Hospitality Businesses Failing To Maximise Employee Benefits 18
CLH News
Apr/May 2023
Despite continued rates of job vacancies within Hospitality, businesses are not maximising every tool in their armoury to attract and retain staff, according to hospitality research consultancy, KAM. New research has revealed that Hospitality businesses are not effectively communicating what they already offer; 75% of employees couldn’t find information about employee benefits while researching their hospitality job. 20% said they only found out during their interview and 15% had to wait until after they’d started in the role.
phones, unless they are head office. When it's someone's personal phone, and we are asking people to interact by those means, it just gets a bit sticky. It's app fatigue. The perfect solution would be you join, here is your company app, it's going to give you engagement, comms, rotas, pay, it’s a single sign on.” The majority of employees (75%) say that offering employee engagement services makes the business a more attractive place to work and there is an expectation for businesses to offer services which look after their physical and mental well-being as well as their financial well-being. In fact, offering certain benefits can have the power to encourage employees to switch jobs; 83% said their company offering a specific health and well-being benefit contributed to them deciding to switch jobs.
Hospitality employees say their current employers need to do a better job of communicating the services available to them; 79% would use employee engagement services more if they were made aware of what was available.
Scott Read, CEO of Employee Services, at Growth Partners: “We’ve been keen to understand the relationship between the awareness and usage of employee engagement services and the number of vacancies in the hospitality sector. The research has really highlighted a potential problem - businesses may have employee benefits in place but if they’re not easy to access or communicated effectively, they’re not having an impact - potentially adding to the problem rather than helping to resolve it.”
Katy Moses, MD at KAM (www.kam-media.co.uk): “Hospitality businesses are absolutely missing a trick when it comes to attracting new employees with very few effectively communicating the level of employee benefits. So many companies offer phenomenal employee engagement services but very few are using this to attract potential candidates. Even current employees say they’re not made aware of what is available to them despite the clear impact they can have on staff retention.”
With regards to ‘health and lifestyle’ the most popular benefits among Hospitality employees are gym discounts, flexible shifts, healthy eating programmes and medical healthcare (no surprise that this is particularly popular among older employees.) The most sought-after financial benefits are 24/7 online access to pay documents, the ability to receive their pay earlier than pay day and an online chat service to query / sort out issues with their pay slip.
The research found that 55% of employees have (knowingly) worked in a Hospitality role which offered some kind of employee engagement services. Unsurprisingly this is much higher for those who have worked in larger multi-site businesses. Only 1-in-4 who work in single-site businesses say they have been offered employee engagement services. Across the board, those in a back-of-house role are least likely to say they have been offered employee engagement services.
Anne-Marie Sarantis, Head of People, Gusto:“Everything has changed since covid and there has been a shift towards better engagement and usage of benefits– it’s all important, but equally many employees don’t even use it when we give it to them. So it's important that these services can be easily accessed and that we, as a business, signpost them sufficiently to our employees. You can't not have employment engagement services, in this day and age.”
But despite high numbers of employers offering Hospitality employee engagement services, the research found that many employees find them difficult to understand and access; 68% said they would use employee engagement services more if it was easier to access. The majority would find it easier if they were all accessible in one place, like an app (77%.)
The study also looks at happiness level among current employees and found that 88% of people currently working in hospitality are happy in their role, this decreases to 78% for those working specifically in pubs and bars and is even lower for those working back-of-house (73%.)
Claire Clarke, People Director, Flat Iron: “We are expecting our employees to download apps on personal
You can download the full report here: https://mailchi.mp/kam-media/employee-engagement-services
Hospitality Rising Reaches Half of All 16 to 30-Year-Olds
Only five months into the launch of Hospitality Rising’s inaugural campaign, ‘Rise Fast, Work Young’, the campaign has reached over 5.5m of the UK’s 16 to 30-year-olds, equal to half this demographic, via its digital marketing campaign. Hospitality Rising, the world’s biggest hospitality recruitment initiative, was created to tackle the sector’s challenging jobs crisis. As part of the industry backed campaign, Tik Tok creators were also engaged to create content that specifically targeted young job seekers. This alone generated 13.5m impressions, reaching 2.1 million young people. Mark McCulloch, founder of Hospitality Rising and campaign director,
said: “We are reaching this 18-30 audience like no one else is. We get them, we know where their attention is daily and we are reaching them on their phone screens in a more relevant way than anyone else with relentless TikTok campaigns, ads and content creator partnerships. We now need to focus on reaching all 18-30 year olds at least four times in a short period because this is where you see consideration move to action. “Whilst hospitality businesses are working on retaining staff, we’re here to support them in their efforts by finding new and effective ways to attract a new audience into the industry.”
