The relevance of meaningful employee experience in the hospitality and event industry

The relevance of meaningful employee experience in the hospitality and event industry project focuses on the hospitality industry, which covers services related to tourism and catering as well as services related to the production of events and experiences. The project is national and its implementation period is two years.

The relevance of meaningful employee experience in the hospitality and event industry project focuses on the hospitality industry, which covers services related to tourism and catering as well as services related to the production of events and experiences. The project is national and its implementation period is two years.

The hospitality and event industry is characterized by non-standard working relationships, seasonal work, part-time work, fluctuations in workload and irregular working hours. Many employees have left the industry and there is a critical shortage of manpower and skills in the industry nationwide. According to MaRa ry's Vitriini magazine (2022), the labour shortage has been punishing companies in the tourism and restaurant industry for years, and the situation has worsened with the coronavirus. The industry needs practical measures to promote attraction and retention factors and to increase leadership and recruitment skills. Several surveys and studies have shown the differences between generations and the challenges of engaging and managing young people in the hospitality and event industry. The younger generation needs meaningful content in their work. Experiencing significance is valuable in itself, but it is also connected to commitment to the workplace, as stated in Työpiste (2023), the online magazine of The Finnish Institute of Occupational Health (FIOH).

The main goal of the project is to strengthen the attraction and retention power of the hospitality and event industry by means of meaningful employee experience and related management skills, especially from the perspective of the Y and Z generations. The sub-goals are to identify the development needs related to the meaningful employee experience in the hospitality and events industry, to strengthen the leadership skills and employee understanding of the managers, to especially strengthen the prerequisites for the Y and Z generations to be at work and the company's recruitment skills (attraction and retention power of the industry), and to introduce the operating models and tools developed in the project to the project's target groups for use.

The main result of the project is a scalable operating model (electronic guide) to strengthen the understanding and competence of the meaningful employee experience of companies and managers operating in the hospitality and event industry, especially from the perspective of the Y and Z generations. The guide contains industry-specific development paths created in the project to support companies, examples of the industry's leader personas and employee profiles, tools tested in the project, and a model for strengthening recruitment skills and prerequisites to be at work. The project also creates other publications and mutual cooperation and networks of the participants in the project. All those interested in the matter are welcome to the national webinars implemented during the project.

The project's measures will strengthen cooperation between higher education institutions operating in the regions of Päijät-Häme, South Karelia, Pirkanmaa and Lapland, and companies in the hospitality and event industry as well as other actors (regional TE services, organizations, etc.) across regional borders. The operation and results of the project will improve the employment of generations Y and Z in the long term and the conditions for being at work in the hospitality and event industry (management, recruitment, meaningfulness of work). At the same time, the industry's attraction and retention power develop.