Four Seasons Goes to Paris - Case Study Example

Executive summary

The CEO of the Four Seasons is referred as the world citizen due to his background of education that is diverse. This restaurant showcases how the American hotels take good care of customers’ values or rather people’s values. The Four Season maintains its clients' values through cultivation, creativity as well as sustainability pertaining the culture of the organization in every place or rather a country that the organization explores or rather develops business opportunities regarding its chain of restaurant. It is true that the end goal of Four Seasons Hotel is to provide a relaxed and personalized service that would make the customers feel like maximizing their leisure time value. As an organization grows, it has to expand its services to other countries. By doing so, the organization is guaranteed of increment in its annual revenue.

Apart from the benefits, the Four Season Restaurant enjoys by expanding its services to Paris, France; it also faces a good number of challenges and problems. The challenges are based on the areas that incorporate the foreign culture, rewards and retention, recruitment and selection as well as performance management and employment relation as an organization. To mitigate such problems, the report has recommended the use of Golden Rule Model to ensure uniformity in the aspect of culture within the organization. The applicants should pass through four times severe cross-examination before the best employees are selected and recruited. Both monetary and promotional reward should be utilized to motivate the workers. Training should be done on a great scale to cut the training expenses, and lastly, communication between the employees and the employees should be enhanced so as to create a friendly environment or rather a friendly working place.

Introduction

The Four Season is a chain of restaurants well recognized by its adaptability of different cultures concerning its establishment of chain restaurants in a good number of countries. The Four Seasons is a chain of hotels that was first established in the country of Canada. The major objective of the Four Seasons is to provide services that are unique, luxurious as well as services that are of high quality to both travelers and business people (Hallowell, Knoop, & Bowen, 2012, p. 124). Apparently, the Four Season has gone international by expanding its restaurant chain into the country of France in a city of Paris. The restaurant chain is well known as the George V. This report focuses on the human resource management challenges and problems experienced by the organization as it expands internationally into France in the area pertaining culture, reward and retention, recruitment and selection, employment relation and also performance management. The report finally outlines the recommendations that address the HRM encountered challenges.

Culture

The awareness of a culture can be depicted as the attitudinal insights that are internalized concerning the standard or rather the clear understandings that are held by a certain group of people. A group’s unique understanding dictates the values that are predominant, attitudes, individual’s outlooks as well as beliefs. The opening of the first restaurant chain in Paris by the Four Seasons led to some human resource management challenges or rather problems.

As per the Four Season case study, French is attributed or rather associated with a culture that is more of Polychromic. This type of polychromic culture encourages the strong human relationships. Also, it supports lifetime relationships or rather relationships that are sustainable. This is the contrary of the American culture whereby individuals encourage relationships that last for a short period. It now became a cultural challenge or rather a cultural problem to conjugate these two types of relationships so as to fit into the company’s standards (Puffer, 2014, p. 277). Also, it does not mean that opening a Four Season restaurant chain in a foreign country will lead to employment of only foreign workers. The company has to deploy the skills or rather human labor from its pioneer country since these individuals are more conversant with the company’s way of operations. Therefore, it becomes a human resource management challenge to conjugate different cultures under one roof with one end goal.

Also, a good number of employees from France have the tendency of being reluctant on any implementation of policies until they see the success or rather benefits of the new systems. The French employees highly doubted the introduction of the Golden Rule into the Four Season Company’s system. They thought that the Golden Rule implementation was too American. This type of attitude pertaining the French employees influences the atmosphere concerning the workplace environment significantly. It is common for a good number of staff to disobey orders from above or rather supervisors and also been reluctant during working hours (Chipello & Sanders, 2016, p. 19). It became too costly for Four Season Organization as the operational costs increased profoundly since the management had to spend more money as well as time so as to transform the employees into adapting the organizational belief.

In some instances, the workers from the country of France depicted some emotional way of handling or rather tackling their daily activities which may of negative or positive impact to the system of the restaurant chain. For example, the French employees are always attributed with high tempers. This implies that they quickly lose control over their tempers (Heinrich, 2007, p. 104). This is the reason as to why they are referred to be of polychromic culture. It is true that the French employees have no objectives that are vivid as they are capricious. Also, the employees from the country of France mostly they care about their relatives as well as their friends who are extremely close. It is true that it became a problem to the human resource department to manage such employees.

