Red Carpet Recruiting: How Hotels Can Win the War for Talent - Adam Robinson, Hireology [Sponsor Bonus]

Josiah: Earlier this year, Adam Robinson, CEO of Hireology, joined us for an eye-opening masterclass on the hospitality industry job market and talent opportunities that we have. There's a link to that in the show notes, but I want to tell you, it was so popular that I knew I needed to bring Adam back as we close out 2024 and prepare for the next year to get his latest observations. In this episode, Adam dives into insights from two new research studies that he commissioned on hospitality hiring trends. He breaks down why flexible schedules and faster response times are becoming essential, how streamlined referral programs can boost hiring quality, and why food and beverage roles could be a powerful magnet for young talent. I found that fascinating. If you're looking to turn your hiring process into a competitive edge, you won't want to miss these valuable, actionable takeaways. So let's get into it.

[intro]

Josiah: I've been looking forward to speaking with you, Adam, again because about six months ago, we had the chance to have a conversation about what is going on with regard to hiring in hospitality. You run a company that is doing really interesting things in the space. You also invest a lot into research to help all of us understand what is going on, to move beyond the anecdotes into some data around hiring. So this is a topic that is top of mind. You and I recorded what I think is a masterclass, which we perhaps should have charged for, but it is free. I'll include a link in the show notes because I can't tell you how many people have told me how much they've appreciated that, have learned, you know, not only the origins of the company and how you got started, but what you're doing now and what you're seeing in the market. So I'll link in the show notes, encourage everyone to check that out for some context heading into this conversation. But of course, we're recording now in November 2024. Many people are in the planning process for a new year. They want to know how can we be prepared? How can we operate as effectively as possible? And as a way to kick off the conversation, I'd love to hear from you. Over the past six months, what have you been hearing, seeing in the market? What's been going on and taking place with regards to hiring?

Adam:
What we've seen happen this year is general sluggishness after a breakneck pace of hiring. You know, hospitality led the way. Hotels and hospitality led the way in hiring. I mean, top one or two in the categories in every BLS report, you know, going back to the lockdowns ending. And, you know, we shed about a million workers. We've hired about a million back. We're still a little short of the max, but it hasn't gotten any easier. But what has happened is as financing has gotten harder, as the bid-ask spreads on properties have remained wide, and deals just aren't getting done, or they're not getting approved, or they're just not penciling, properties aren't changing hands. So we're not growing capacity. As an industry, we generally have plenty of hotels. Between January of this year and today, about 50% of the job inventory across our customer base went away. And so what that, when we dug in, and it's obviously alarming, we generally have a pretty good view on the economy four months in advance when stuff like this happens. It tells you something, and that happened. The expansion rolls came off the board, and hotels are hiring to the replacement rate. The big headline is there's not a lot of net new rooms coming online, you know, enough to move the needle like it has in prior years. We're absorbing development, and people can't build new stuff. They can't start new projects. And so you'll have this gap of not a lot of new stuff. I mean, new hotels are getting built. I'm not saying that's not the case, but it's just the breakneck cases are based on development. It's just not possible anymore. And that's just during the sentiment that we're hiring to the replacement rate. The second headline I'd give you is, and this really came out in the F&B study that we did, that I presented at the most recent conference AHLA put on in San Antonio, is there is a greater emphasis from the job seeker in their search on flexibility and just general well-being. So the workforce is telling us in this research, I would rather have more flexibility than make the most money. So in there is opportunity for managers to say, okay, well, maybe I can get out of this cycle of this wage spiral where I just have to pay a dollar an hour more every six months to everyone on my team so they don't all quit and start to say, well, maybe I can manage this differently. Maybe there's a chance I can handle shifts differently. Maybe I can trust the team to find their own coverage. Maybe I can implement technology that allows them to figure it out without going to the clipboard in the break room. I mean, there are different ways to do it. And that's, and those become perks. So, you know, those are the things we spend a lot of time on.


