The manager leaves in two years
We looked at the career records of 11,650 people who worked in six kinds of hospitality. The middle stay was two years. Only 44% stayed three years or more.
We expected luxury hotels to do better. They sell the brand. Surely they would be best at keeping their own people.
They were not. Of 354 people who worked at luxury international hotels, 43% stayed three years or more. The number for all employers was 44%.
Five-star guests. Two-year managers.
Bar chart. All employers 44 percent, luxury international hotels 43 percent stayed three years or more.
Why this matters now
Hotel owners already feel the cost. In the American Hotel and Lodging Association's survey of 246 hoteliers in late February 2026, 65% named labor costs as a top financial pressure. Only the cost of goods and supplies ranked higher, at 71%. Another 42% named workforce shortages.
Labor is the second-biggest worry on the list. And a manager who leaves every two years makes it worse.
Find your kind of employer
Here is every kind we measured. Look for your own bar. If you are below the 44% line, some of the seats you refill may not have needed to open.
Bar chart by kind of employer: national hotel brands 49 percent, contract dining 47, luxury hotels 43, hotel management companies 37, restaurant groups 34, New York independent hotel groups 28. All employers 44 percent.
Who stays? The ones who move up
Look at people who had already stayed two years. Of those who got a second role inside the company, 88% made it to year three. Of those who did not, 58% did. By year four it was 75% against 37%.
Companies with a ladder tended to keep people. Companies without one tended to lose them sooner.
Grouped bars. Reached year three: 88 percent with a second job inside the company, 58 percent without. Reached year four: 75 percent versus 37 percent.
Part of this may be skill, since the strongest people may be the ones who get promoted. We have no control group, so read it as a direction. But the gap is wide. And the ladder is thin: 39% of people at national brands got a second role, and 17% at New York independent hotel groups.
The first day is not designed
A luxury hotel will remember how your guest likes her pillow. It will not tell its new manager who they report to.
We read 220 New York hotel job descriptions. Of the 26 from luxury hotels, 31% said who the job reports to. Of all 220, 17% did.
Bar chart. 17 percent of all hotel job posts and 31 percent of luxury hotel posts say who the job reports to.
Who is hiring all these managers?
A few employers. Of the 527 postings we read, 248 were for a manager seat or higher. Sixteen employers had three or more of those seats open. Together they held 101 seats, or 41%.
Split bar. 16 employers hold 101 of 248 leader seats, 41 percent. All other employers hold 147 seats, 59 percent.
A group with a dozen leaders to find is not running a search. It is running a hiring program. Most still run it as a string of one-off posts.
Four moves for your talent plan
Most leaders treat talent acquisition as a task. A seat opens, a posting goes up, a search starts. The numbers point to something bigger: a plan, with four parts.
1. Build the ladder. People who got a second role inside the company stayed far longer. A ladder is part of the plan, not a perk. Do this: put the next step in the posting, and name who was promoted last year.
2. Design the job. Few postings say who the job reports to, even at luxury hotels. A strong brand does not keep managers; a clear job helps. Do this: write the reporting line and what a good first year looks like, before you post.
3. Plan the program. If the middle stay is two years, every manager seat comes back around. That can be planned and budgeted like any other cost. Do this: list every leadership seat with its likely reopen date, and name one owner for each.
4. Know the market. A few big employers hold four in ten leadership seats. You are hiring against them. Do this: read the postings next to yours for pay, title and reporting line. If a seat keeps reopening, stop posting and start a standing search.
We do not have outcome data on firms that plan this way, so we will not claim it works. These are the questions the data raises. They are worth answering before the next seat opens.
People are your strategy. Talent acquisition is where it starts.
Does this ring true?
This is a first draft of a way to think about talent. We would like your feedback. Which of the four moves is weakest where you work? What else would you want to know?
How we did this
Two sources. First, the career records of 11,650 people in our database who finished a stay at one of six kinds of hospitality employer, with names withheld. Years are rounded and we count only stays that ended. Second, public job postings for New York hotels on Google Jobs in September and October 2026: 527 postings from 275 employers, after we removed repeats and postings outside the city. We read the full description on 220 of them, 26 from luxury hotels, so read the luxury description numbers as a guide. There is no control group.
Want this for your own business? We can run the same read on your jobs and set it next to your peers. Book 20 minutes →
Also on LinkedIn: read and comment there →
Founder, HumanWorks. Duke Fuqua MBA, formerly A.T. Kearney.