The termination model pertaining the employees from the country of France is somehow tricky to the management of Four Seasons restaurant chain. According to the French management culture concerning the sector of labor, any corporation has got no right to fire any employee at will (Young, 2010, p. 127). The dismissal or rather the firing of an employee should be conducted through a legal process whereby the management has got to document all the causes of the employee termination. The legal procedures have to be adhered to before firing an employee even if the employee is remiss. This implies that, whenever an employee is hired, it becomes hard to terminate the employee’s contract even if the concerned employee’s performance does not align with the organizational end goal. Therefore it becomes hard for the Four Seasons Restaurant Chain to fire any employee even if the employee is remiss to the organization and this becomes a human resource management problem as a result of expanding to the city of Paris in the country of France.

It is true that the culture pertaining the people of France has a far-reaching need of respect. Due to this reason, the French people cannot tolerate the habit of others talking openly and publicly about their weaknesses. Therefore, it becomes a challenge to the supervisors to enquire on the weaknesses pertaining the employees. Also, the French culture enhances the aspect of saving the face while preserving their dignity (Vora, 2016, p. 8). This point calls for managers who are highly skilled so as to take control actually whenever the employee’s ego is offended as the workers lose their tempers quickly. In other words, the French employees are always short tempered. Therefore, this implies that the Four Season Restaurant Chain in Paris will have to be cautious as it will be tough to manage the relationship between the employers and the staff members in the aspect of leading the emotional tension of the French employees.

As per the hierarchical model system, a good number of French workers have a tendency of referring or rather reporting every incident to their boss. This implies that the manager is always accountable according to the French culture (Puffer, 2014, p. 271). This is the contrary of the American culture as the employees have the tendency of approaching a colleague before contacting the supervisor whenever they are referring to any incidence. Therefore, the French employees are always attributed to a strong hierarchical perception. This leaves an incredibly serious challenge to the Four Seasons human resource management since the managers will have to deal with a good number of employee cases as compared to the supervisors. In another word, the Four Season managers in Paris will have less time to manage the restaurant chain as they will be busy handling employees cases and this poses a threat to the success of the organization.

Recruitment and selection

The human resource management faces a significant challenge in the sector of recruitment and selection. Once an employee has being selected and then recruited into the organization, it becomes hard to replace or rather fire the employee even if his or her performance is shrinking. In the country of France, the law regarding labor stipulates that an enterprise cannot fire or rather dismiss an employee arbitrarily. The French employees benefit a lot from the labor law as it enhances their flexibility in that, employees are given time to adjust to the working conditions of the workplace (Peng, 2011, p. 56). The time given is not limited, and this makes the employees be reluctant and not to be active towards their workplace adaptation. This implies that whenever an organization make an acquisition, it becomes hard for it to replace the employees. Therefore, this becomes a problem to the human resource management as it has to take a lot of time so as to extract the best employees. Also, it becomes a challenge to the human resource pertaining the Four Season Restaurant Chain in Paris to determine the best employees from all the applicants.

Also, as per the French law case, the Four Season organization has to inherit all of its recruited workers including their rights that are recognized legally regarding their prior service. The recruitment and selection become another challenge to the law of labor may increase the cost and hence affect the Four Season Restaurant Chain’s revenue at the long last (Landman, 2008, p. 21). Therefore the human resource management has to work extra hard to ensure that the income from the Four Seasons that is situated in Paris is not adversely affected. This is true since the hotel of Four Season has to adapt to the French policies and also an environment that is new to the human resource management. Lastly, the organization has to take in the aspect that a good number of the French employees will not be in a position of adapting to its management at a rate that is faster and they will not have a right of firing employees who are not safe in the workplace.

