The global hospitality industry is facing the biggest labor shortage in its history

Fanny Laude, SVP Talent Experience & Digitalization at Accor

The global hospitality industry is facing the biggest labor shortage in its history. The Covid pandemic bears witness to and provoked these changes. Through furloughs, concerns over safety and work-life balance, employees have more frequently chosen to pursue other fields of work for more flexibility in hours or higher wages.

As a world leading hospitality player operating 5 400 hotels in 110 countries, Accor is currently, in certain regions of the world, struggling to find Talent to meet the pent-up travel demands. Faced with these ongoing challenges, the key is to remind people of how wonderful hospitality is as a career path, shift the focus to what makes hotels great places to work and then showcase these key assets to attract Talent.

At Accor, we are convinced that our human capital is our greatest asset:  hospitality is fundamentally about people, and Accor has a long-standing commitment to its Talent. Accor has a strong Employee Value Proposition (EVP) – “Be Limitless: Do what you love, Care for the world, Dare to challenge the status quo!” This embodies our commitment to our people and aims to attract and retain the best Talent. Our employee promise is relevant in today’s context more than ever. The unique challenges of past years have highlighted the importance of our people and what it means to support them, we now have the opportunity as a responsible employer to showcase how Accor empowers teams and encourages Talent to grow. By fostering employee wellbeing and enhancing career development opportunity, and building a stronger future for the Group collectively, we will show that Accor is a great place to evolve.

With more than 300,000 team members all over the world, Accor fosters a culture of diversity and inclusion and places a strong focus on enabling social elevation, providing job and training opportunities that offer social mobility and economic inclusion for people that have often had no prior training or higher education.

In 2022, Accor surveyed nearly 200,000 employees to collect data about their education level. The results showed, 60 to 65% respondents working in our hotels have not completed higher education. The number was 32% at managerial level and we aim to raise this to 34% by 2023. Not having a diploma or extended experience is not an obstacle for motivated and talented individuals with the potential to grow in our sector. The Group acts as a social elevator. At Accor we pride ourselves on providing a chance for all to succeed. We promote employability and dynamic career paths for the low-skilled Heartists© in our hotels all over the world by deploying dedicated programs to develop their potential. Our ambition is to eliminate any kind of inequalities and discrimination in the hiring process and offer fair and equitable opportunities for everyone to develop. This includes blossoming skills and gaining experience that will help them reach their full potential.

We put in place a great number of actions worldwide to bring this role of social elevator to life. In 2022, we launched “Les Jobs au Talent!” in Europe, a no CV required job initiative, where people could gain employment without any prior experience in hospitality. We identify candidates with strong motivation and a good sense of service. As of today, we have organized 6 sessions, recruited 145 people (80% of candidates had no qualifications), and filled 3/4 of vacant positions.

Another example is our partnership with Evolvin’ Women, a Dubai-based social enterprise, which provides unemployed women from rural areas with training, work experience and one-to-one mentoring across Africa and Middle East. In 2022, 40 women have been recruited in the United Arab Emirates after the two-year program.

This year, we have announced a new partnership with SINGA, an international organization accelerating inclusion of newcomers to engage in social, professional, and entrepreneurial projects. Over the next three years, Accor will contribute financially to help 1,500 refugee newcomers launch their entrepreneurial projects in 13 European cities. Participants will receive the necessary tools, participate in group workshops and benefit from individual coaching.

We strongly believe that a hospitality group’s success relies on its people, and we therefore naturally place people at the heart of what we do. We will continue to welcome everyone with openness, empower our team members, and provide opportunities for all.