84% of Hospitality and Retail Candidates Have Abandoned a Job Application, New Research Reveals

New insight has revealed there is growing demand for faster, fairer and more flexible hiring, as the pressure on businesses to attract and retain frontline talent grows.

The new whitepaper from Sona and KAM, Always on Recruitment lays bare the scale of the issue with a huge number of candidates (84%) saying they have abandoned a job application due to frustrations with the process.

The most common of these are:

1. Lengthy application forms (46%)
2. Waiting for a response (39%)
3. Lack of communication through the hiring process (37%)

This comes at a time when hospitality and retail businesses continue to navigate recruitment challenges, rising employment costs and ongoing competition for employees. What the results reveal is that improvements to the candidate experience could help employers attract and convert more applicants into team members.

With 44% of candidates most likely to apply for jobs outside of traditional office hours, in the evening or late at night, the research shows that one solution is offering ‘always-on’ recruitment. This provides a more flexible approach that enables candidates to engage with employers, submit applications and progress through hiring journeys at times that fit around their lives.

Other improvements that employers could put in place, include more clarity and detail early on in the application journey. Nine out of 10 candidates, for example, want shift patterns to be provided upfront and 89% expect clear hiring timelines before applying. Similarly, more than a quarter of respondents (26%) said they had abandoned an application because pay, hours and other key information was unclear.

Tech is also seen as part of the solution with the vast majority of candidates (87%) saying they are comfortable with technology supporting updates and reminders, provided human interaction remains where it matters most – namely when discussing pay, shifts or contract terms, with 62% of people wanting human involvement for this.

Katy Moses, Founder and Managing Director at KAM said: “The findings of our latest research demonstrate that today’s candidates have clear expectations about what a good recruitment experience looks like. They want transparency, flexibility and regular communication through the process.

“The opportunity for employers is significant, particularly at a time when businesses are working hard to attract and retain talent. Therefore, removing unnecessary friction from recruitment can have a meaningful impact on hiring outcomes and candidate engagement.”

The research also highlights the growing role of technology in improving the hiring experience. While candidates place a high value on human interaction when discussing pay, shifts and job offers, many are comfortable with technology supporting routine tasks, such as application updates, interview scheduling and reminders, helping employers keep candidates engaged throughout the process.

Paul Watson, VP of Hospitality at Sona, added: “Hospitality and retail businesses are competing for talent in an increasingly demanding environment. Every candidate matters and this research shows that many employers may be losing good people before they even reach the interview stage.

“What’s encouraging is that candidates are telling us exactly what they want – faster communication, more transparency and greater flexibility throughout the recruitment process. Employers who embrace more responsive, candidate-centric recruitment processes will be best placed to improve hiring performance, reduce applicant process and ultimately, build stronger teams. Recruitment needs to work around the realities of frontline work, not traditional office hours, and technology can now make that possible.”