The next step for the campaign is to bring on board new operators to back a burst of activity aimed at an audience of job seekers leaving education this summer. With six months of the first year left, those wanting to back the hospitality movement can join from £5 per team member. Celebrity chefs including Tom Kerridge, Angela Hartnett and Raymond Blanc OBE, have also generously leant their time and support to the initiative. Businesses looking to join the movement should register their interest by emailing hello@hospitalityrising.org
New Award Winning Technology Can Save You 35% To 55% On Cooking Oil in Deep Fryers If you own a restaurant or a kitchen with a deep fryer, then you might be surprised at how much you spend every year on cooking oil. Have you ever calculated this direct cost? If you haven’t, then you should, because Canadian Company, Eco Friendly Chef Corp. is helping thousands of professional kitchen operators to dramatically cut their oil costs in half. A new innovative product called OiLChef is revolutionizing the food industry. The award-winning OiLChef device is one of the most sophisticated technologies available in the world for deep fryers today. It is not a filter or a chemical, but rather a device which is simply installed in your deep fryer in less than 10 seconds! Putting the OiLChef in your fryer will give you a competitive edge and attract more consumer dollars. Your fried food items will absorb less oil and therefore will contain fewer calories. Good for the consumer, good for the bottom line. Reduce carbon footprint: It will minimize your environmental impact through a reduction in energy and oil consumption. Faster service: Food cooks quicker.
Reduce food waste: Food is crispier and holds its shape and texture for longer. Great for food delivery. Zero flavour transfer: It prevents flavour transfer between different foods being cooked in the same oil. Kitchen smoke and frying odours: It reduces the smoke and odours of frying in your kitchen/restaurant. Creating a more pleasant working and dining experience and minimizes the workload on your air filtering systems and maintenance. Health & safety: It reduces the smoke point of your oil, and thereby lowers the risk of a deep fryer fire. Also, staff interaction with changing the fryer oil is cut down by at least half, reducing risk of accidental burns and oil spillage. Reduce operating costs: It gives you the opportunity to cut down or move away from costly monthly additives required to improve oil quality. Fewer people hours are required each month for fryer changes. For further information visit www.oilchef.co.uk Contact Louis Farry by phone or email: louis.farry@oilchef.com or Tel. 07448419664
Girbau UK Launches Under Counter Washers and Dryers Known for its robust commercial and industrial laundry equipment, Girbau UK has launched its first professional grade Under Counter washers and dryers that fit underneath standard 900mm height counters. Both machines combine energy efficiency, ease of use and compact size with high quality, durable construction making them ideal for hospitality applications. The new Under Counter washer’s stainless steel Active Drum™ has hourglass lifters that guide loads to gentler central areas for better load balance and reduced wear on delicate items. It is available with a choice of 6kg or 8kg capacity with either a pump or gravity drain. All models have a 180-degree
opening door for easy loading and unloading. Quiet long-life operation is assured by the washer’s sturdy Quattro™ construction with durable shock absorbers that allow virtually vibration-free high-speed spinning. The washer features cast iron stabilisers for higher spin speeds, better water extraction and increased spin efficiency. It has an easy-to-use LCD user interface and 28 flexible programs including disinfection, mop, microfibre, allergy settings and three customisable programs. It also comes with in-built service diagnostics and a delayed start function.
The Under Counter dryer can also be stacked on top of the washer to save space. The 6kg capacity model is available in both condenser and vented versions and the 8kg model is vented. The Sensi Dry system automatically determines the right drying time, saving energy and assuring fabric care. Its auto programs save energy as the running time is automatically adjusted according to load size and the required dryness. Butterfly drying ™ tumbling in a figure of eight movement, non-stop in one direction stops clothes from bundling and ensures long life durability of the motor and belt. The lint filter has an automatic indicator to remind users to clean it for energy efficiency and safety. The dryer’s memory function remembers the last program used including any chosen settings, so if nothing needs to change, you can simply press start for the next load. The new under counter washer and dryer are available to order from Girbau UK. Visit www.girbau.com or see the advert on page 11.
