Underemployment Here To Stay

Last year, Snag CEO Peter Harrison wrote in Multi-Unit Franchisee magazine about 5 "up-and-coming trends" that he saw bringing change to the multi-unit franchising workforce. He based his thoughts on what he had heard at the company's Hour Minds annual customer conference. The event attracted more than 350 brands and thought leaders who met and talked about the now and next of hourly work over three days, 20 sessions, and countless side conversations.

If you recruit and retain hourly workers, this tip's for you: Underemployment is more than a trend--it's a crisis. After surveying 2,000 hourly workers earlier this year, we discovered just how much underemployment was growing: almost 50 percent of hourly workers said they need more hours, and employers are realizing that tapping into the underemployed is increasingly more fruitful than seeking the unemployed. And now employers are developing their own tactics for ensuring their employees are getting enough shifts.

From offering extra hours as a perk to testing out flexible scheduling techniques, employers are learning that tackling underemployment is key to solving its symptoms, such as high turnover and low application flow.