Your wanderlust is helping with the recovery of jobs in a field severely impacted by the pandemic-related lockdowns. The travel and tourism sector has experienced a robust rebound, increasing its net workforce, a sign that it has emerged from the pandemic’s long shadow.
According to data collected by specialist staffing firm Xpheno, a collective of leading airlines, hotels, and tours & travel management companies has seen an increase in headcount of almost 11% since January 2023. The data shows that during the time, hotels added 3% net headcount, airlines gained 17%, and travel agencies added 10%.
According to Xpheno, this cohort dealt with attrition that ranged from 6 to 16 per cent during the time. Over 26,000 people have been hired in total gross terms so far this year (January–May 2023) across the bellwethers. Each working day of the year, around 175 resources were onboarded. On the other hand, the same was over 30,000 during the entire year of 2022. Based on the present trend, the cohort’s growth would be twice that of last year, with 90% of 2022’s net headcount increase already accomplished in the first five months of 2023.
This sector is set to create new jobs this year, said Xpheno co-founder Kamal Karanth. “The travel and tourism sector has clawed back to health after Covid hit in 2020 and early 2021. With the larger economic buoyancy in 2021, business travel resumed before personal travel, and tourism got their boost. The travel and tourism sector has been one of the steady contributors to active job openings over the last six quarters. According to the current trajectory, 2023’s travel and tourism talent growth is set to be twice that of 2022,” said Karanth.
ITC Hotels EVP (HR and L&D) Sanjay Bose said, “In the last one year, ITC Hotels has expanded its footprint across brands wherein about five properties with over 500 keys were added to the portfolio. This has created almost 1,000 job opportunities in the industry.”
ITC recently launched its properties in Goa, Dharamshala, Udaipur, Ahmedabad and near Jim Corbett National Park. Cleartrip HR head Ajay Sreedhara said, “We see a steep increase in hiring at Cleartrip. We have grown by about 120 per cent in headcount since January 2022 and with a line of sight of another 20 per cent increase in calendar 2023. While majorly investing in the tech and product space, we are also growing across categories, business development, and building capabilities.”
Location-wise, Delhi has seen the most demand for talent in the airline and tour and travel management sectors, while Mumbai has the highest demand in the hotel sector.
