Hospitality businesses can run like clockwork with the right workforce management tech

Hospitality businesses are a lifeblood for the world’s economies, serving as a ‘rest-stop’ for the masses who seek a well-earned break from the daily grind. 

Ironically, these businesses rarely catch a break for themselves. To satisfy demand, many establishments need to operate all year round, especially during major holidays and peak periods.  

Having the endurance to do so is a challenge in itself, especially on the workforce management side. Finding the right number of staff, at the right time — and managing them effectively — serves as an ongoing challenge for Hospitality managers. Let’s stand in the shoes of a hotel staffing manager, for example: 

Christmas holidays are approaching. Your hotel is booked out for the next two weeks, and you’re going to need to ensure your staff are rostered effectively across all departments. If not, you risk jeopardizing the guest experience. 

As you move through your rosters, you realise you are somewhat short on security, housekeeping, and food staff. These are 24/7 departments, and you’ll need extra staff to bolster the ranks. 

It’s tempting to stretch your current staff with extra shifts and overtime, but you know from past experience that this can lead to fatigue and contribute to poor customer service. The health and wellbeing of your workers must be a priority. You accept that you’ll need to hire extra staff — and quickly. Now, in a scramble, you begin posting ads across several job boards online.  

You wish that somehow you had the ability to plan your rosters in advance — as well as an easier solution to hiring workers, when in a pinch.

Staffing in hospitality is a double-edged sword 

A UK study found that the behaviour of hospitality workers, technical competence aside, was the crucial difference between a great customer experience (CX) and a negative one — and we don’t need studies to affirm how valued we feel when receiving high quality service. While staffing plays a crucial role in ensuring a positive CX, it also comes with its caveats. 

There is no shortage of hospitality venues worldwide, even in smaller towns and cities; think of the cafes, restaurants, pubs, bars, and so on, which all keep the industry alive. An abundance of businesses leads to an abundance of open roles — and with many of these roles requiring little-to-no experience, there’s generally plenty of people willing and available to work them. 

On the other hand, the temporary nature of employment in Hospitality leads to high levels of employee turnover and overall retention issues. It can then be difficult to rely on a stable roster of employees for peak periods.

Hospitality businesses must stay prepared for around-the-clock and peak periods

The true challenge for Hospitality managers and business owners therefore lies in sourcing enough workers in an efficient and cost-effective way to meet consumer demand. To do so, careful planning and appropriate forecasting are absolutely necessary.  

Without these processes, managers may find themselves cutting too many staff in response to seasonal demand troughs. If these cuts are too deep, they can leave employers scrambling to find talent when demand increases – or it may place stress on existing staff to fill the gaps in rosters. As a result, Hospitality businesses may turn to third-party labour hire agencies to do so, which can be extremely costly.  Retaining skilled workers at a more managerial or niche level can also be quite difficult, due to high levels of employee turnover.

Humanforce's workforce management solutions are ideal for all Hospitality businesses. But first — why Humanforce? 

We are veterans in workforce management technology. Humanforce was one of the first software companies to specialise in scheduling and time & attendance in Australia. For 23 years, we have made the lives of HR, managers and frontline (‘deskless’) workers easier through our workforce management software suite — and continue to do so today in the US, UK, and New Zealand. 

Today, Humanforce offers its workforce management software as part of an all-in-one human capital management (HCM) platform. This platform also includes HR, Talent, Payroll, and Benefits. This is what we can do for Education providers at all levels, including schools, boarding schools, universities, colleges, and more.

Humanforce's Rostering & Scheduling solution optimises your workforce for 24/7 operations 

Humanforce’s Rostering & Scheduling solution allows Hospitality managers and business owners to auto-generate optimised, demand-driven, award-compliant rosters in just a few clicks. It’s a centralised, cloud-based rostering tool that grants both managers and employees unrivalled flexibility and customisation over their shift work arrangements. 

For larger venues such as hotels and resorts, or bars/restaurant businesses across different geographic locations, managers can easily split their staff across multiple locations, as well as receive notifications for shift conflicts. They can then rearrange the roster accordingly. Overall, this promotes efficiency by helping to ensure that all departments are appropriately staffed.  

Managers can also keep an accurate record of total hours worked by all employees, giving them greater control over the flexibility they can offer their workers. If certain workers have been rostered on for days on end, or taken on a few too many overtime hours without adequate breaks, managers can call on others to fill the gap. In doing so, they can prevent burnout and unnecessary spending on labour costs. Even better, labour costs are presented in real time directly in the roster as it’s being created, giving managers more control over their labour budget. 

24/7 establishments may also rely on rotating rosters, which we talk about in detail in this article. To summarise the benefits for Hospitality venues: managers can swiftly create rotating rosters, where workers alternate their shifts between morning, afternoon, and night over weeks at a time, within the software itself. 

Employees also stand to benefit from features such as the ability to bid on available shifts or swap shifts — all while using the Humanforce Work App. This provides greater flexibility and autonomy — potentially helping workers to fit work more effectively around their life commitments. 

Finally, both managers and employees can enjoy the benefits of an intuitive UI and click-and-drag controls. Intuitive workforce management software is a fantastic way to boost the efficiency and effectiveness of your staff, among other benefits.

Additional Humanforce solutions for Education providers 

Awards & Compliance 

Also included in the Humanforce WFM suite is the Awards & Compliance solution — allowing managers to accurately interpret complex awards, track changes as they happen, and apply them with ease.  

The sophisticated award interpretation engine (sometimes referred to as a pay conditions engine) ensures that all modern awards and employment agreement pay obligations and entitlements are met, providing instant calculations to indicate exactly how much employees should be paid. The payroll calculator quickly and accurately calculates wages, penalties, overtime and allowances in accordance with current labour laws. 

This is an essential feature for Hospitality businesses employing employees from multiple different backgrounds, simplifying award and payroll calculation.  

Talent 

Humanforce Talent is ideal for Hospitality businesses relying on casual workforces. 

It grants them a candidate-centric, holistic approach to workforce planning by pooling pre-qualified candidates, contractors, internal staff and alumni into a single talent community. 

Managers can then contact pre-qualified candidates on an as-needed basis, which is beneficial for any Hospitality businesses looking to bolster their ranks for busy periods. 

This is just a snapshot of what Humanforce can do for your organisation. To find out more, visit our website or talk to one of our experts today. 

About Humanforce 

Humanforce is the all-in-one platform for frontline and flexible workforces, offering a truly employee centred, intelligent and compliant human capital management (HCM) suite – without compromise. Founded in 2002, Humanforce has a 2300+ customer base and over half a million users worldwide. Today, we have offices across Australia, New Zealand, the US, and the UK. 

Our vision is to make work easier and life better by focusing on the needs and fulfilment of frontline workers, and the efficiency and optimisation of businesses. 

To learn more about how Humanforce’s solution can help automate people processes in your business, please contact us.