Attraction and retention strategies – Queensland Tourism Industry Council video

[Daniel Gschwind – QTIC]

The current labour market is exceptionally competitive right across the economy, including in tourism and hospitality. The labour-intensive industry is really challenged to make sure we have enough staff with enough skills in our industry.

We have to offer not just secure employment, we have to offer careers, long-term opportunities. We have to tap into every labour pool there is and have a real value proposition for prospective staff. Many people don't understand, they still see tourism and hospitality as a job that you have before you get a real job.

The reality is much different, we have hundreds of thousands of jobs in this sector in Queensland alone, and they offer enormous opportunity to build long-term and sustainable careers.

With the support of the Queensland Government, we've been able to set up a career roadshow now for Queensland that will travel throughout the state and bring together employers with real jobs with potential employees, both young people who are leaving school in the next 2 years, but also current jobseekers.

We have so far delivered 4 career shows in Brisbane and 3 in regional Queensland. We have 9 on the program and then the others will be rolled out over the course of this year.

[Anita Russell – Emporium Hotel]

So the Emporium was involved in the QTIC roadshow. We had a lot of students and job seekers who actually came through the hotel. We gave them a tour right through back of house area. During the site visit, I also got the opportunity to talk to the students and jobseekers coming through.

From doing these events I've got a great success story. It was actually from the roadshow last year that we held where I met Mia Arnold. She knew she wanted to do hospitality as a career. We brought her in and interviewed her here at the hotel, and we ended up hiring her as a school-based trainee.

So while she was at school, she was employed here one day a week and on weekends. She since finished Year 12 and now is employed with us on a permanent basis. And actually, she doesn't know this yet, but this week we're going to be announcing that she has just won our Team Member of the Month for the month of February and it's voted by team members.

[Mia Arnold – Emporium Hotel]

I went to the expo and I got to look around at different hospitality opportunities. Then I got to come here and do a site visit of the hotel where I met Anita. And then that led me into this job.

[Anita Russell]

Talking to students about my career and the opportunities I've had, I can see the light in their eyes when they see, wow, I can really do this too. The career opportunities, the travel that you can do. The sky's the limit.

[Daniel Gschwind]

So one very important aspect of this program is to not only attract people to the industry but also keep them in the industry. What we've done is we've added a micro-credentialing program to give employers an opportunity to make available to their staff, upskilling opportunity that are easy to access and not disrupting the business.

We have delivered to 480 employers who signed up for the program, more than 16,000 lessons already for their staff. It has proven to be an exceptionally effective tool and also give more long-term career prospects to the employees.

Australia has a very strong brand as a great place to visit, as a place with great experiences. But we have to be able to deliver those experiences consistently across the board with top skills. It is the only thing that we can really do to keep our industry, our businesses, and our state at the forefront of a prosperous tourism industry.