The hospitality industry is experiencing a labor shortage because of changes brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic, said Highline Professor Justin Taillon.

Taillon, who is program manager for the Hospitality and Tourism Management Department at Highline, said the industry has experienced many changes over the last year, but one of the biggest has been the newly increased number of job openings. 

“On the frontlines, this is the strongest job market I’ve ever seen in my whole life,” he said. “We shut down our whole industry for a couple of months, but the employees couldn’t just not work, and our government officials weren’t taking care of them effectively, so they left our industry. Now, getting those people back has been very difficult.” 

As a result, students are having a much easier time finding work, said Taillon.

“There’s never been a labor shortage like I’ve seen right now,” he said. “Any time any of my students want a job, I get them hired within hours.” 

Taillon said there are different levels to the industry. 

“Ownership groups of hotels exist for the purpose of short-term real estate investment, not operations, and they look at hotels and restaurants as cash flow,” he said. “It’s not for the betterment of community, or frontline workers, or any of that.”

These groups have been hurt by the pandemic more than most other people in the industry, he said, but this doesn’t directly impact him or his students.

“I’m certainly not opening a $60 million hotel,” said Taillon, “And I doubt any of my students are in the next year either, so we’re not really concerned with ownership groups.”

He said despite what many people think, the hospitality industry is doing well, and this misconception may have something to do with the voices people are hearing, mostly ownership groups.

“That’s who controls the narrative you read in newspapers and media and that kind of stuff,” Taillon said. “When the Seattle Times wants to interview somebody, they call Marriot, Hilton, whoever, they don’t walk into a hotel and interview the front desk manager. No one is hearing this voice, it’s going unheralded in mainstream media, and it’s a little frustrating to me.”

He said even though the ownership groups are making less money, they’re doing fine in the grand scheme of things.

“We’re not in trouble,” said Taillon. “Our hotels in Seattle are running about 55 percent [capacity], give or take the day, and hotels usually break even around 45-50 percent, so these people are still making money.”

He broke it down further, saying different kinds of hotels have seen different degrees of success throughout the pandemic. 

“The luxury market is doing badly — that’s Four Seasons, Fairmont, Thompson hotels, W hotels — they’re not doing well, but those are $250 million hotels,” Taillon said. “They’re not normal hotels. Most of our hotels are in the mid-scale, and economy market — Residence Inn, Courtyard Inn, Aloft, Motel 6, Super 8 — and those are doing really well.” 

He said a friend of his owns the Best Western in Auburn and that hotel is frequently fully booked, which is just one example of how mid-scale hotels are still doing well, despite the pandemic.

One reason why the luxury hotels have been struggling is because of the demographic they attract, he said.

“What we’re missing now is the business market,” said Taillon. “The business travelers aren’t doing it and they probably won’t come back for a year and a half because of the way budgeting works in companies. Therefore, Four Seasons won’t be doing OK until 2023, but that’s fine.”

He said because hotels like Four Seasons have so much money in assets, they can easily survive another year or two while the business travel market slowly regains some sense of normalcy.

Taillon said the pandemic has forced him and his students to change the way they learn and interact with one another. 

“Everybody’s outgoing and we love seeing each other and working together, we’re all teamwork and collaboration-oriented people, and then COVID forced us onto Zoom,” he said. “And it’s horrible for our personalities. It’s horrible for who we are as people that we can’t see each other or communicate the same way.” 

He said the change has been tough for his department as many of his students are training to work in the hospitality industry 

“We’re all in school to learn what we need to know after we graduate,” Taillon said. “For us, it’s about how to communicate face-to-face, to excel in managing people. How do you excel in reading body language when I can’t even see your body? How do you excel in managing people when we’re not even in a room together?”

While Highline’s overall enrollment numbers have gone down in recent months, Taillon said his department has actually seen nearly a 10 percent increase in FTEs.

“Our department has gone up, but a lot of that has to do with who we are,” he said. “A lot of individuals are having a hard time moving to online because they have to communicate differently. We communicate as our job. That’s what we teach, that’s what we do, so Zoom in terms of actual communication hasn’t been that hard.”

Taillon said the reason for this may be the fact that his department simply isn’t like many other departments.

“Being on the prof-tech side instead of the gen-ed side, it makes us more flexible,” he said. “Our job is to prepare students for the workforce, not to get students off to a four-year college. Our entire purpose for existing is different which I think has helped us.” 

The pivot to Zoom and remote learning has brought on some unexpected benefits, said Taillon, citing decreased drive time and more time to help students as a result.

“I’m just on Zoom like 12 hours a day, and I’ve been doing it for over a year and I’m not getting tired,” he said. “I’m able to work more with students than I’ve ever been able to simply because I don’t have to worry about cars anymore.”

He also said working through Zoom has given him a chance to interact with students from all over the world.

“We have students signing up for classes from Alabama, Maryland, Texas, Hawaii, and I’ve got students in China, Japan, Korea, and probably more I’m forgetting,” said Taillon. “I have students in Indonesia right now, and I can set meetings up with them at like 10 p.m. because I’m in my house anyway.”

He said this communication with people from different cultures is an essential aspect of his job and all jobs in the hospitality industry.

Taillon said in the months to come he’s hoping to get back on campus, and because of his department’s involvement with Highline’s food and beverage operation, he may have an unexpected advantage. 

“While some students will have trouble finding classes on campus, we’re teaching our coursework inside the coffee shop, the Fireside lounge, and we have our own classroom inside Building 23,” he said.

The classroom in question — which is home to such unconventional items as wine bottles, an espresso machine, and a bed — relies on tangible, hands-on learning experiences that can’t be replicated through a computer, he said.

“I don’t want to show people how to do all of this anymore on Zoom,” said Taillon. “Teaching wine tasting online is really just two people drinking alone in their room, and it’s weird. It’s a lot better to teach these skills hands-on, with the machines, with body language, communication, and teamwork. That’s what I want.”

If you’re interested in learning more about the Hospitality and Tourism Management Department at Highline, you can visit their website here.