Sustainability and inclusion key to easing hospitality recruitment crisis

The Master Innholders is urging hoteliers to focus on building sustainable and inclusive businesses to help ease the industry’s recruitment crisis.

Research by Fast Company revealed that 40% of millennials have chosen a job because the company is sustainable, while 56% of workers responding to a Glassdoor survey claimed that workplace culture was more important than salary.

With UN climate summit COP26 putting the spotlight on environmental issues and employers competing for candidates to fill vacancies within their organisations, there has never been a more important time to improve in these areas.

Recognising the importance of sustainability and diversity and inclusion, the Master Innholders has signed up leading experts on these subjects to speak at the next Hotel Leadership Conference.

Aiding senior hotel professionals with their hotel’s sustainability strategy will be Sue Garrard, a sustainability strategy adviser who has worked with large firms such as Mars, Lloyds Bank, Heineken and O2 while Ben Wielgus, head of sustainability at Informa, will be helping attendees understand how the risks and opportunities from sustainability can affect an organisation’s overall strategy.

As the senior vice president for equity and inclusion at WarnerMedia, Asif Sadiq MBE is well-placed to advise hotels on becoming more inclusive workplaces and will share his tips for embedding diversity and inclusion in all elements of a business.

Providing further insight into diversity and inclusion across the hospitality sector will be Joanna Aunon, director of WiHTL, the community devoted to increasing diversity and inclusion across hospitality, travel and leisure.  The organisation aims to support businesses to build inclusive cultures where anyone can thrive and reach their potential and Aunon’s session will be a must-see for hotel leaders looking for inspiration in this area.

This year’s conference chair James B. Clarke FIH MI, general manager of Hilton London Bankside, said: “The title of this year’s conference is BOLDER. BRAVER. BETTER. to reflect the industry’s intention to rebuild as we emerge from the impact of the pandemic. To support this we identified six key pillars around which to build our programme of content. Sustainability and diversity and inclusion are two of these pillars and, as research shows, jobseekers are attracted to businesses making strides to improve in these areas.   

“With recruitment continuing to be a huge challenge for the sector, it is therefore vital that hotels make improving sustainability and diversity and inclusion a priority.

“We are thrilled to be welcoming so many expert speakers to the next Hotel Leadership Conference and I encourage senior hotel professionals to come along to find out how they can implement their tips into their own businesses.”

For more information and to purchase tickets, visit the Hotel Leadership Conference website.