12th September, 2024

It really was an Alaskan Dream!

This week’s HR Bitesize includes:

  • Tales from an Alaskan Cruise
  • An invitation to join me next week for our live monthly online training
  • An update on our HR Club

I have recently returned from a wonderful holiday in Alaska. Just the Hubby and I, and 32 other people, plus the crew of the ship. Yes, you read that right there were only 34 passengers on the Alaskan Dream for 8 days, cruising the Inner Passage of South East Alaska from Juneau (the Capital) to Sitka (an old Capital). It was an incredible holiday, but I’m not going to tell you about the wildlife or the glaciers or the Tlingit people in this newsletter, because where would the HR lesson be in that?

Instead, I’m going to share my thoughts on the crew.

We were tour 16 of the season and the crew were absolutely incredible. We were treated like Royalty. We were fed, watered, fed again, entertained, fed some more, educated… and fed some more.

These guys were an incredible team.

But with my HR hat on, this really got me thinking, so I had a chat with Wayne, our ‘Hotel Manager’ (pictured serving us from a hot chocolate buffet)

While Captain Eric had worked with the company for many years, all the other staff, including Wayne, were pulled together at the start of this season. They were recruited from across America and many had families somewhere in the Lower 48 (States), who they were separated from for 6 months.

Almost none of them had worked in Alaska before, although many had worked in hospitality for years. One expedition leader had previously worked in Hawaii as a marine biologist, our engineer was ex marines and one of our head waiters had worked in 5 star restaurants around Florida.

The group had to come together, live together, eat together and work together 24/7 for 6 months. To be able to do that and survive with your sense of humour intact, serving highly demanding passengers with your sanity intact, takes a very special kind of person. From recruitment to training to ongoing support, the staff experience had to be extraordinary. They had no phone signal most of the time. No wifi on the ship. No clothes washing facilities and very little free time. Sharing sleeping quarters with colleagues also meant that there was nowhere to go to escape. They were almost constantly on call.

Do you recruit staff as committed to your business as these guys?

Do you train and support your staff so you could live with them 24/7 for six months if you had to?

Do you ensure that you have all positions covered and cross covered in the event of illness or an emergency?

What policies and procedures do you have in place to ensure that the right people are doing the right job to deliver outstanding customer service to your clients at the right time?

What changes do you need to make to ensure that you are carrying no ‘dead wood’?

I can’t stress this strongly enough.

Employment law is changing and it is going to be harder to manage and remove the wrong people from your business. What changes do you need to make now?

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Until next week, have a great week

Donna

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