Higher revenues, organizational growth, and an aspirational vision — the fastest way to achieve these goals is through your employees, particularly in hospitality settings where front-line positions such as front desk staff, concierge/guest services, and restaurant and room service staff play a critical role. Employee development is essential for the long-term success of hospitality organizations. 

Employees who feel they are being developed will produce at a higher rate than those who do not. Furthermore, 87% of Millennials say “professional or career growth and development opportunities are important to them in a job.” Unfortunately, only 29% of organizations have a clear learning development plan for their employees. 

Why Do Hotels Struggle To Develop Front-Line Hospitality Employees? 

Leaders must take the time to understand their employee’s individual strengths and weaknesses, and their unique long-term aspirations. So, how do leaders assess these aspects? 

First, leaders should use a talent assessment to understand their employee’s strengths and weaknesses. Second, they should have one-on-one career development discussions, focused on their unique career aspirations. This blog will focus specifically on recognizing talent and setting goals using talent assessments. 

Use Talent Assessments to Gain a Comprehensive Understanding of Employees 

A hospitality assessment that evaluates strengths and weaknesses is essential to understanding the whole employee. Most selection and development tools focus on the skills, knowledge and experience of hospitality workers. While these are important to know and understand, our research shows they account for only about 50% of the variance. 

For a complete picture of the employee, the key for leaders is to use a talent-based assessment. Talent assessments examine the thoughts, feelings, and behaviors of front-line hospitality employees. These include traits like: 

• Guest Centricity 
• Positivity 
• Work-Ethic 
• Service 

When a leader understands these talents — the foundational, unique strengths of the employee — a leader can use them to maximize their success and contribution to the hospitality organization. 

Celebrate Employee Talents 

Leaders can focus on development with yearly goal-setting sessions with each of their direct reports. The goals should represent each employee’s aspirations and should be based on two main aspects: 

• The team member’s talents 
• Their knowledge and skills 

Leaders should use assessments to understand and maximize the unique strengths of employees, then coach them using feedback from those assessments. Talent Plus offers talent assessments for hospitality organizations and at every level of employee. For example, Talent Plus offers the Front of House Talent Online ® Assessment TOA ® specifically designed for front-line hospitality employees 

The Talent Card Shows an Employee’s Top 5 Talent Themes 

The Front of House Talent Online Assessment questions are associated with one of 15 talent themes. Once the TOA is completed, the leader and the employee can both access a report that celebrates the employee’s top five talent themes. This report is the Talent Card ®. 

From a strengths-based approach, the Talent Card focuses on employees’ greatest strengths and how to grow each one. Now, it is key that the leader (and employee) focus on developing those strengths. 

All fifteen themes in the Front of House TOA contribute to employee’s overall talent. But our research shows, the top five themes contribute about 55-60% of their overall strengths. Therefore, by focusing on these top five strengths, the leader and employee will see a greater return on their investment. 

Create Goals Using Each of the Top 5 Strengths 

Creating goals for each strength is the most important part. The Talent Card guides the way for the leader to create these goals. 

When an individual receives a Talent Card, they can click on one of the themes to expand each talent. This reveals two sections: 

• How this talent may be exhibited in their work 
• How to grow this talent 

Each section contains three points. Using the “grow this talent” section, the leader might ask the employee, “Which one of the three points most resonates with you as an area of opportunity?” That is, which one of the statements does the staff member want to focus on to grow, and why? 

After an individual selects the statement they want to focus on, leaders should encourage them to follow these three steps: 

1. Form a goal around that statement. Formulate a relevant, timely (within a year), and attainable goal. 
2. Create a measurable outcome. This is key. For the goal to be successful, there must be a measurement. “Trying harder” is not enough. 
3. Two to four process steps to reach the goal. That is, what are the key steps to create a successful goal? 

Don’t Forget to Review Goals 

It is important for leaders to ask their employees to submit their goals for review. In many cases, unfortunately, employees and leaders utilize goal-setting activities only for remedial reasons (like improving a certain skill) and fail to create a specific goal with a measurable outcome. 

Instead, leaders should have quarterly follow-up meetings with employees to monitor the success of their goals. This helps to accelerate individual’s natural talents and develop them into leaders. 

Use The Talent Card to Understand Strengths 

With this process — having employees identify their strengths through a talent assessment, and developing their strengths through the Talent Card — individuals have an opportunity to grow their strengths and enjoy a more rewarding career. 

Your hospitality organization will benefit by retaining talented, enthusiastic employees who grow into leaders. And as always, Talent Plus is here to help you accomplish this!