The Specifics of Human Resource Management - Essay Example

Managing Human Resources for Tourism and Events

Introduction

Human Recourse Management (HRM) is a vital coherent and strategic approach to deal with the administration of a company's most esteemed resources: the employees working there who both collectively and individually contribute to the accomplishment of the company's goals. Basically, Human Resource Management deals with issues connected to individuals, for example, hiring, training, compensation, contracting, improvement, well-being, safety, health, inspiration, and motivation, employee morale, correspondence, administration, supervising, etc. HRM can likewise be performed by Human Resource representatives or by line managers. It is based on the proficient use of workers in accomplishing two fundamental objectives within an organization or a company. The primary objective is to make an effective use of the employees' skills, abilities, and talents in order to accomplish the company's ultimate objectives. Secondly, alongside realizing the objectives of the company, Human Resource management tries to guarantee that the employees are satisfied with their roles, working environment, monetary compensation, career growth, and professional development, or with any other benefits they receive from the part of the company.

As a part of general HRM, Human Resource Management of Tourism, Hospitality, and Events related industries is based on the same techniques, approaches and activities, while dealing with issues related to personnel and employee administration. Still, regarding all the peculiarities and specific requirements of tourism and events related organizations, HRM practices and activities in this field can differ from general HRM practices in order to better fulfill the industry's needs. This paper is aimed to provide an understanding of the key activities involved in human resource management; research, analyze, and discuss the specific requirements for HRM in tourism and events related fields; and reflects on a major problem of Seasonality within the Tourism and Hospitality industry, providing a better understanding of the specifics of Human Resource management within an industry.

Principal Activities of Human Resources Management

Stimulating productivity

Productivity can be measured as an amount of output per worker. With the globalization trends, when organizations are not restricted to boundaries, continues stimulation of productivity has turned out to be much more essential. HR managers can improve productivity through multiple activities, such as adaptable policies, the better communication system between employees, bonuses to salary, and other benefits that are likely to improve employee loyalty towards a company.

Improving quality of performance

Company's competitive advantage and popularity are both subject to the quality of services and products and it offers to its clients. The role of HRM in assuring quality lies in talent acquisition, constant supervising and feedback, engaging employees, advancing and improving managerial techniques, providing training and seminars for employees.

Empowering

Increased profits and better performance outcomes are driven by fulfilled, conferred motivated and committed employees. Consequently, employees who feel overburdened, unmotivated, insecure, and the individuals who gripe about a lack of training and cooperation at work, and absence of empowerment and motivation would not have the capacity to give the expected results. Success today requires motivating staff to create an environment of learning, information sharing, development, cooperation, and flexibility while eliminating issues that hinder employees' development and growth. HR manager has a possibility to create a working environment where work is not constrained, but rather is fun, motivating, and rewarding.

Planning and Analysis

Human Resource planning and analysis activities are assessed to distinguish the present and future needs of employees within an organization that would help the business accomplish its objectives. The key target of this activity is to distinguish factors that might increase the value of the organization. A key segment of this action is to expect the powers that may impact the future supply of and demand for employees (Mathis and Jackson, 2003). HR managers should have an access to company's internal and external data that will enable planning and analysis activities to be based on facts rather than on simple perceptions and predictions.

Assuring Equal Employment Opportunity

A noteworthy necessity for any business or organization is to be an equal opportunity employer, and this majorly affects all other HR activities and forms an integral part of HR management. Equal Employment Opportunity laws and regulations oblige a business to make certain that the selection and recruitment process is attempted to limit discrimination based on a person's race, color, origin, religious beliefs, gender, disability and some other qualities that could bring about bias and prejudice to an employee's or a candidate's employment.

Staffing

Human Resources is accountable for supplying a company with talented employees that could advance the company's progress, contribute to its growth, and catalyze the accomplishment of the business. Staffing is embraced with the motivation behind discovering individuals who might enhance and contribute to the business or the individuals who might increase a company's competitive advantage. In order to successfully fulfill staffing process, HR managers apply multiple activities, including job analysis, talent acquisition, preparing appealing job descriptions, position advertising, interviewing, and further selection, recruiting and training activities.

Development

Human Recourses managers should assure that the employees have all the necessities for professional and personal growth within a company or organization. Development capacity of HR is critical to increasing rates of job satisfaction, decreasing staff turnover, upgrading organizational culture, enhancing working practices, and making an environment that blossoms with learning, creativity, cooperation, and sharing. Development is important for success and growth of both employees and a company they are working in because it provides means to cope with changes massive changes that occur in modern business environment, for example, technological innovations, customer preferences, market and industry trends, as well as gives tools to answer future challenges stimulated by these changes.

