CHRO Award Winner, John Skelton, Shares the Secrets to his Success
Chief People Officer, John Skelton, recently won the CHRO Award for their people-focused approach to employee welfare
Quiet quitting, bare minimum Mondays, and a general resistance to going back to the office full time. All of these are symptoms of a workforce that has become disillusioned with traditional office cultures. This is why The Capital Hotel Group’s approach to employee wellness is disrupting the industry and why the Group’s Chief People Officer, John Skelton, recently won the CHRO Award for their people-focused approach to employee welfare.
“First of all, this award is a way of celebrating the incredibly hard work our team have put in during the pandemic and beyond. We beat big players in the industry that have won many awards for being innovative and that is incredible,” says Skelton.
The CHRO awards acknowledge the chief human resource officers of listed companies, large corporations, state-owned entities, and government institutions and award them for outstanding performance and leadership.
Putting People First to Practice:
When Skelton joined The Capital Hotels and Apartments in 2016, the group had just 199 employees. Now it is the fasted growing hotel group in the country employing over 1000 staff. Part of what has made the Capital Group such an attractive place to work has been Skelton and the Capital management team’s approach to getting the best out of their employees.
He says, “Our business is built around people. There is no hospitality without people, so it only follows that everything we do is centred around our wonderful staff. We actively work to combat things like quiet quitting by offering incentives like ‘unlimited leave’ and free training with no clawbacks.”
Skelton’s department also introduced Employee of the Month initiatives with the winning staff member getting a chance to sit with the CEO for breakfast to discuss the business face-to-face. There is also a new Employee Self-Service system, called Roubler, which uses a custom app to handle staff shifts, payslips, policies, and leave. It is accessible anytime, anywhere. The result of these initiatives is an office with just a 2% attrition rate and morale that is through the roof. It also helps that year-end parties at the Capital have been known to include giveaways of 55-inch TVs, dishwashers, microwaves and washing machines.
He says, “At the Capital, we believe that wellness starts with the workplace and is extended to the family home. We want to empower staff and enable them to live their best life according to the stage of life they are in and do our best to ensure that happens. Others may call it disruptive; we just call it giving a damn.”
Call it what you will, but in a world where employee wellness is increasingly becoming the buzzword of the day, The Capital’s approach is once again showing that it pays to be ahead of the curve.