Josiah:
I appreciate you bringing up both of those points. I think it's really important for people to understand what's going on in the world of finance and real estate. You talked about a lot of finance-related concepts, but that is key, right? That's upstream of everything that happens on the operational side, but it also drives what owners think about how they invest and what goes on across the ecosystem.


Adam:
And that drives employment and drives rooms, it drives rates, it drives everything. And so, you know, from the capital flows come the employment flows, and you really have to, if you want to be ahead of it, you got to look at the cycles in that way.


Josiah:
Right. And then I think to the second point that you made around kind of what are people asking for, we're going to get into that in this conversation, but it's really essential as well because it sounds very simple, but it's very important, right? Listening to what people are asking for is how you create a place that becomes this great workplace. And it's meeting people where they're at. What are they looking for? Your research shows what people look for. So, if you're up for this, I'd love to talk about general observations and research you've done around hiring. Then we'll go down into the F&B side of things, which I'm excited about because I'm having more conversations on that side of the hospitality ecosystem. There's so much potential there, and you found some really interesting things. But if we could kind of start out at a high level, looking at hiring and hospitality, I guess maybe as a starting point, one of the things you alluded to, the hiring still being a struggle in many cases. In our last conversation, we talked about referrals being an opportunity. Research that you did earlier this year showed that 88.5% of hospitality job seekers would refer friends and family to a company they previously worked for if they had a good experience, right? And that's a big yes, but many hotel leaders are still struggling with referrals. How do we create a process around this? I'd be curious to get your take on what the difference between an effective and an ineffective referral program is. How do you do this well? It's a great question.


Adam:
Hotel management can drive 40% of their hires from referrals. That's the headline. If you do this right, 40% of your hires could come from people that are already working for you. And there's all kinds of benefits. Number one, your costs to find people, your recruiting and marketing costs, all go down. It's the lowest cost hire. Second, they're two thirds more likely to be working for you in three years than someone you source externally. So there are all kinds of benefits to employer pro programs. Everyone generally would agree. Yeah, referral programs are great. My best people are referrals. It's intuitive. Well, how do you run it? Well, here's what you don't want. What you don't want is for someone to have to swing by the accounting office to ask if Bob still works in the kitchen and where's my $250 because I referred him and I told Janine and I'm not sure and I didn't, that's where people go, forget it. It's just not worth it. So you really have to make this a tech-enabled process Because you are a customer for this program, and I always think about it this way and encourage your listeners to think about it this way. My customer for this program is my employee. I'm offering a product to my employee. And that product is, I will pay you for referrals, right? You can surround yourself with people you like and respect. You want to work with people you like and respect. We'll actually pay you to help us find those people. So that's the product. A great product experience is it's very easy for me to tell you who I think you should talk to. It's very easy for me to know what happened after I refer them. It's very easy for me to know if I'm going to get paid or not. It's very easy to see that I did get paid. That is a great product experience. The great product experience, your other customer is the employee that you're trying to hire, the person, the referee. Is it easy for them to connect to you? Did you follow up quickly? Was it a pleasant conversation? Did they know I was a referral? Did I get, I want to say preferential consideration, but did I go to the top of the pile because I was a referral and I should have? If you check all those boxes, You're going to, the word's going to get out. Hey, if you refer people, you get paid. This is great, right? And this, you get people bought into this process, but they have to be able to do it in a way that works. It can't be fill out a form on the job application. It has to be something like automated texture, essentially a bot that conversationally asks for the referral, or it's a QR code that links to a referral page that's easy on a phone. That's the way you need to do it. Of course it has to link to the payroll system, you know, so you can check payment statuses and just, so, you know, so it's not an HR team nightmare of administration trying to track down whether people are still working there or not. That's usually where these things break down.


Josiah:
I like your focus on experience, right? How do you, our listeners think about, how do you create a great guest experience? If you're going to run a good hospitality business, you got to do that for your team as well, right? And your potential team members. Let's stay on this topic of making it easy because one of the other things in the research that stood out to me was nearly three-quarters of hospitality job seekers had totally abandoned applications that took too long to complete. This is crazy to me, right? So they're interested in the role. They're interested in the hotel, the company. They're saying like, I'm interested in working here. And then they just give up three out of four of them. And your research also showed that 58% won't apply if they have to repeat steps in the process. So it seems like the friction or making it uneasy is way too common here. What are kind of best practices that you've seen in streamlining this process to prevent this kind of drop off?


