Hotel operators scrambling to fill job openings
They're hiking wages, offering more flexibility and boosting benefits
Against a backdrop of high inflation, rising wages and summer travel, more hotel operators say they are struggling to find workers.
A new survey from the American Hotel & Lodging Association found 82% of U.S. hotel operators are experiencing staffing shortages, with 26% saying the problem has impacted their hotel's ability to operate.
The most critical staffing need is housekeeping, the survey said, with 40% of respondents ranking it as their top hiring challenge. That was followed by front desk clerks (28%), maintenance workers (13%), culinary employees (13.1%) and general managers (8%).
The hiring malaise has prompted hotel operators to offer a variety of incentives to attract more workers.
Seventy-five percent of hotel operators surveyed said they're increasing wages, and 64% are offering greater flexibility with hours and 36% are expanding benefits. But despite the perks, 87% say they're still unable to fill all of their openings.
The problem is worse when a hotel's overall staffing is already low as is the case at the 104-room Extended Stay America hotel in Stevenson Ranch.
“We're slim on staffing … it's rough,” said a manager who declined to give his name. When fully staffed, the hotel should have 13 employees, but they lack a housekeeper and a maintenance worker.
With more rooms coming online in the months ahead, the hiring impasse likely will intensify.
Recent figures from Atas Hospitality Group show Los Angeles County has the most hotels under construction at 22 hotels (2,888 rooms), and Orange County has five hotels
(811 rooms). In the Inland Empire, Riverside County has 11 hotels (1,584 rooms) underway, and San Bernardino County has nine hotels (907 rooms) in the works.
Looking ahead, the fourcounty region has at least 474 hotels in the early planning stages, according to Atlas.
Respondents to the AHLA survey are attempting to fill an average of nearly nine positions per property. That's up from seven in January, but down from 12 positions per property in May 2022.
Room rates and worker pay have risen
U.S. hotel rates meanwhile are soaring, gaining 54% year over year to an average of $212 nightly in January, according to a report from travel site Hopper.
A hotel forecast by CBRE also predicts hotel revenue per room (or RevPAR) will rise to “record levels” in 2023 as even more travel restrictions worldwide are eased.
Coming off the pandemic and months of no work under COVID-19 restrictions, hotel workers across Southern California secured higher wages to help them keep pace with the region's high housing costs.
In April, Unite Here Local 11 secured a $4 hourly pay hike for workers at the Hyatt Regency and Hyatt Centric hotels in Long Beach, which boosted their minimum wage levels to anywhere from $22 to $25 an hour, depending on the jobs they do.
Hotel employees in other cities, including Los Angeles, Santa Monica, Glendale and West Hollywood, have secured similar wage increases through city ordinances, although their wages remain lower than in Long Beach.
In Los Angeles, for example, the latest minimum wage for workers in hotels with 60 or more guest rooms is $18.86 per hour, up from $17.64 per hour.
A hospitality worker bill of rights that would set a $25 hourly base wage for hotel workers also has been proposed for Anaheim.
Pete Hillan, a spokesman for the California Hotel & Lodging Association, said such an increase would weigh heavily on smaller hotels in the city.
“If they go to an immediate $25 minimum wage, that's a 63% increase from the current minimum of $15.50 an hour,” he said. “That's an extraordinary amount. It would lead to higher costs at small hotels and put some of them at risk of going out of business.”
Casting a wider net
As the hotel industry grapples with disappearing workers, the Hyatt chain and others are looking to marginalized communities for workers.
“During the pandemic … 45% went outside of industry altogether,” said Jin Ivacic, global head of talent acquisition at Hyatt, in a recent online interview. “So we knew we had to focus on retention of those that we still had, and reaching out to different talent pools.”
Hyatt, she said, is reaching out to communities with fewer diplomas or formal certifications, such as atrisk youth or immigrants. Hyatt's RiseHY initiative aims to employ 10,000 atrisk youths before 2025.
The AHLA survey shows there are more than 100,000 unfilled hotel jobs nationwide, and the demand has pushed hotel wages to an all-time high, averaging more than $23 an hour.
AHLA President & CEO Chip Rogers said his association and its AHLA Foundation are focused on growing the industry's talent pipeline through recruitment and retention initiatives. The foundation also offers an apprenticeship program that combines on-the-job learning with classroom education for in-demand hotel occupations.
The industry group also said Congress could help address workforce shortages by passing the Asylum Seeker Work Authorization Act. It would allow asylum seekers who are already housed in hotels across the U.S. to work as soon as 30 days after applying for asylum. Current law prevents them from legally working for at least six months.