Disney TAKING APPLICATIONS; Knott’s, Legoland Also Adding Workers
If you think hiring a few good men (and women) is tough in today’s tight job market, try hiring 7,000.
That’s the task facing the Disneyland Resort as it ramps up for the opening of its new California Adventure theme park early next year. That’s almost half again the number of people currently employed by Disney operations in Orange County during peak periods. And the company’s past hiring patterns indicate that about 70,000 potential cast members will need to be interviewed to get to the final number.
But Disney’s not the only theme park that’s hiring.
Knott’s Berry Farm is in search of about 1,000 new employees, the largest recruitment effort in the park’s history. Knott’s will open a water attraction this summer and add a new water park,Soak City,on 13 acres across from Knott’s Berry Farm, along with a second Soak City in Chula Vista. In addition, the park is celebrating the Peanuts 50th anniversary this year,an event that has drawn extra interest since Peanuts’ creator Charles Schultz died last month.
Meanwhile, Legoland, which opened last year in Carlsbad, is preparing to add about 350 employees, too.
“It’s going to be tough,” said Shelle Thompson, president of Tustin-based Abbott Specialty Staffing, which has occasionally worked with the Disneyland Resort to provide office and hotel staff.
“A lot of people want typical 8-to-5, Monday-through-Friday jobs today. Theme parks rarely offer that,” Thompson said. “They won’t have the pick of the litter.”
Though it has been widely reported that California Adventure would create 5,000 jobs, Disneyland Resort President Cynthia Harriss recently upped that figure to 7,000 in remarks at a program for UCI’s Graduate School of Management.
Major Challenge
With Southland unemployment at a record low of 4.7% and OC’s at an even lower 2.3%, the county’s theme parks are facing a major challenge.
“After safety, (the labor market is) the biggest and most critical issue facing the leisure industry,” said Dennis Speigel, president of a Cincinnati, Ohio, theme park consultancy. Speigel said the issue consumed about two hours of a meeting of industry leaders last week in Washington, D.C.
As a result, hiring campaigns are already in high gear.
Last year, the Walt Disney Co. said it would pay $500 bonuses to Disneyland employees who recruit managers for its Anaheim expansion and $50 for recruiting other workers. Typically, that kind of program would generate about 10% of the leads needed for the park. And up to 20% of Disneyland’s cast members might express interest in transferring to California Adventure.
But the bonus program, said park spokesman Ray Gomez, is going “extremely well.”
“Almost 40% of the new hires so far are from referrals,” he said.
Ads are running on some local radio stations, too. Those ads provide an 800 number that allows applicants to be pre-screened by phone. Some are invited in for interviews immediately.
While Gomez said that kind of campaign is typical for this time of year, he added it was likely the ads would be extended to recruit for California Adventure.
But while a wide variety of recruiting methods are used by Disney, Gomez said the company relies “very heavily” on word-of-mouth recruiting.
Schools Targeted
Disney execs are also making the rounds of area schools, following a plan first employed in Orlando, according to Thor Degelman, a Newport Beach theme park consultant and former Disney exec who spearheaded hiring efforts at Disneyland Paris and also worked on recruiting in Orlando.
Last fall, Paul Pressler, president of Walt Disney Attractions and former president of the Disneyland Resort, was on hand at Cal State Fullerton to introduce a six-course program called the Center for Entertainment and Tourism Studies that is expected to debut this fall, and to discuss available jobs in the entertainment and tourism industries, whose numbers are expected to double in the next decade. Pressler said the Walt Disney Co., which helped develop the curriculum, hopes the Cal State program will contribute to the industry as a feeder for the system.
Judy Robinson, an employment and recruiting specialist for Abbott Specialty Staffing, said Disney’s strong mission statement and upbeat, positive image should work to its benefit even in a tight employment market. And Disney’s history of keeping wages and benefits about 10% to 15% above the average probably won’t hurt, either, Degelman said.
The attraction of a new park is a plus, too, as Legoland,which debuted in Carlsbad last year,found out.
“Initially we had more candidates than we could handle,” said Donna Schmidt, director of human resources. But Legoland only had about 1,000 jobs to fill,a fraction of Disney’s needs.
And Degelman said Disney’s strict adherence to appearance standards could negate some of the positives for the company, too, given some of today’s fashion trends.
“There have always been fashion issues,” he said, “some are just more visible today.”
Such large-scale recruiting efforts don’t come cheap. Industry insiders say that a recruiting budget twice that for a normal operating year is a typical scenario for a new park.
But industry observers say that, because of the company’s corporate structure, almost all the recruiting is likely to be done in-house and involve a staff of 10 to 20 temporarily transferred from other duties. If provided by a recruiting firm, those services might cost half a million dollars on a fee basis, Speigel said.
Other Openings
The theme park isn’t Disney’s only concern, however: it is also building a 750-room resort hotel,the Grand Californian,on the grounds of California Adventure. The Grand Californian is likely to account for about 1,000 of the 7,000 jobs at California Adventure. And the hotel isn’t grappling with just a shortage of entry-level workers.
The market for hotel management tightened last year, creating a higher-than-normal turnover among higher-ups at OC’s largest hotels. And Bill Snyder, executive director of the Anaheim Area Hotel & Motel Association told the Business Journal last fall that there are projections for a management shortage in the hospitality industry.
Though the hotel was barely out of the ground last summer, the resort appointed Tony Bruno,then general manager of the Disneyland Pacific Hotel,as GM to oversee the property.
Meanwhile, Legoland isn’t taking any chances this year, either, relying on job fairs and community partners as a feeder system for its candidates.
Because the park caters almost exclusively to younger children, Schmidt said it uses “higher standards than some theme parks,” and runs background checks for sex offenses and criminal records.
Knott’s, too, is going the job-fair route,its first was last weekend,to support operations at the main park as well as the Soak City locations in Orange and San Diego counties.
For the first time, Knott’s also has hotel positions to fill,at the newly acquired Radisson Resort at Knott’s Berry Farm (formerly the Buena Park Hotel),and about 150 employees will be recruited for the Cucina! Cucina! Italian Caf & #233; at that property.
Director of public relations Bob Ochsner said the company also uses a recruitment marketing and advertising firm to support its efforts and has “increased hiring budgets and wages to ensure quality and quantity of employees.”
Seniors An Industry Target
One thrust being taken by the industry to help relieve the labor shortage is tapping the senior market. Degelman said it’s “heavily used” in Florida for the Disney venture there. And both Knott’s and Legoland work with the senior community, as well. As that segment of the population grows, it could become increasingly important to the leisure industry if the job market remains tight.
Degelman said the toughest job Disney probably will face is maintaining quality in hiring large numbers of people in an intensely competitive market.
“One of the most costly issues is the lack of employees. It’s one of the most important start-up issues,” Speigel said. n
