Are our industry challenges all about data? People Leaders not having the clout they deserve is a problem… Our Founder, Abi shares her thoughts below:

The stories of a toxic culture, lowballed budgets, and insufficient ‘people clout’ come at me in droves.

People departments are frustrated that, although their voices have moved higher up the agenda in the last two years, it remains a battle to get a well-needed headcount and or to impact culture.

It’s not often I hear a tale of a people department that has truly convinced the board of its significance. Who has proven to the decision-makers that investment in people has an ROI? Where boards prioritise people as they genuinely share the belief that people will make or break their operation.

Of course, it shouldn’t be that hard. We know there is a direct link between revenue, guest satisfaction, employee turnover and employee engagement, right?

So why is it so difficult to prove our case?

As a mentor, coach, friend, and recruiter to hundreds of people leaders over the years, I see their plight. I hear their frustrations. For many though, when pushed on data, their arguments simply don’t stack up. Evidence feels weak and gut feeling prevails.

In some cases, we simply have no data. Arguing cases for budget or headcount based on anecdotal evidence and whims. Sometimes it works. But by no means does it feel like a war has been one. Simply the current battle in the current timeframe.

In other cases, we have data. We measure annual turnover, we measure 90-day turnover, and we have our engagement scores. We can see patterns and know whether we are better or worse than last year and can no doubt give ourselves a pat on the back for having what looks like some great measures compared to the hell pit of recruitment that was 2021/22 season.

But how do we really know whether that’s any good?

Is 30% ‘less than 12-week turnover’ good? Is it better or worse than my competitors? Is 100% employee turnover good? Are we crazy concluding ‘that’s just hospitality’? Is it?

But more than that, in our own operations what do these stats correlate against? How do I create a business case for my increased budget or headcount? Are the sites with the best employee engagement delivering the best customer experience? Are the sites with the lowest management turnover producing the best like-for-like sales? Is low employee turnover producing increased EBITDA?

So. Many. Questions. Why aren’t we evidencing this?

Six recent conversations with people directors led me to believe there are several reasons. Access to accurate data appears problematic, multiple HR systems that aren’t integrated sound frustrating, concern over anomalies is real, and firefighting in the operation not allowing for strategic thinking plays a role. Then there are the people leaders who just haven’t thought about it yet.

I imagine for many it’s a combination.

But imagine if we did.

If every time we went to the board with a budget request or headcount plea, we got a bit fat yes. A big fat yes because we could prove, without question, that the sites that have lower turnover, higher engagement, and better training scores are high performance when it comes to like4likes/payroll/profit.

Imagine if every conversation we had about people experience, people budget, and people strategy was based on data.

I guess this sounds obvious, and you may well work for a large organisation that of course bases all their decisions on data. But for the SMEs, it doesn’t feel like the norm. It’s not according to our conversations. And don’t get me started on awareness of people data at the site level….

But the good news. The future is data. We have more data now than ever before. We can prove or disprove anything, and I can only hope that as our beautiful industry grows over the coming years, so does our obsession with people data.