Travel agents have been urged to widen their talent pool and recruit staff from other customer-facing professions such as hairdressing or coffee shops.
Speaking at a workshop at The Advantage Travel Partnership’s annual conference, Gail Kenny, founder of travel recruitment firm Gail Kenny Executive Recruitment and Best Workplaces in Travel, told agents to “think outside travel” to solve current staff shortages.
The message came as the consortium’s latest business impact survey, conducted in April this year, showed 47% of members were worried about staffing their businesses while 38% said they were taking on employees with no travel experience in order to fill staffing gaps.
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Kenny said: “Don’t just recruit for experience – look beyond that. Has this person got the ability to do this job longer term and the right mindset?”
She said travel firms needed to consider all ages across different demographics, stressing the opportunities to employ over-50s, disabled people, working mums, career returners, and young people.
Jennifer Lynch, general manager, ArrangeMY Escape, said difficulty recruiting staff had led her to look outside the sector to employee staff for two-branch agency in Worcester and Malvern.
She said: “Recruitment has been the biggest challenge. We need people to hit the ground running but it’s not realistic, especially in rural locations, so we have recruited new members of staff that are from other industries.
“While it is hard, if you put the time and effort in, it will pay off. They bring in new ideas to the business, and having staff of different ages can attract new customers and help your business grow.”
Lynch said one of her new recruits was a hairdresser who had “the right qualities for the job and a passion for travel”.
“This is almost worth more than someone who had been in travel for 20 years. It’s the attitude you want in your business,” she added. “Where are we going to be as an industry if we continue to ask and demand experience?”
Travel Bureau joint managing director Jeanne Lally said she had asked a lady who works in a local coffee shop if she was interested in working in travel.
“This lady knows every customer’s name,” she said, adding: “I think it’s really empowering to recruit from outside the industry. It’s about attitude and aptitude. The people are not there so you have to look over your shoulder.”
Blue Cube Travel operations director Tracy Wilson said one of her business travel agency’s staff had come from McDonald’s and had no experience of working in travel. “She’s flying now,” she said.
Kenny agreed: “Anyone who is working with people and has good great customer service and the mindset to help people is what you want; whether it’s someone serving sandwiches in Pret a Manger or big macs in McDonald’s.”
She also urged firms to be transparent on pay, using salary bands to manage expectations from people with varying levels of experience.
Pictured: Gail Kenny, founder of travel recruitment firm Gail Kenny Executive Recruitment