Adam:
We're in an industry where almost 80% of people run their entire job search process to a phone. So the first homework assignment I'd give your listeners after they're done listening to this podcast is to get out their phone and try to apply to a job at their own hotel. I think we might've talked about the last time I was on there. Like you really have to think of this like a product manager. Try to apply to a job at your own hotel and just note the, do it on a phone and note the experience. Is it easy? Is it inviting? Do I have the same experience that someone would have looking for a room? Is the brand consistent? Or am I retyping my resume with my thumbs? Does it look like I'm filling out a 1040? I mean, just note the experience there. You get seven fields on a job application before people start to abandon. Seven. Ideally it's five. And you know, when we work with hotels, we say, look, you get first name, last name, email, cell phone, you know, maybe address optional. That's it. Shorter is better. And then let technology take it forward. The other big one is if your website requires users to create a login to apply for a job, you're losing about 70% of your traffic. It'll just evaporate. And it's like having someone create a customer account to look at inventory, right? That stuff ended a long time ago, but these HR practices are still antiquated. They're run to make it easier for payroll administration. It's not going to be a red-carpet experience for the person you're trying to convince to come to work for you versus the 15 other employers they're talking to. That's how you get that right. So it's mobile-friendly. Very short applications, ideally leverage the one-click apply features that live in so many of the candidate sources in there, and just auto-populate this stuff. Don't make people rewrite things. It's all the things that you yourself would appreciate if you were applying for the role. Just audit your own process. You'll find it. You'll find the things that go, this is a pain. Maybe we should not do this anymore. I wonder how many people are abandoning the cart, as it were, in the middle of the process. It's a lot.


Josiah:
And in a world where hiring is challenging, you can't afford to do this, right? You can't afford to do this. I like the red carpet analogy. That might need to be the title of this episode, but you know, kind of red carpet analogy, red carpet recruiting. Exactly. But also kind of how you put it, just what would you want? Let's stay with that because this seems to be consistent throughout the process. Your research also showed that 69% of candidates expected communication every couple of days. I mean, that just checks out. That's what I would want. I wouldn't want it to go to some black hole and it's like, where did it go? I guess, kind of, what are some things that you've seen there on hotels communicating well? What needs to take place for that to happen?


Adam:
Yeah, it's the number one frustration of job seekers everywhere. I'm sure everybody's had this experience. You apply to a job, you never hear back. That's frustrating. Is my time worth zero? That, thank you. You go for an interview, you don't hear back for a week. Time is valuable. So is yours, presumably. Why did we waste that time? It just doesn't reflect well on your culture or your management team. So, you know, the number one thing you could do is just over-communicate. You know, and there are ways to set this up where you know, every other day, hey, just checking in. Here's the next step. We'll be back to you. We received your application. We'll be in touch, then actually be in touch. You just have to build these things into the communication cadence again, because it's what you want. And you can do all of this with automated tools. Just know what the structure is. You know, think of it like a customer and make it real. You talk to a general manager and you go, OK, well, a guest is showing up on Friday. You have this reservation on the books three months in advance. What do you do for a guest the week of arrival? Well, we send them an email on Tuesday, and then the concierge reaches out on Wednesday, and then they get the automated early check-in on Thursday for their Friday arrival. Okay, do that for employment. I mean, that's the template. Hey, you're coming in for an interview on Friday. We're so excited. Just to confirm, we look forward to seeing you Friday. On Wednesday, it's like, we're on for Friday. Here's who you're going to meet with. By the way, here's where we, you know, park here. Here's a link to the map. Then Thursday, can't wait to talk to you tomorrow. You can set these things up. You know, it works. You do it in your corporate business. Just treat your people with the same respect.


