Employee turnover: it costs UK businesses billions of pounds every year. In hospitality in particular, where operators constantly have to battle to stay profitable, keeping trained and trusted staff members around for as long as possible is an essential value-add. However, hospitality is one of the industries where retention is actually poorest, exceeding 70% in recent years. Surely it doesn’t have to be this way.
So, how can operators reduce employee turnover? We’re sure you know the basics, but here’s a quick summary:
Training and development
One of the top determining factors for employee satisfaction is how well equipped they feel to do their job well. This means training your staff adequately. If from day one you make your employees feel supported and invested-in, they are far more likely to decide your company is somewhere they want to invest in, too.
Empowering choices
For many employees, being given the trust and responsibility to make decisions for themselves is one of the most rewarding parts of any job. Wherever possible, give your staff the freedom to decide how to tackle certain issues and challenges, with relevant teaching and support to help them do this well.
Good salary and benefits
It is always worth paying a bit above average to encourage your employees to commit to their job for a longer period. Hospitality workers are prone to job hopping, but a higher salary always makes it harder to say goodbye.
Technology and Human Resources
One of the fiercest reservations against new tech is that of technological unemployment – the fear that technology will make humans redundant. From the loom to the toothpaste-tube-lid robot (Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, anyone?), many inventions have been vilified for replacing human workers.
This applies in the restaurant space too – operators can presume that introducing automation means ditching employees, but this often isn’t be the case. Although firing a till-operator brings savings in the short-term, the impact on your bottom line, and team morale, will be unremarkable. Instead, the introduction of automation and technology should be seen as a golden opportunity – how can you take that added resource and transform it into a game-changer for your business?
How can you up-skill your staff to use their time more meaningfully?
Up-skilling Your Staff
To learn more about making the most of your human resources, let’s look at NKD – thought-leader in employee engagement. NKD work to improve business performance through the employees. They partnered with Virgin Atlantic on projects focused on empowering staff to provide better customer experience. By taking the space out to focus on employees’ power to bring ‘magic touches’ to their customers, and create ‘great chemistry’, Virgin Atlantic gave their staff space and cause to focus on the value-adding human interactions in their roles. Those are the aspects of a job that most employees value and enjoy the most, but rarely have the time and energy spare to really focus on them.
The outcomes of NKD’s projects were not only to increase Virgin’s Atlantic’s customer satisfaction from 93% to 97% but also to leave colleagues feeling “more valued, connected and empowered to make a difference through their work”. In the same way, making the investment to up-skill your staff can be a win-win-win for you, your customers and your employees. Allowing employees the skills and capacity they need to provide better customer service both makes your customers more likely to come back and your employees themselves far more likely to stick around.
Staff who are rushed off their feet want to leave – staff with the time and skills to make somebody’s day better feel excited to come back to work again tomorrow. Instead of a replacement for employees, automating technology is a tool to help your staff, relieving their pressure and boredom in the day-today and freeing them up to really add value.
How can Vita Mojo help?
Our digital ordering solutions, back-of-house management and data insights all make life easier for you and your staff. The Vita Mojo Operating System automates the monotonous parts of restaurant management and operations and frees up staff to do what they do best – delight your customers.
We partner with you to fully unlock the power of digital for your business – our expert team works closely with you to identify your unique restaurant challenges, create a roadmap which maximises your digital opportunities, and support you every step of the way.