Entering into the Paris market, the organization of Four Seasons faces problems concerning the labor regulations. This is true since the country of France is not a place that is friendly to its employees as the rules and also the laws contradict the working conditions. It is true that the French government takes a close concern of the distribution of income as high taxes are imposed in the country. The cost of labor is very elevated in the country of France as the French government tries to redistribute the big social system (Young, 2010, p. 128). Due to high costs of labor, it becomes expensive to the management of Four Season in Paris to conduct the recruitment processes. Hiring a large number of employees implies that the Four Season Restaurant Chain will be making less profits due to the high costs of input caused by the high costs of labor. Therefore, it becomes a challenge to the human resource management of the Four Seasons organization to minimize the recruitment of employees or rather to reduce the labor costs and maximize the profits acquired. Also, the best employees that are extracted and at the same time recruited from all the applicants easily move to other companies since they possess the best skills. Employees constant movement to other companies seems to be an upcoming habit that is common in France. This implies that the Four Season human resource management is encountered with a challenge of retaining the best employees in the organization.

The operations, as well as activities that are embraced in the company of Four Seasons, are viewed to be unique by the French workers. This is true since they are not conversant to the American way of operations. For this reason, all employees who are selected have to go through a unique training so as to ensure that they fit well under the workplace conditions. Training the French employees before they are fully recruited becomes a problem since it is expensive and at the same time costly. Ignoring the workers training will lead to underperformance (Solomon, 2010, p. 40). Also, training them cuts off the revenues hence decreasing the acquired profits. Therefore, this becomes a puzzle for the human resource management of Four Seasons organization to tackle. Apart from the aspect of training, a good number of recruited employees still have the culture of being reluctant to any new idea that the managers try to implement. When conducting the recruitment as well as selection processes, it totally hard to identify the workers who will be reluctant to the implementation of new ideas. This is true since this habit is internally built. Therefore, this is considered as a challenge to the human resource management as they can rarely distinguish workers with this habit from the workers without this habit.

Reward and Retention

It is true that the North American people have a tendency of utilizing the model of monochromic. This implies that they always possess a code of behavior that is built within a high degree of scheduling and at the same time promptness in meeting the organizational appointment and obligations. On the other hand, the French employees are associated with polychromic values or rather models. This implies that they value greatly the human interactions as well as relationships over appointments and also schedules that are arbitrary (Heinrich, 2007, p. 103). For this reason, the French employees mostly recognize rewards that incorporate work promotions and not any other form of promotions. It is true that they significantly consider a reward in the shape of job promotions since they value a lot the human relationships. The Four Season Restaurant Chain in Paris faces a challenge of convincing the French employees concerning the rewards that are of monetary benefits. Therefore the human resource management of the Paris Four Season Hotel faces a significant challenge of ensuring that the French employees appreciate any reward and work towards the rewards.

Also, in the aspect of retention, it becomes another problem that the human resource management face in the country of Paris. The French employees who are highly skilled have a tendency of migrating to other companies. Mostly, the organization of Four Season Hotel in Paris remain with staff who are not adequately skilled since a good number of qualified employees shift to other organization for the search of green pastures (Chipello & Sanders, 2016, p. 15). It is a great challenge to the human resource to convince them to remain in the organization or rather to change their shifting culture.

Performance management and employment relation

The system of French encourages a 35 hours work per week. This is the contrary of the American system whereby they promote a 40 hours work per week. Under this category or rather sector of performance management and employment relation, the human resource management pertaining the restaurant chain of Four Season faces a problem of adjusting its way of operation so as to fit the 35 hours workweek (Landman, 2008, p. 14). The 35 hours work per week is a French rule and the Four Season management has to adhere to it. It is also a significant problem whereby, the employees are paid dearly, and they work for a limited time. This implies that the revenue to be collected from the Paris Four Season restaurant is small as compared to American restaurants whereby employees are paid moderately and work for an adequate time per week.

According to the performance management, the French employees have the tendencies of referring any emerging problem to the managers instead of handling it. This is the contrary to the North American employees whereby they are believed to be empowered by the management with the ability to solve any emerging problem. It is now a significant challenge to the management team to transform the French norms into fitting the standards of the Four Seasons organization. Also, under this category, it is true that the French workers are believed to be empowered with the model of skeptic (Vora, 2016, p. 3). The theory of skeptic suggests that the employees will always be accustomed to doubt anything that they are not familiar to or rather they do not see. This goes with the French workers whereby they always tend to wait on the sidelines regarding an implementation of a new model to the organization. They are always reluctant until they see the impact of the introduced model. In some situations, the managers may be annoyed by this act hence affecting the relationship between the employees and the executive as well as the organizational performance.

