Moto’s Rising Star has ‘completely moved the dial’

“Nothing short of a miracle,” is the way Moto Hospitality’s people director Louise Hughes describes the results achieved by Amy Primrose in the 20 months she has worked for the company.

In just one year, the resourcing manager more than doubled the number of job applicants from 48,000 to 106,000, and halved Moto’s vacancy rate from 6% to 3%.

This feat, according to Hughes, is even more remarkable given the “great resignation” in hospitality post-Covid and Brexit, and the motorway locations of the business, which are not served by public transport or accessible by foot or bicycle.

“She’s been instrumental – completely, completely moved the dial,” enthuses Hughes.

So how has Primrose fuelled this change within Moto - which serves more than 120 million visitors every year from its 69-UK-based outlets?

Ironing out potential recruitment hold-ups has been a significant step, according to Hughes.

“The labour market is so tight, if you don’t snap people up quickly then you’ve lost them,” she says. “That made a huge difference.”

Primrose examined the recruitment structure of the business and doubled the central resourcing team from two to four heads. She then reorganised the way first step job interviews were handled for new outlets.

Traditionally, potential candidates were dealt with by on-site managers, but this work was transferred to the people team centrally, freeing up busy store bosses to focus on the opening of new units – Moto launched 14 new Pret and KFC outlets last year.

It also meant applications were not sitting in busy managers’ inboxes, Hughes says.

Primrose, who joined the business in May 2022 from BaxterStorey where she worked a similar role, also knew a one size fits all approach to recruitment would not work in reaching a younger generation living on social media platforms like TikTok.

“Amy has seen that [they] don’t respond to somebody ringing them, it’s got to be an instant message or video,” Hughes explains.

“She has looked at the personas of the different age demographics to think about how we best reach them”.

The careers website was recently redeveloped to become interactive and will shortly be “dropping a load of real-life video footage from colleagues”, while storytelling has played a key role in shining a light on the culture of the business to attract staff.

Hughes believes this approach is a “really simple and impactful way” of portraying the employee experience alongside Moto’s successes.

Additionally, Primrose has explored ways to attract underrepresented groups by addressing the language used in company adverts and she joined forces with a colleague to produce a visual one-pager highlighting both the Employer Value Proposition [EVP] and the ethos and spirit of the company “in a snapshot’.

“Amy’s focus, passion and determination really is incredible and everyone who interacts with her speaks really positively about just how impressive she is,” says Hughes. “She is a role model for our values as well as being an advocate for diversity, inclusion and positive wellbeing.”

The people director also credits Primrose’s positive, half glass full attitude as well as her calmness, which she says is crucial if people are “flapping around her” or if units haven’t opened or people haven’t turned up.

She also applauds Primrose’s tenacious approach.

“She’s built a really great team. What I really like about her is her challenge – she can challenge at any level, whether that be me, or the ops director. She came and presented at board the business case to get the applicant tracking system, [an engaging AI solution].

“She’s just so convincing, so credible in terms of knowing her stuff. She doesn’t [influence others] with emotion, she does it with facts and figures and is really, really respected.”