? Chipotle's hiring team saw a 77% week-over-week increase in applications, and a 298% increase over the first week of April.
DIY with Breezy
Virtual events are the name of the post-pandemic hiring game — but opening your (virtual) doors to candidates can mean a rush of applications that’s hard to manage.
Here’s how Breezy can help you hone in on your best candidates:
- Automatically sort incoming candidates using a pre-screening questionnaire, then track qualified candidates through the Breezy pipeline. Each pipeline column represents a different stage, and can be customized based on the role in question.
- Once you have your pipeline set up, you can drag and drop candidates into the correct column, move them to a new stage while viewing their profile, and even bulk move candidates.
- If you’re already a Breezy user, here’s how to view and manage your pipeline settings in the visual dashboard:
- Click Positions/Pools in the left sidebar.
- Open the correct position.
- Click the gear icon ⚙️ in the top-right corner of the window to open Position Settings.
- Click Pipeline in the left sidebar to access the Pipeline settings.
Hospitality recruitment strategy #2: Put a unique spin on interviewing like Donatos
For pizza delivery franchise Donatos, quality service doesn’t stop at the restaurant door.
To attract new candidates in the post-pandemic era, the hiring team at Donatos decided it was time to demonstrate what they do best. Combining drop-in interviews with their delicious dinners, they came up with an irresistible way to get candidates talking (and eating): Dinnerviews. 🍕
Donatos’ ‘Dinnerview’ events were designed to make getting a job as easy as grabbing a pizza. Candidates can drop in to one of the events, get a certificate for a free pizza, and even land a job on the spot.
A new job and a free pizza? Now that’s what we call clever hiring.
DIY with Breezy
Donatos’ ideal candidates have to love pizza, so offering free meals was a no-brainer to get the right applicants through the door.
But we’re not all selling the world’s favorite food, and figuring out how to attract the right candidates isn’t always so simple.
Here’s how to use Breezy to get to know your ideal candidates better:
- Customize candidate feedback surveys to find out what applicants really want.
- Use Breezy’s candidate experience survey questions to create a killer feedback questionnaire.
- Automatically schedule feedback questionnaires to go out to candidates (whether they were successful or not).
- Check out the questionnaire report to look for patterns and identify areas for improvement.
- Act on candidate feedback to improve your candidate experience every time.
Hospitality recruitment strategy #3: Focus on inclusive hiring like CH&CO
Across the pond in the UK, independent hospitality catering company CH&CO has gained a name for itself as an equality-focused employer that knows how to keep quality employees on the books.
With pay transparency high on the agenda and a human-first approach to hiring, it’s no surprise CH&CO have an employee turnover rate of less than 2%.
Here are a few other highlights of CH&CO’s diversity-focused recruitment strategy:
- In 2020, the company 3X’d its Learning and Development team to demonstrate their commitment to employee development.
- CH&CO publicly supports its LGBTQ+ employees by actively taking part in Pride Month, and running the LGBT Network, “a social group that brings together members of the LGBTQ+ community plus allies, from across [the] business”.
- The company unites candidates from all types of backgrounds by focusing on a shared mission on their careers pages. Just check out this tidbit
“WE ARE CH&CO. A group of chefs, nutritionists and people pleasers with a shared passion for food that fuels emotional positivity as well as physical wellbeing.”
DIY with Breezy
Inclusion in the workplace starts with a quality hiring process — and Breezy can help you step up your diversity game from day one. Here’s how:
- Automatically post and promote your open roles on dozens of the top job boards for underrepresented talent.
- Minimize bias in your screening process by creating an applicant questionnaire to screen candidates based on the right things.
- Set up blind-screening to filter out any info that’s not directly relevant to the role (like certain criminal records).
- Use Breezy’s structured interview questions to keep everyone on the same page.
- Hand over interview scheduling to candidates to allow individuals to choose their own best time to connect.
Come out stronger with a resilient recruitment process
Thanks to the current landscape of fewer workers, more demand — hiring is a major challenge for today’s hospitality industry.
But with the right recruitment strategy, it doesn’t have to be.
From getting to know your candidates better to putting a creative spin on the classic job interview, there are many ways to uplevel your hiring strategy and attract top-quality staff.
These brands took tangible steps to think bigger with their recruitment strategies and boost their employee numbers and now (with a little help from Breezy), you can too. 😉
