Next, Where Are All the Workers?

The Great Mismatch of workers, starting with hotels and restaurants

Maybe you’ve noticed.

Service at restaurants can take forever, as you try to get the attention of the few overworked staff. Hotels with a single harried concierge behind the counter want you to use automated check-in. Grocery stores with aging checkout clerks want you to use automated check-out. You walk along a busy street, and business after business has posted signs pleading for workers.

So where are all the workers?

Even though the record number of job openings in the U.S. is starting to diminish, there are still plenty of jobs in many industries, especially hospitality and tourism, and plenty of organizations simply can’t find enough workers. Nearly 9 in 10 small U.S. businesses that are hiring report there are few or no candidates. In India, IT hiring may require 10 million workers. Though Japan has just reopened its doors to foreign tourists, nearly three-quarters of hotels say they can’t find enough staff. In New Zealand, where I lectured for a week last month (and where the food, incidentally, is excellent), 8 in 10 restaurants report they’re understaffed, so they have to get creative about meeting the increase in customer demand.

At the request of the Australian government, before I was in New Zealand, I spent a week lecturing up and down the Queensland state’s coastline, from Gold Coast to Sunshine Coast. Good news: Lots of people are traveling, so there is a lot of demand for hotels and restaurants. The continuing challenge: Same problem as in Aotearoa, not enough hotel and restaurant workers. In 10 years, the city of Brisbane will be hosting the Summer Olympics, so hospitality worker demand will only increase.

And it’s not just the hospitality field. Some employers in Malaysia are exploring the use of robots, drones, and assistive technology to deal with a lack of workers. Canada is allowing international students to work unlimited hours to cover worker shortages. Businesses in Montana are “trapped, desperate” for workers. In many countries, there won’t likely ever be enough childcare workers: Right now the U.S. alone is 100,000 short. The same is already true for elder care workers -- and that will only get worse as we all age. Construction workers? 400,000 job openings in August.

So where are the workers? As with everything related to work markets, it’s complicated. At Charrette, we’ve identified nine contributing factors. Here’s how it works in the hospitality industry:

1. In the face of lockdowns and infection risk at the onset of the global pandemic, many hotels and restaurants around the world laid off staff. Are we surprised if some workers aren’t exactly eager to return to a place that might simply lay them off again in the next downturn?
2. The Great Reshuffle (aka Great Resignation) is still a thing, as record numbers of people quit their jobs. You’re far more likely to quit when you see others doing it, and there are still lots of job listings.
3. Some hospitality work isn’t exactly engaging or well paid. Cleaning rooms and washing dishes don’t make many Top 10 lists for work.
4. As a result, hard-working immigrants often do those support jobs. But many countries deliberately limited immigration during the pandemic, and are having a hard time restarting the flow. They also can have deep restrictions on what work immigrants can do.
5. Entry-level hospitality workers often want to gain experience so they can make more money. But many young workers decide quickly if they don’t like a job, and the alternative -- gig work through Uber or Doordash -- is a smartphone tap away. (“Quick quitting.” Really?)
6. Hospitality work is often shift-based, with inflexible schedules that complicate childcare and sick care for relatives. Again, gig work is often far more flexible.
7. The combination of long COVID, early retirement for older workers, and parents (usually mothers) who have childcare or eldercare requirements, all reduce the number of people in the labor force.
8. A lot of hospitality work needs to be done onsite. You can’t deliver food from remote -- at least, not without a robot. So you need a local workforce ready to do the local work.
9. Young workers intent on meaning and purpose in their work may not immediately see how hospitality work might contribute to their vision of a better world.

For several years, I’ve explored the future of work with clients like EHL, Switzerland’s École hôtelière de Lausanne, one of the top hospitality colleges in the world. Restaurants, and especially hotels, have served as career launchpads for millions across the globe. Maud Bailly, CEO of hotel powerhouse Accord Southern Europe, onstage at the recent Unleash World conference in Paris called the hospitality industry “a social elevator.” An economic downturn will inevitably change the picture in certain industries and geographies. But for restaurants, hotels, and tourism businesses, this workforce mismatch is likely to remain with us for a long time. Even in a possible global economic downturn, the 10% with money are still likely to continue traveling.

So, if some industries are having such hiring problems, why are tech companies laying people off? Well, first, they’re ignoring my advice to stop firing people: There are lots of creative ways to keep more people employed. But this is how workforce mismatches work: Even in the greatest economic downturns, there are usually many jobs open -- just in other industries or geographies.

What should you do Next? If you’re having trouble hiring, we’re all going to need to get very creative.

• Hire for “flex” (soft) skills. Bailly said that Accor’s hotel brands are no longer requiring resumes for many work roles. Show you can learn quickly and work hard, and they’ll train you. (Opportunity@Work’s Byron Auguste calls these STARs -- Skilled Through Alternative Routes.)
• Make work more interesting. If workers don’t want to wait tables all week, break the job up, and train waitresses in bookkeeping so they can help balance the books half the week.
• Recruit creatively. Newly-retired workers in your area have a book club? Entice the club to work in your restaurant as a group, and host their book club after hours.
• Promote women. They only have 12% of leadership positions in hospitality, despite having over half the total jobs. More women in management will encourage other women to join.
• Expand immigration. Governments and hospitality businesses can work together on immigration packages, including work visas, accommodations, and jobs. (For more background, read this research from Google.org and Brookings. Thanks to Hector Mujica for pointing me to it.)
• Plan ahead. Jobs Queensland has done an excellent job determining the skills that will be needed in coming years, and is working with a range of stakeholders to align training, recruiting, and employment.
• If you’re a job-seeker, get creative too -- and get mobile. If you’re willing to relocate, there’s likely to be continuing opportunity.

-gB Gary A. Bolles

I’m the author of The Next Rules of Work: The mindset, skillset, and toolset to lead your organization through uncertainty. I’m also the adjunct Chair for the Future of Work for Singularity Group. I have over 1.1 million learners for my courses on LinkedIn Learning. I'm a partner in the consulting firm Charrette LLC. I’m the co-founder of eParachute.com. I'm an original founder of SoCap, and the former editorial director of 6 tech magazines. Learn more at gbolles.com