Josiah:
That's great. It seems like this red carpet recruiting approach is going to be important because another finding in the research was that there's been a decline in offer acceptance, right? So people go through the whole process, make an offer. I think your research in 2023 showed that 67% were taking that first offer. Now it's down to 49%. What's behind that? What's going on?


Adam:
There's more confidence in their employment prospects is first and foremost. Last year, rampant inflation, people falling behind. People were jumping to the next highest paying role to keep up with the wage price spiral. It was just a horrible cycle that we were in in the country. It was tough. People were jumping. That's ameliorated somewhat. Wage increases have ameliorated somewhat. People are more selective now. I think particularly from 21 to 23, and 22 is really the peak of this, it was like, I'm going to grab the pay. I'm just going to grab the pay. You're going to have to pay me more, period. And wages went up 28% or whatever over a two-year period in our industry. And some of that was mandated, regulatory, municipal wage laws, and things like that. It was mostly just the market. And I think people learned a lesson. I mean, it certainly comes through in our research. There is a value placed on culture, well-being, and flexibility. So now it's more like, okay, I appreciate that you're interested in employing me, but is this the best thing for me? You know, how will this alter my life for the better? Is this more than just a paycheck? Do I like the people I'm working with? I mean, these are what they're saying in the research is like, enhance the offer beyond just pay. So make it more than a paycheck. Give me flexibility and show me a career path. Those are the things. And I will wait for the offer that gives me those things. So you can be a little more thoughtful as an employer in your process, but you need to have something different and special in order to really win in this market.


Josiah:
I'm glad you outlined that because this is not just about getting people in the door. It's about keeping them, keeping them engaged. And I think all those factors you outlined will be key for that. Something in the study also stood out to me: 81 percent of hospitality workers would consider returning to a previous employer. Two things stand out there. One is you probably have team members that could be recruited back to another hotel, another company. Right. So you can't just rest on your laurels. And two, it seems that investing in that overall experience is going to be really key right? So that you can kind of encourage those referrals we talked about earlier. Is there anything, I guess, specifically on this notion of kind of maintaining relationships with, I don't know if you want to call it like an alumni network, but how can our listeners think about that?


Adam:
Yeah. It's CRM for recruitment is how you think about it. You know, these folks work for you for whatever reason, as long as they're eligible for re-hire and, you know, they didn't do anything crazy that would make you not want to employ them again. Why lose touch? They've already worked for you. The grass is rarely greener and maybe they regret leaving, maybe they liked it. Why not check in? Keep them posted on what's going on. It's very easy to go into your database, it's structured properly, to say give me every six months on the anniversary of their termination date or exit date, check in with an email. Hey, we wanted to let you know We have opportunity here. If your circumstances have changed, we'd love to have you consider coming back. Here's a link to our current openings. It takes nothing. There's no effort. So why spend thousands of dollars advertising openings to the market when you've got a 70% turnover rate? You've got a lead list. They work for you before some percentage, as it turns out, 80% plus would go to work for you again if they had a good experience. You know, if they left for whatever life circumstance or a little bit more money, you don't know why it costs nothing to try. You know, that's where I'd start because it's worth it. So again, it's referral programs. It's, you know, alumni networks. I know lots of groups that, you know, those set up a alumni network on LinkedIn and, you know, they're, We do that in Irology. It's just something that you should do. Find a home for people who have that shared life experience. Flexible return options. You want to pick up a couple of shifts a week. Do you have opportunities for part-time work? Maybe they'd want to pick up a little more, you know, more hours, nights, or weekends, or those tough shifts, or maybe I'm open to doing that night auditor role without leaving my current employer. You never know. The problem is you're not asking, you know, so think about it a little bit differently. And then I think the final thing is you got to tell the story. Find people that have boomeranged and showcase them on your career site. I left, it sucked, I came back, I'm happy. Like that's the template.


Josiah:
It comes back to thinking about this almost like in sales and marketing as you would do for any other context. You're telling a story, right? Why here? Why now? But you also mentioned something that I think stands out to me in the sense that it doesn't cost anything else. That's true if you're using great technology like you have at Hierology, because this is the power of technology because you can build in this automation. You can kind of think about it once, you can build it once and then just let it run, right? And I feel like this is the big opportunity we have.