Pay and Benefits

Remunerating employees for their work in a form of wage, rewards, and benefits is a major part of the work of Human Recourse managers. Motivation, loyalty, and commitment of the employees greatly depend on how they rewarded for their work. Employee rewarding and paying models may include but are not limited to traditional salary, profit sharing, wellness programs, compensations for exceeded hours of work, bonuses, and benefits.

Wellness, Safety, and Security on a Workplace

Job satisfaction and company's flourishing is unrealistic without assuring employees' wellness. The Occupational Safety and Health Act has made businesses more receptive to wellbeing and security concerns in a workplace (Mathis and Jackson, 2003). Security is about ensuring procedures that would minimize the possibility of injuries and accidents at a workplace, while wellbeing is guaranteed trough implementing practices that would eliminate or minimize risks with specific chemicals, equipment, or tools. HR managers take responsibility for assuring safety standards on a workplace and compliance with multiple laws and regulations of health and safety.

Assuring sound working environment

Respect at a workplace is vital for developing a healthy relationship between employees and employer. The relationship between the managers and personnel at all levels in the association must be founded on shared comprehension and regard so that association and the staff thrive together. For this to happen Employers must comprehend the privilege of their representatives on them and should ensure that those rights and obligations are satisfied though workers must comprehend that they have certain commitments to satisfy towards the business, this mental contract is a premise of setting up a long haul relationship that adds to the accomplishment of the firm.

Human Resource Management in Tourism and Events related industries

The importance of HRM in the tourism and hospitality industry cannot be denied. There are two factors which highlight this significance. The main factor is that the hospitality and events related industries are people-oriented which makes them being client driven and quality-focused. In fact, the human component has significant influence in the general achievement of any business, yet particularly so in the Hospitality industry, for example, a hotel business. Numerous individuals from the workforce (e.g. receptionists, administrators, and waiters) are in direct contact with the visitors and are seen as been required in accomplishing the targets of the business. The nature of provided services depends not only on the employees' skills but also upon the attitudes and training of the staff. It is broadly contended that individuals are indispensable for the fruitful conveyance of tourism services and, as an outcome, the individuals who work in tourism are generally depicted as a basic measurement in the effective operation of organizations within the industry.

A huge number of aspects characterize the relationship between Tourism and Events industry and Human Resources Management, for example, the level of qualification of employees, the structure of the work in ventures of arrangement, the proportion between those individual employed full-time and partial time of work, the amount of season employees, and the turnover rates (Riley & Szivas, 2003). A very popular model of management called "4Cs", which corresponds to congruence, cost-effectiveness, commitment, and competence, is believed to work well within travel, hospitality and events industries when integrated into a company's business strategy. As such, commitment is gained trough creating awareness of business goals and helping employees understand how they can contribute to these goals. Competence can be gained trough eliminating skills gaps among employees trough training and feedbacks. Both, employee and managerial competence are important to the accomplishment of business goals and objectives. Congruence is achieved when both employees and managers are following the same course of action and have the same vision to work together in accomplishing business targets. In this case, cooperation and transparency are likely to improve working relationships and identify any problems in accomplishing business goals and the ways these problems can be overcome. Finally, cost-effectiveness is gained when HR managers utilize human resources successfully and proficiently and amplify employee efficiency.

From the professional perspective, a major part of employers consider that tourism industry needs workforce with a high level of training, skills, a wide scope of knowledge, good preparation, knowing at least one foreign language, ability to promote and advance the service, and good interpersonal and communication skills (Boella, Goss-Turner, and Eade, 2005). However, the majority of jobs within the industry are low-paid and attract only a pool of poorly qualified laborers, mostly recent college graduates or unqualified laborers. Consequently, such specifics of the Tourism and Hospitality industries make the work of Human Recourses managers more complicated and demanding within the field.

Similar to numerous businesses, the Travel, Hospitality, and Events industries have understood that employees are the most vital resource of the business. Particularly in the hotel business, having a committed, qualified and competent workforce can reflect whether the hotel is good or terrible. The HR managers can cover verging on each part of the hotel. This makes HRM a vital and huge part of the administration in the hospitality business. There is a wide range of zones, enhancing them is the obligation of human asset chief bringing about the generally better performance by the whole company. The HRM division is in charge of screening, interviewing, hiring, training, and supervising new employees, as the recently hired individuals can genuinely influence the execution of the business which makes it essential for the directors to enlist the best and qualified specialists present in the business sector by taking after suitable employing process, in which each hopeful is basically assessed and just those with the sparkle are being contracted. The most essential task for the HR manager is to get the most talented individuals for specific job, since in hospitality industry, numerous employees tend to simply partake in the work, as they believe that there is nothing else to do, while, in fact, the industry require proactive employees who can make decisions on their own and can satisfy the client's needs in time (Brotherton, 2003).

