Managing Holiday Seasonal Staffing Needs in the Hospitality Industry

With the holidays rapidly approaching, many hotels and restaurants will experience a surge in customer traffic. While this is traditionally a slow time for hotel occupancy, other aspects of your business will be running at peak capacity. Corporate holiday parties often provide a steady supply of events throughout December, and holiday banquets on Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Years will bring in large numbers of guests who don’t have a family gathering to attend. These events can place a great deal of stress on your banquet, culinary and stewarding teams.

In many instances, your existing staff may not have the bandwidth to manage the volume of events occurring over the holiday season, and you may need to hire seasonal staff to help ensure all positions have adequate coverage. Therefore, it’s important to start thinking about your seasonal staffing needs now to get ahead of the busy rush.

The success of your holiday events often depends on your ability to hire quality seasonal workers. These employees play a critical role in delivering the exceptional service necessary to ensure you’re able to maintain a reputation as a top choice for companies to host their holiday parties, and for families to visit for holiday banquet meals. Make sure you have a plan in place to address this important need.

Set Staffing Projections

When planning your staffing needs for the holiday season, it’s important to identify the specific positions you’ll need to fill. Will you need to beef up your banquet staffing to accommodate the increased number of events you host? Do you need additional kitchen staff for specific events? Is your support staff team large enough to ensure each event runs smoothly?

You can determine your staffing needs by analyzing your holiday event sales and the number of seasonal holiday employees you’ve hired over the past few years. This will help you to more accurately predict the number of employees you’ll need for this upcoming season.

Identify the Traits that Contribute to Success as a Seasonal Holiday Employee

While possessing the skills necessary to do the job is essential for any employee, the traits that contribute to success in seasonal roles can be different than the traits you value in a person applying for a full-time position.

Some traits to prioritize when hiring seasonal holiday staff include:

• Flexibility – Your seasonal workers need to have a great deal of flexibility. You need them to fill specific roles at specific times. Therefore, you need to find employees who are looking for short-term work and have the ability to accommodate your scheduling needs.
• Work experience – You’ll need to get your seasonal employees trained and up to speed quickly, so it can be helpful to hire individuals who have prior experience in the role you need them to fill working at establishments that cater to a similar clientele.
• Adaptability – If you need to fill several different positions as part of your holiday staffing, it may be helpful to find individuals who are capable of working multiple roles. Someone who has experience working in several different positions you’re trying to fill can give you greater scheduling flexibility and potentially reduce the number of seasonal holiday employees you need to hire.

Reach Out to Prior Seasonal Employees

Your prior seasonal employees are a great resource to mine when looking to fill the same roles for your upcoming holiday season. These individuals provide several important benefits:

• They’re familiar with your processes and can get up to speed with minimal training
• They understand your standards for the customer experience you strive to provide
• They have a prior relationship with your business and many of your managers, making it easier for them to assimilate into your existing team
• You have already vetted them, and they have demonstrated both an ability to do the job and a cultural fit with your team

Obviously, not all prior seasonal employees will be a great fit to rehire. You’ll want to focus on those employees who demonstrated that they are a good fit for the role.

Conduct a Thorough Hiring Process

After seeing which roles can be filled with prior seasonal employees, it’s time to conduct a thorough hiring process to fill your remaining open holiday positions. The following tips will help ensure this process runs as smoothly as possible and provides you with the best possible candidates.

Create Detailed Job Descriptions

When posting open seasonal holiday positions, make sure your job description is very detailed and accurately conveys the scope of the role. This will help avoid a situation where you receive a large number of applications from unqualified candidates.

Make sure your job descriptions include the following information:

• Duration of the contract
• Specific compensation and benefits offered
• Specific shifts you’re looking to fill
• Expectations of the role
• Any desired skills your candidates must possess

Utilize Multiple Recruitment Channels

You’re more likely to fill your seasonal roles with highly qualified candidates if you cast a wide net. Make sure to advertise your holiday positions on the following recruitment channels to reach the broadest possible audience:

• Your social media profiles
• Job boards
• Staffing agencies

Conduct Effective Interviews

Anytime you’re trying to fill a position at your business, it’s important to conduct effective interviews that help you determine which candidate(s) will be the best fit for the role. Seasonal holiday jobs are no exception to this rule. We’ve prepared a breakdown of the best interview questions for hospitality staff to help you get this important task right.

Provide the Proper Training

Your seasonal holiday employees are placed in a challenging position. They must jump right in and perform at a high level during one of your busiest times of the year. To set them up for success, you’ll need to provide effective training that will get them up to speed quickly.

Make sure your holiday employee training program includes the following elements:

• Orientations that cover your company culture
• Job-specific training that teaches the essential skills/software knowledge necessary to succeed at the job
• One-on-one mentoring by more experienced team members to ensure your seasonal holiday workers are provided the support they need during their shift to become comfortable with your processes very quickly

Xclusive Services Can Help You Manage Your Seasonal Holiday Staffing Needs

Managing seasonal holiday staffing needs can be challenging and create headaches for your management team. It can often be easier to have a dedicated staffing partner to help you address this important function. At Xclusive Services, we have you covered.

Xclusive provides staffing solutions for a wide range of hospitality industry positions. We provide line level (hourly/entry and skilled level) staff, and our managers are available to support the recruitment, placement and partnership management of the staff we supply.

With our Xclusive Excellence™ commitment, you’ll have peace of mind that our seasonal holiday staff will be highly qualified and fit into your team with very little direction. In addition, we work with seasoned hospitality industry workers who take their jobs seriously and are committed to delivering the exceptional customer service your guests have come to expect.

As part of our Xclusive Excellence™ commitment, you can count on:

• High quality staff, even on short notice
• Managers available 24/7 to provide any assistance you may need or to help resolve any issue that may arise
• Our team handling all legal compliance matters, including all paperwork, for the staff we provide

To learn more about how Xclusive Services can help address your seasonal hospitality staffing needs, please request a quote, or call a local office for immediate staffing needs.