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Switch to homeworking model enabled USAirtours to ‘raise our game’

USAirtours chief executive Guy Novik has credited the decision to switch to a homeworking business model with giving the company access to a national recruitment pool.

Speaking at Travel Weekly’s People Summit, he urged travel firms to embrace hybrid working in order to recruit staff.

The tour operator closed its east London offices a few months into the pandemic in 2020. All staff have continued to work from home since.

Novik attributed the move to homeworking for giving the company access to a far wider range of potential new recruits nationwide.

He said: “Where we were based in east London, parking was difficult and it was difficult to recruit. We now see ourselves as a national employer. We have raised our game.

“We have not changed our salary offering; what we offered in London is perhaps more attractive to people in other parts of the UK.”

The last 20 members of staff taken on by the company “do not live anywhere near London”, added Novik.

He urged other firms to look at their business models. “Organisations that don’t embrace hybrid working will find themselves recruiting from a diminishing pool of talent,” he warned.

But he added: “You have to invest in your line managers because engaging and inspiring people remotely is more difficult.”

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