Staffing remains a focal part for HR over all industries. In Tourism and Hospitality field, selecting solid applicants who have client-orientated attitudes is vital. Another specific difficulty for HR management in the field is disseminating the workload among skilled and inexperienced or newly-hired staff members. Seasonal business needs that connection straightforwardly to the company's capacity to assure a high level of provided services. HR managers must foresee what number of individuals the company requires, and when. The managers must utilize appropriate screening procedures to guarantee all employees can perform at a level that corresponds to clients' expectations.

The Problem of Seasonality in Travel and Hospitality Industries

Seasonality can be defined as a transient imbalance in the field of tourism, which might be viewed trough such components as numbers of clients, expenditure of clients, movement on interstates and different types of transportation, admissions to attractions, and employment patterns (Butler, 1994). Despite seasonality is a problem that has gotten much consideration in the tourism related business many years ago, yet it still remains unsolved (Butler, 2001). Seasonality has been considered as an essential issue for the tourism business and has been considered as a major factor in making numerous troubles confronted by the business, such as issues in accessing capital, in acquiring and preserving full-time staff, low rates of profitability creating high risk in operations, and for issues identified with abandoning and overuse of facilities (Butler, 2001, p.4).

Generally, studies group the major causes of seasonality into the three classifications: climate (e.g. temperatures); calendar impacts (e.g. days of religious celebrations such Easter or Christmas); and timing decisions (e.g. vacations). Natural seasonality is identified with fleeting varieties in the atmosphere amid the year, in the hours of sunlight and of daylight, the variability of temperatures. There are different variables bringing about institutionalized seasonality in the tourism industry, such as human traditions or customs.

The effects of seasonality can be gathered into three fundamental classifications: financial effects, socio-social effects, and natural effects. Financial effects of tourism seasonality are linked with issues in the off-peak periods, particularly the loss of income because of the wasteful utilization of assets and offices. Murphy (1985) contends that organizations need to achieve significant incomes from a couple occupied weeks in the late spring, with a specific end goal to guarantee accomplishment for the entire year. In this circumstance, it is hard to draw in speculators or banks from the private division and venture from open powers may along these lines demonstrate vital (Mathieson & Wall, 1982). Another major problem of seasonality is the trouble in selecting and retaining full-time personnel (Yacoumis, 1980).

Eliminating the outcomes of seasonality in tourism appears to be a difficult task (Butler, 1994). In any case, despite the fact that it will never be completely wiped out (McEnniff, 1992) there are diverse systems to try and out the crests and troughs. To this point, Butler states that there have been found a few effective ways to deal with the problem, for example, counting attempting to stretch the principle season, enhancing markets, utilizing differential tax incentives on a temporal premise, encouraging the length of holidays, empowering a domestic tourism in the off-season, and opening off-season activities, for example, festivals and celebrations (Butler, 1994, p.335). In their work, Weaver and Lawton distinguish six essential supply coordinating procedures to change the components and effects of seasonality, which include: expand request outside crest season, lessen request in the top season, redistribute request, diminish supply, redistribute or rebuild supply (Weaver & Lawton, 2002, p.211-213). In this study, the models are gathered in two fundamental classifications: approaches and techniques' for demand, and approaches and methodologies' for supply. The most widely recognized methodology to neutralize seasonality is based on creating and promoting celebrations, events, and festivals. These can either be conventional or misleadingly made occasions, outline to draw in guests in the fundamental season (e.g. the Edinburgh Music Festival in August) or in the off-peak season. In this second case, a good example could be the Oktoberfest in Munich, which has resulted in a creation of a "mini-season" in the city (Allcok, 1989). The outcomes and success of applied systems and strategies to overcome seasonality are interrelated with the socioeconomic and topographical patterns of destinations.

Conclusion

The importance of Human Recourses Management in the Tourism, Hospitality, and Events related industries should not be undervalued. Taking into account the finding of this paper, it is possible to assume that the travel and events related industries are people-oriented and client-driven which makes them interrelated to the success of applied Human Recourses strategies. In fact, the workforce component has a significant influence on the general achievement of any business, so on Travel and Events related industry. The paper found a number of aspects which characterize the relationship between Tourism and Events industry and Human Resources Management; these are the level of qualification of employees, the structure of the work in ventures of arrangement, the proportion between those individual employed full-time and partial time of work, a number of season employees, and the turnover rates. Finally, the research has found that seasonality is one of the most difficult problems in Tourism industry and presents a significant challenge to HRM.