Airbnb Shares Jump Strong Quarterly Results with Expansion Plans (02/14/25)
Today, Reuters reported on Airbnb’s remarkable growth, with its shares growing an additional 13.3% in a pre-market trade. With such a significant growth in it’s business, its CEO, Brian Chesky, shared with Reuters his plans for scaling Airbnb over a 3 to 5 year period. So what exactly does this mean for Airbnb’s operations? As any organization grows, it’s human capital management strategy will need to change as the demand for more employees to support its growth operations becomes increasingly necessary.
Although I don’t know what’s under the hood at Airbnb, I would like to see them have an employee-focused strategy on their human capital management as they begin to scale over these next few years. At the end of the day, an organization doesn’t exist without the individuals who come back to their jobs each and everyday. But, constantly adjusting to the needs of an organization’s employees is a challenge and I believe it’s the their responsibility to not only control their internal culture, but also focus on how the working environments change for its employees as the challenges of scaling arises.
The Supervisor-Employee Relationship
So, what might this look like? On a more granular level, I think about the working relationships between supervisors and employees. When supervisors are tasked with a massive change to day-to-day operations, how are they facilitating this change? Take for example implementing a new data management system. When departments are notified that a new system is being implemented, how are its supervisor communicating and advocating for their staff when challenges arise. Also, how are they discovering these challenges? Are they meeting with their employees one-on-one for check-ins on how this new system affects their job or are they having a department meeting to talk to them all at once? Are these department meetings more like a town-hall or is it something less personal such as sending a department wide email that includes all employees.
If there’s anything I can leave with a new supervisor who is struggling to implement change directives and wants to see their employees succeed is to focus on where their employees are at. What are they struggling with and how can you, as someone who’s has likely been in their role before, help them with navigating their responsibilities of their job as well as learning a new system? Both of these should be overcome together.