Accor plans to hire 4,000 workers for new hotels

Accor, operator of brands including Ibis and Novotel, plans to take on 4,000 staff across the 23 hotels it plans to open in the Middle East over the next three years.

Accor's brands include Ibis and Novotel. Pawan Singh / The National

Accor is on a drive to recruit 4,000 staff to work at the 23 hotels it aims to open in the Middle East over the next three years.

The European operator, one of the biggest hotel companies in the world, with brands including Ibis and Novotel, will draw staff from its existing hotels, the local market and countries including China.

"[Hiring] used to be a big challenge prior to the crisis in 2009," said Christophe Landais, the managing director of Accor Middle East.

"Now we have much more requests for employment than we have positions available."

The company intends to recruit 1,500 employees for the eight hotels it is opening in the UAE this year alone, including the new luxury Sofitel hotel on the Corniche in Abu Dhabi.

Accor, which also plans to open hotels in Saudia Arabia and Bahrain among other countries, already has about 7,000 employees at its 56 hotels in the region.

Nearly all of the major international hotel chains are expanding aggressively in the region as they position themselves to tap a growing global appetite for travel - with visitors coming particularly from emerging markets such as India and China - and the increasing numbers of flights that are coming into the region.

Marriott plans to open a JW Marriott hotel on Sheikh Zayed Road in Dubai this year and is recruiting 1,150 employees.

"We're hiring key people from China, from the US," said Rupprecht Queitsch, the general manager of the JW Marriott Marquis, which is to be the world's tallest hotel.

"The good news about this hotel is that it has raised a huge amount of interest in the community. We get a lot of CVs. We might not even have to do a lot of recruitment trips. We might get most of it from the local market."

Hilton, meanwhile, projects that it will take on more than 9,000 employees over the next three years just for its hotels in Saudi Arabia.

The total direct contribution of travel and tourism to the economies of GCC countries should reach US$44 billion (Dh161.6bn) this year, up 27 per cent from 2009, according to data from the World Travel & Tourism Council.

Mr Landais said that career development for Accor employees was a critical part of preventing them from moving on to the company's competitors.

"What we felt is important for us as well is not only to attract people to our group, but is also to retain them," he said. "Definitely, people are expecting more and more [for us] to have a career development plan for them.

The objective for us is not only to fill the gap in terms of competencies and to build the service to be delivered to the clients, but also to develop the people we have working for us to develop personally and to grow within the company." The operator has established the Accor Academie Middle East to train its staff.

Still, there remains the challenge of encouraging UAE nationals to enter the hospitality sector.

"Unfortunately, the Emiratis are not so responsive to working in the industry," said Mr Landais.

twitter: Follow our breaking business news and retweet to your followers. Follow us