3 Tips for Improving Retention in Hospitality (Guest blog)

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Like retail, hospitality has a high employee turnover, currently around 70 to 80% annually. Compared to a healthy turnover of around 15 to 20%, this number is excessively high. While it's a well-known fact in the industry that employees often change jobs, the ability to retain your most valuable employees is crucial. Effective onboarding is not just a process but a strategic tool that plays a key role in this, as it ensures that employees are equipped to deliver the right levels of service and contribute to the success of your business.

Before we delve into the specifics of onboarding, it's crucial to grasp the financial implications of high turnover. The cost of hiring a new employee can be upwards of $4,000 per person, making it a significant expense for the company.

So, if you want to avoid the revolving door of staff and save significant costs, consider these tips.

Improve Onboarding

As a manager, it's your responsibility to set up your staff for success from day one. Regardless of their job role, efficient and thorough onboarding can be the difference between them lasting the first shift and being one of your longest-serving employees.

If people know what to do and what to expect and are armed with the proper training and knowledge, they will feel more confident in their abilities to carry out the job role. Plus, they will make fewer mistakes, too. From ensuring they have the correct hospitality training to learning health and safety, company expectations, and how to complete their job daily, the more they know and can do, the better for your company and the employees.

Improve Employee Culture

How often have you been told that your workplace is toxic or that people aren't happy coming to work? A toxic workplace culture can manifest in various ways, such as lack of communication, favoritism, or high turnover. Improving your workplace culture can instantly help you boost retention rates. After all, people don't quit jobs—they quit people. Whether other employees or managers are contributing to the toxicity, you need to identify and address these issues.

It's crucial to foster a positive workplace culture where everyone is treated fairly, allowed to express feedback and work in confidence that they are being supported by their management team. Addressing and understanding their cares and worries is key to improving workplace culture.

Providing constructive feedback and not micromanaging can support a healthy workplace culture, as can rewarding employees via recognition for a job well done; a survey found that nearly 70% of respondents had worked for over a year without any feedback or acknowledgment of their duties, even just a simple thank you.

The more you give your employees to make them feel valued and supported, the more they will give back in how they perform each day, and the longer they will be inclined to work for you.

Be A Better Leader

There is a significant difference between being a manager and a leader. A manager is responsible for overseeing tasks and ensuring they are completed, while a leader inspires and motivates their team to achieve their best. While a good leader can be a manager, not all managers can be or are leaders. With 57% of people citing they left previous employment due to their management, it's time to address issues from the top down instead of the other way around.

How are you or your management team dealing with your employees? Is it a mutually respectful relationship, or is there an inequality? Poor leadership and management will snowball and cause pain points and conflict within the team, removing any harmony and replacing it with negativity and even animosity.

It's crucial to understand that the first step in addressing turnover issues is to evaluate the company's leadership and management practices.