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According to the Geelong HR Index, conducted by Harvest, the leisure, tourism and hospitality sector is one of the region’s key industries finding difficulty in hiring staff for the remainder of the year. The heat is on, but many hospitality employers will be left out in the cold when it comes to gaining casual hospitality workers.
“It’s a real and present challenge”, states Harvest Talent Recruitment and People Solutions Director, Maree Herath. “This is the time when many in the tourism and hospitality sector ramp up. However, without the people to provide the service these traders simply won’t be able to provide full services for holiday makers.”
According to the Geelong HR Index, a survey of over 100 employers, a sample of only five employers from the Leisure, Tourism and Hospitality sector recorded 92 tourism and hospitality workers needed in the coming months. This is more than an average of 15 staff per employer in this sector. While survey respondents may have been our region’s larger employers, it’s a fact that staffing numbers traditionally balloon in hospitality over the summer months; we are still falling short on our ability to fill vacancies.
The biggest challenge this sector lists, as with many others, is the pure lack of supply. Another factor which was more prominent for this sector than others surveyed was the lack of interest in the industry or discipline. Traditionally, retail and hospitality work was a “right-of-passage” for our students and overseas visitors. Today, our COVID years have seen our teenagers and young adults opting out of unsavoury work hours and weekend work and many, now the world has opened up, are leaving the country, taking gap years or making the most of an overseas working holiday.
Our reliance on international workers has evaporated too with Australia’s net migration figures extremely low. Leading up to the Jobs and Skills Summit and according to Westpac Chief Economist Bill Evans, Australia had recorded net migration of minus 70,000. Net immigration prior to the pandemic sat at 250,000 and, of this, 150,000 – 180,000 would add to the working population. We are at least 400,000 workers shy of where we would normally be, and this is a huge challenge. Putting it simply, Australia made it easier to leave than come to our country and the stigma is still there compared to other countries who are now throwing open their borders. A key action point from the Jobs and Skills Summit was to provide over $36million in funding to accelerate visa processing but it won’t happen fast enough for our hospitality trade.
A double-edged sword for Geelong is our increase in population over COVID. Geelong was the place many Melbournians flocked to, and Geelong is highlighted as having the highest population growth over the last decade of all of Australia’s regional cities. According to economist and journalist, George Megalogenis who, at the G21 Stakeholder Forum held in April, reported Geelong’s populations growth as 26.2% over the years 2011 to 2021. This was above the figures for Sunshine Coast (25.9%) and Gold Goast (23.7%). What this means is Geelong is full! If we can attract workers to the region, we cannot house them.
The HR Index Survey queried the region’s employers on what needs to be done to assist with a region-wide talent attraction strategy and a resounding majority listed accommodation and affordable accommodation as a gap that needs urgent attention. The government has committed $575 million nation-wide to invest in social and affordable housing. Again, this won’t be in time for the tourism boon which kicks off in less than two months.
“It’s hard not to feel for the hospitality sector who were the most challenged during COVID when government restrictions prevented trade.” Herath comments “They will have less than a desirable bounce-back this summer. Adding insult to injury, inflationary pressures will start to weigh in on discretionary expenditure in the coming year”. Herath reflected survey results showing 80% of respondents from the sector reporting their business would be slightly impacted and 20% stating their business would experience significant adverse impacts due to the economy.
According to Deb Nash, Business Manager at Truffleduck, who is fully supportive of a region-wide talent attraction strategy “we (the hospitality sector) need to support each other in attracting talent. It’s no longer a look after yourself affair, we’re all in this together.”
The Geelong HR Breakfast, hosted by Harvest at Truffleduck on Wednesday 5th October 2022, will report further trends from the 2022 Geelong HR Index and with special guest speaker, Brett Ince, CEO, Tourism Greater Geelong and the Bellarine, attendees will learn our strategy to attract and house people to work, live, study, invest and holiday in our beautiful City.