Adam:
It really is. I mean, there is We are working as fast as we can to automate as much of the friction to remove it as possible. That's the human, I have the intention as a human being to provide a great experience to candidates. And that runs into the reality as my job, my job as a HR leader, general manager at a property. I just don't have time to do it all. So my intentions are pure, but my reality is, by reality and I just can't do this consistently, technology can do these things. That's really the solution to this. In the same way it has been the solution in guest services and reservations, all of these concepts are almost quite literally lift and transfer it into your recruiting and talent acquisition process. Work a funnel, work your relationships, call your prior customers, try to win them back. It's just a constant cadence and adding value to the listener. I'm reaching out to you with some opportunities you may want to consider. Or, hey, did you know we just added employment reimbursement policy? Or, hey, you know, we're sending all of our people in this role to this training at the AHLA Foundation. We've just added that portfolio of learning. Come take advantage of it. I mean, you just, it's product design is really what this is.


Josiah:
I love it. I want to shift tracks slightly and talk about food and beverage. And for me, this is really exciting because I have been having conversations across the ecosystem from developers thinking about food and beverage as a way to make their real estate, their investment more valuable to operators, you think about kind of this being a magnet for people in the community, it can be a great revenue driver, it can create a hotspot. So it feels like F&B in hospitality is hot, especially within hotels. What prompted you to do a deep dive research into F&B specifically?


Adam:
Well, it's such, I mean, it's a profit driver. for our customers. It was like, we can't just pay attention to the hotel side of the business and serve our customers in the way that they really need us to serve them. I mean, your whole service operations have an F&B component that's material. And it's not just the front of the house customer experience. I mean, a number of conversations I had at the F&B committee meeting at the HLA conference was all about the logistics of procurement and group buying and all of the things that really make F&B work is just getting better prices on your inputs. All of that is so important, particularly as you get scale. But what was interesting is we found that you know, if I work in a, if I'm in the F and B business, if I'm a career restaurant worker, hotel restaurants are the number one preferred option on the list, period. So the workforce would prefer to work at a hotel restaurant than an independent standalone restaurant by about a factor of 20%. So 28% would prefer to work in a hotel environment versus 22% at an independent restaurant. And the reason that jumped out of this research was all about wage and schedule stability. For whatever reason, this may be true or not true, I can't prove that this is or is not true, but the opinion of the workforce is that hotel F&B operations provide more stable hours and predictable shifts than independent restaurants. So that may or may not be true, but the market thinks it's true. So if the market thinks it's true, check is, you know, is that actually true for us? And then use that as your sales lever. I mean, that's the, what's the product we're designing. Hey, we're looking for experienced hospitality workers, bartenders, servers, cooks, procurement, whatever it is. We're going to offer you stability and flexibility. So stay in the business you love, but do it in a way that meets your needs. That's a pretty darn good message. You're selling income stability and predictability and flexibility. Those are all very good things to sell. And the market thinks we have that. So I would lever the heck out of that. Second, Our industry offers better non-monetary compensation. Better benefits and bonuses, generally better career opportunities, better health insurance, better time off and retirement plans. Hotels have a larger revenue scale. A restaurant is a lot less likely to fail in a hotel than it is you know, on the corner. I mean, just it's a healthier business. It's a better life if you're in this industry. There's my soapbox. But, you know, that's why I think those things are true for people.


Josiah:
What's interesting, I think it's true for experienced talent, as you mentioned, but the research also showed that it's very appealing to younger talent too, right? Gen Z and millennial workers are also more attracted to F&B positions than the overall average. So it seems, I mean, for all the reasons that you mentioned, it feels like this is an opportunity across the board to double down on. And I guess it just, I mean, hearing you, it just underscores everything we've talked about so far. Make it easy, give options, look for kind of perks that you can provide to sweeten the deal.


