CATS Applicant Tracking System

As a wide industry that often gets thrown around in conversation, hospitality is quite large. One of the main factors of any hospitality company is that they have customer satisfaction as one of their goals. Examples include sectors such as entertainment, travel, food industry, events, HR, sales, marketing and even education.

In such a wide range of fields, there is always an increased demand for the upkeep of these operations. This can also make it hard to have a strategy because there is such an array of industries tucked under the hospitality umbrella.

Follow these tips to help you within the hospitality field:

1. Leverage Referrals

Referrals typically make for pretty good employees as they have had a referenced entry point. They typically perform up to 15% better than other hires and have a higher retention rate as well, making them worthwhile hires for a company.

If a staff or company has a plan in place to create a referral program for employees, this can help encourage messaging to their respective networks. This makes the whole recruitment process much easier and gets possible candidates to the front door. Then once they are there, all you need is the recruiting software to help manage and organize them.

Tools such as Linkedin can be really powerful tools. With a few employees sharing a job order to their connections, you can easily garner thousands of valuable impressions to get some traction from potential candidates.

2. Peer Interviewing

Typically recruiters make some placements outside of their area of expertise - but that’s where your peers come in handy. If you know someone who is more capable or knows good hospitality talent when they see it, listen to them!

Handing the reins over to another trusted person can be the saving grace of finding a good candidate. It is also typically like a referral in that it can lead to a great hiring process and even better retention.

This process is similar to split recruitment in that if you team up with another recruiter, you can both succeed in making the placement. One of the best Split-fee networks to do so is the Top Echelon Network, filled with over 1000 candidates and job orders - the opportunity is there!

3. School recruiting & Apprenticeships

For a little bit more of an active approach, you can always go out and search for candidates to fill these positions. There are often school job fairs designated throughout the year. Even during the last year of the pandemic, events were held in an online event setting.

This can help you target students who are specifically looking for part-time work or experience within the hospitality industry. This is definitely a more proactive approach to recruiting, however it could pay off in the longer run in getting placements.

Taking care of these employees matters as well. Ensuring them what the jobs offer and what sort of experience they can achieve would be a really great way to just open up the communication regarding the position.

4. Create Giveaway Marketing Materials

Getting brochures, small newsletters or even just business cars can help get the word out there. In some ways, it can help to market your HR or recruiting firm. By giving your staff these materials, they can be free to hand it out to anyone they feel fit for certain positions that come their way.

This leads the recruiter free to some easy leads in their offtime and can create another avenue for potential candidates.

5. Utilize Social Media

Rather than traditional routes of finding jobs, many people are out using social media in an attempt to find job opportunities. In 2019, 79% of job seekers looked for new jobs on social media platforms such as Facebook and LinkedIn before going to traditional job sources. This makes it a really good place for recruiters to gather contacts and candidate information for potential placements.

So while you or your company also promote yourself, there is the chance for outreach and doing some gathering of candidates from social media. Go into it with a strategy to connect with these potential candidates and stick to the ones that will be relevant!

6. Allow for situational or judgement tests

This one sounds more confusing than it really is, however in practice a team of recruiters or a hiring manager could use this is a really good training example. This entails inviting candidates in for a hands-on and honest day-in-the-life of whatever position they might be applying for. This is a really great way to get the candidates you have in the door and figure out best-fit candidates.

This can help both you and the candidate figure out if the position will result in a good turnout and resolve any surprises early on in the process. Using an applicant tracking system to be able to send out email and custom calendar invites is a really convenient way to schedule for such events.

7. Outsourcing Recruitment

Sometimes there is a lull and you cannot, for whatever reason, get the candidates to flow in. That’s okay! Consider outsourcing recruitment to be able to find solid placement opportunities. Especially with hospitality business that is so broad, there are ways to track down the ones out there seeking jobs.

<li The more help, the better - the only thing that matters is the $$$ </li>

<li This can save you time in the long run and have your pipeline still full </li>

<li This can help your turnover rate and increase retention </li>

In conclusion, there are many different ways you can develop your recruitment strategies surrounding the hospitality industry. This is a sector that will continue to remain wide and increase as more and more people need personal services.

Some strategies can be more tough than others, it is all about what you think will work best for you. We are in a constantly changing world, so some of these might be more effective than others in 2021 - but rest assured it will be a great area for recruitment.

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