Conclusion and recommendations

It is true that as an organization grows, it has to expand its services to other countries. By doing so, the team is guaranteed of increment in the annual revenue. Apart from the benefits an organization enjoys by expanding its services to foreign countries, it also faces a good number of challenges and problems. The challenges, as well as issues, are always based on areas that incorporate the foreign culture, rewards and retention, recruitment and selection as well as performance management and employment relation as an organization such as the Four Seasons expand its services to Paris, France. Due to these challenges, the report outlined some recommendation as seen below so as to mitigate these challenges.

I recommend highly that the Four Seasons restaurant should select the relevant workforce by ensuring that all the applicants go through four times severe cross-examination. By doing so, the organization would feel convinced with their staff selection and recruitment. Also, the four times cross-examination would ensure that the right employees are recruited who have the relevant assertive behaviors that fit best the culture of the organization (Mello & Mello, 2014, p. 92). Since the country of France implemented policies that excessively protects the employees, the Four Season should always make enquiries that are discreet concerning the acquisition. Therefore, the Four Season human resource management should be cautious when hiring employees and ensure that they go through the four times cross-examination as they cannot fire them once employed.

The Golden Rule theory is another critical aspect in mitigating the challenges faced by the Four Season restaurant in Paris. It states that an individual should treat other people in a way that he or she should wish to be treated (Nash, 2005, p. 72). This rule has resulted in high annual income in the American Four Season Restaurant. Therefore implementing it in Paris will ensure that there exists a common culture within the organization as the employees would work towards one end goal. The Golden Rule Model provides that all employees are treated with dignity and respect by the managers. For the French employees to treat well organizational customers, then the organization has to handle them well in the first place. It is true that the Golden Rule leads to job satisfaction and in the long run, foster satisfaction of customers and productivity as well. Therefore, Golden Rule will ensure cultural uniformity within the organization hence it will become easier for the human resource management to run its operations efficiently.

Also, communication is another crucial aspect to be considered in the Paris Four Season Hotel. I suggest that, in every month, the top manager should be meeting with other executives, supervisors as well as employees in a small group of approximately 25 individuals. These groups should meet be meeting monthly so as to discuss the emerging issues and the results to be addressed to the groups. Apart from that, the organization should encourage an open door event yearly whereby employees attend the events with their family members. This way, the employment relationship will be highly enhanced hence the workers will find it to be normal to discuss their weaknesses openly with their managers. By disclosing their shortcomings, the management can handle them efficiently and at the end of the day, the management performance will be highly enhanced as workers would be working free from their weaknesses.

The system of motivation should also be given a hand in the Four Season Hotel in Paris. Although the French employees are not familiar with the American way of motivation or rather rewards, the Golden Rule Model will highly teach them to appreciate any kind of reward. They mostly conquer with the promotion bonus but due to Golden Rule that encourages one organizational culture, the employees will be able to appreciate rewards in the form of monetary values. Also, the human resource management should ensure that awards such as the “employees of the month recognition awards”, as well as the “employee of the year”, ought to be rewarded accordingly (Mello & Mello, 2014, p. 99). Also, programs aiming to raise awareness regarding hardworking employees, where employees are accorded a chance to point out the most resilient and industrious acquaintances should be implemented. Motivating the workers by rewarding them will ensure that the skilled employees are retained in the organization or rather would guarantee the retention of the workers. Also, the Four Season Restaurant would benefit by increasing their annual revenues as workers would be hard working as they would be focusing on the rewards.

Also, I highly recommend employee training that is done in large scale so as to cut down the expenses of training them. At some point, the human resource management should invite the employees who are highly experienced in the system to train the newly recruited workers. Some of the Four Season activities should be cut or rather replaced by activities that are more detailed and also those that considerate welfare and care. By doing so, the high costs of staff training and hiring would be controlled or rather managed.