Adam:
Exactly. And there's a trend, I mean, not to get too philosophical here, but this trend towards maximizing flexibility for the workforce is pervading all sectors. Whether you're a white-collar technology company, you know, hiring degreed college professionals and engineers like us, or whether you're hiring someone at the front desk to work on shifts, overwhelmingly job category by job category, the workforce expects more flexibility. There is no maximum flexibility in driving Uber or delivering Instacart. I can work whenever I want. I pick up a shift, get paid, and I'm done. Our industry offers a pretty close second. Shift work in this business it's kind of the way it is in F&B. So if I, in this generation, prioritize its flexibility more than any other in the past across all segments, and someone's entry-level is not sure what they want to do, they know they don't want the office job, they know they want more stability than working on the apps, we're the solution for that. We are the solution for that. It's cash tips. It's shift flexibility. You can generally pick the hours you want. You can pick the environment you want. If you like working with people, you like providing service, you like the food and beverage industry, you like hotels, there's a lot to sell here. I think we undersell it.


Josiah:
That's great. Yeah, I love the advice to sell and make the case more effectively than we have been. But I think it's also good to kind of look at the Ubers or the DoorDashes of the world because there is this base level where it's like if you don't have almost like these hygiene factors in place, right, then there are these other options. But if you do it well, you could be more compelling. Right. And I think that in a In this constant war for talent, this is important to remember.


Adam:
Yeah, you have to understand, you're competing not for all categories, but for most categories, your competitor isn't the next hotel. The competitor is the apps. It's working for myself. It's being an influencer. It's doing whatever else I can do to make the money I need to make that doesn't require me to contort by itself to whatever working environment you think is a good one. I don't have to agree with that. I have options. And so you're competing with maximum flexibility. And how you compete with maximum flexibility, but also maximum instability, is to give more stability with flexibility. That's how this industry competes with pure app-based shift or gig-based economic opportunity, is we lever up on stability in career path, in training, in a team, in a culture, in a brand, and those things that the right people really care about.


Josiah:
And to that notion of right people, I think another thing that stood out to me from the research was the sense of loyalty, right? Where I think if it's done well, you're creating this very compelling working environment. I've anecdotally picked this up in conversations, both among leaders and students, people who are considering careers, that some people, they actually want to work in hospitality. They're actually oriented that way. They see it as attractive. So if you can do this well, your research also suggests that there's a good chance that you can keep them around. This is worth investing, getting people on the door and treating them well so they stay with you and can build their careers as they're helping you run a great business.


Adam:
That's right. We undersell the opportunity here. I think, let me just say it this way, parents misunderstand the opportunity for kids going to hospitality programs. They go like, really? That seems like a tough business. People don't understand that you can come out of one of these programs and in five, six, seven years be making six figures and running a property. You can do this. There is no greater path to economic upward mobility than working in this business. I mean, You can be successful. It's hard work and service and attitude and just being diligent and learning the trade. This industry offers that, and I would love to see us sell it better because we need it in this country. And we need the workforce. So, you know, I, I think when people understand what this industry offers, once they get it, they're in it and it's benefiting them, that loyalty comes and it's why people stay in it for 30, 40 years because you get in it and it, and it's real and it works. It's not easy, but it is very rewarding. And I think we should be selling that all day long instead of we have jobs. We need to sell career opportunity, stability, flexibility, and the fun of the business that we're all in, which can sometimes be not fun, but that's every job.


Josiah:
Absolutely. Well, I would, before we go, I want to get into kind of helping people plan for the year ahead. But before we get to that, I mean, these two studies we've been referencing are each over 30 pages long. There's so many data points we could be talking for hours here, and we'll link in the show notes where people can download those. But just before we get into planning for the year ahead, is there any other data points or kind of things that you want our listeners to know about, or should we talk about planning for the year ahead?


