The hospitality and tourism sector in the Philippines is grappling with challenges in retaining employees as many workers seek better-paying jobs abroad, according to an industry group.
The Hotel Sales & Marketing Association (HSMA) highlighted the issue during a press conference for the upcoming 2nd HSMA Sales & Marketing Summit. HSMA President Loleth So, who is also the Group Commercial Director of Megaworld Hotels & Resorts, emphasized in an ABS-CBN report the difficulty in not only hiring new workers but also in retaining them.
“It’s the retention program of the hotels. How do you keep the employees in hotels happy and not only happy, but content enough to stay where they are and continue to work with the hotel,” So said.
HSMA is developing a program to attract workers to the hospitality sector and reduce the rate of resignations. The group noted that many employees are drawn to higher-paying opportunities abroad, including cruise ships and countries like the Middle East and Japan, which have recently increased their recruitment of Filipino hotel workers.
“The deficit is coming from a lot of our colleagues going abroad. The Middle East has been getting a lot from us, even Japan, surprisingly, despite the language barrier,” said HSMA Director Jenny Gabon-Santillan, who is also the Sales & Marketing Director of City of Dreams Manila.
Additionally, some tourism workers are shifting to other industries that offer work-from-home setups, which most hotels cannot provide.
These challenges, along with new industry trends such as the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in digitizing hotel services, will be discussed at the summit in June, which will be attended by around 300 hotel officials and representatives.
“AI is currently helping the industry digitize itself in a lot of ways like chatbots, robots that serve, but it will never ever replace marketing people,” said HSMA Director Agnes Pacis, who is also the Vice President for Commercial of the SM Hotels and Conventions Corp.
Despite these workforce challenges, the group remains optimistic about the sector’s growth, anticipating a more dynamic 2025 following the normalization of travel demand post-pandemic.