Adam:
Well, I'll tell you this. This is not a short-term thing. This is a long-term thing. We are entering a period where there will be fewer entry-level workers entering the workforce over the next 10 years. That's just demographics. The US population is generally in peaking phase right now. And the entry-level workforce is just going to get progressively smaller as the birth rate declines. The economy is going to grow. The number of people available for work is going to shrink. Those are going to work in opposition over the next decade. Problems not coming away. You've got to have a solution for it. And, you know, as you think about next year, how do you prepare? What I'm telling people is just audit your current process. Get out your phone, apply to a job. Note the experience. Does anyone get back to you? Secret shop your whole process. Is day one great for a new hire? Is their first day exceptional? If not, why not? How do we make that first day exceptional? Just fundamental questions we can answer that make a real difference that don't require budget approval. You just have to put the intention into doing these things. And now's the time to take stock of that. It really will change your performance as a business.


Josiah:
I appreciate everything you've shared throughout this conversation because you've kind of outlined what's taking place over the last couple of years, looked at the market and the options that workers have today, and then looked into the future years or decades to come and how this will play out. So, this is the time to invest in this process. It's a time to get better. Not only will it help you win today but in years to come. I would love to get into some action items for our listeners before we go, maybe in two categories. One would be the property-level general manager who is reading this research. And I'm just kind of thinking of some of the advice that you've given. You just mentioned, you know, take out your phone, you know, sort of go through that process yourself. Are there any other action items for the property-level general manager who wants to get better at this?


Adam:
If you're a GM and you and your management team are struggling to hire people, the first thing you need to determine is whether you are going fast enough. Are you running the process fast enough? So here's what matters: what we call hiring velocity. It's how quickly you get to people and get them through the process. So, there are two KPIs to track as you enter the new year. Number one, how long does it take for us to get back to a candidate after they apply? If that number is more than 72 hours, just get it within 72 hours. You will double your response rate. It will dramatically and positively affect your results. Just go faster. Get back to people quicker. And if people are interviewing within five days of applying, you're good. If it takes longer than five days to get people in for their first conversation, that's the second thing you do. Do those two things. Changes the game. You're just operating better than the other employers out there. That's it. As a GM, I would put it in your management KPIs, frankly, application review rate and time to the first interview, track those two things. It's, it, it solves so many downstream problems. That's very specific, but that's what I, if a GM was telling me, how would I, how do you measure it? I'd say those are your two metrics.


Josiah:
That's great. If you're a corporate leader, imagine that applies even more, right? I'm thinking about the challenges or the opportunities of doing this at scale. I think metrics and tracking become even more important. So I imagine this applies in that context. Any advice that is specifically for a corporate leader who wants to get better organizationally at hiring?


Adam:
Well, I mean, any hotel group, whether managing properties or operating your own, is not one business. It's a collection of businesses, and they're all localized, and talent markets are localized. And so if you have a horizontal technology solution that treats your business like a monolith, you're not getting the insights you need to spend your time and resources wisely. You have to know what's happening at the property level to manage by exception. Do you know which five hiring managers are the slowest to review applicants across your portfolio? Do you know which five properties have the fastest time to first interviews so you can investigate what they're doing right and share those best practices? Do you have an early warning system for when something's about to slide off the road regarding recruitment where you will have to intervene? You have to have that operating transparency, and it just requires a partner who understands the tech required to do that stuff. And so corporate HR is all about whack-a-mole and triaging issues at the property level before they turn into big problems. And you just have to have that location-level visibility to do it. It's a very specific answer, but corporate leadership, if you're hearing, we have a recruiting issue. You have to dig into it at the property level. The only way to do that is if you have the data. If you don't have the data and you're really just telling stories, it's not helpful. So that would be my New Year's resolution is, is to make sure I know where we're at, and that I'm tracking the things I want to improve.


Josiah:
I love it. I like specific advice, so I appreciate you sharing that, Adam. For people who want to learn more about the research that you've done across this area, where can they access these reports and learn more about Hireology?


Adam:
Yeah. Hireology.com. All of our applicant studies are available in the content there for free. Take, distribute. Anyone on our team would be happy to talk with you about these things and share with you industry benchmarks and your best practices. All of that's available on our website, and I know you'll link the study here in this episode.


Josiah:
Absolutely. Adam, thank you so much for taking the time to explain all of this and for teaching us all.


Adam:
You're very welcome. Thanks for having me back.