The Legal Implications of Hotel Management - Term Paper Example

? LEGAL ASPECTS OF HOSPITALITY MANAGEMENT Hotel, restaurant and travel law Introduction The start-up process of any business involves legal procedures. These legal procedures involve the laid rules and regulations that govern the scope of the business. Many business firms are always guided by these laid down legal procedures. The start-up process of either a hotel or a restaurant demands the management to adhere to some of these legal procedures. The management of a hotel or a restaurant is one of the practices found under hospitality management. Managers in hotel, restaurant and travel firms are therefore required by the law to prevent any form of violations to these laws. The managers of these firms need to take into consideration the various actions and precautions they need to avoid. Avoidance of these precautions will therefore save them the number of the lawsuits that they need to attend to. Good traits imposed by the management of these firms would provide the firms with good reputation. The reputation of the firm would earn the firm more clients. The success of the firm would also lies with the competency of the employees. Therefore, adequate and competent staff is vital for the realization of the objectives of the firm. Employee’s knowledge of the legal framework of the firm is equally important. Maintenance of good legal practices by the employees would ensure survival of the firm. The firm would be able to survive because it would not be subjected to many lawsuits. For the smooth running of the hotel, staff development is crucial. Proper management of these hotels, restaurants and travel firms would also ease the coordination of the scheduled activities of these firms. Managers would have ease time carrying out other administrative duties of the firms. Correct legal practice would also enable these firms to effectively deal with external forces such as the political environments. The knowledge of the legal practices would give hospitality management students a good chance to meet the expectations of the employer firms as well as the expectations of the recruiters (Gerber 168). Simulation of the “real world” dynamics The studies which were learnt in the class work would therefore impact the necessary skills required by the hospitality management students to effective manage such kinds of firms. Running and maintenance of hotel and restaurant firms is a demanding task. The manager of these firms must have the technical knowledge concerning the operations and the legal practice of these businesses. The management processes would provide the hospitality students with the platform to put in practice all the theories they have learnt in the class. The knowledge of the laws governing the practice of hotel, restaurant and travel firms would help the students to; Meet the expectation of the employer and the recruiters Most of the employers and recruiters of the hospitality management students demand a lot from them. The employers would assume that the students have all the solutions to the problems that hospitality management profession faces. In such cases, the knowledge gathered from the class work would be essential. These students would use the knowledge learnt in class to provide the solutions for the numerous challenges that face this sector. The students would be able to schedule the activities of these firms for purposes of meeting the required levels of objectives. In this hospitality management course, the fresh students would be able to create a real life business plan for the firm and implementation of the created plans. The curriculum is needed to form the satisfaction of the basic purpose contained in the hospitality management education. The preparation procedures by the students would therefore entirely relies on the curricula. Create more business opportunity for these firms As managers of these firms, the students would be able to exercise the knowledge obtained from class to expand the business territory for the firms. The students would be able to create good relationships between the firm workforce and the clients. The success of any business relies on the ability of the business to have a strong customer base. This strong customer base is created by good relations between the management and the clients. Hospitality course teaches these good relations techniques. Therefore as a hospitality student, there would be a lot of ease in the creation of these relations. Meet the expectations of the customers Provision of quality services is the desire of many firms. This desire at times is not easy to achieve. The achievement of this desire depends on the creativity of the management. Hospitality students have an upper hand in the achievement of this desire. The course itself emphasizes on the provision of quality services. This knowledge of quality provision would help a hospitality management student to meet the desires of the clients. As a manager, the student would be able to focus on the customer’s satisfaction. Quality is a factor of consistency. As a manager the student would insists on consistency in the provision of the services. This can be achieved through proper management of the firm’s staff and proper supervision of the delegated duties. Create friendly business environment Hospitality requires an individual to surpass the treatment expectation of the clients and the employees. As a manager, the hospitality student would be able to create a friendly business environment for both the workers and the customers. The student manager would employ some of the hospitality skills taught in class to the real business environment. A friendly business environment appeals to the customers as well as the employees. The employees are able to sacrifice their time for the firm if the firm is friendly to them. The output of the workers would be doubled in cases of friendly business environments. The friendly nature of the firm would also appeal to the external donors who will like to be shareholders of the business. Profit generation would be increase. The firm would be able to enjoy economies of scale. Discussion Travelling department is linked to the hotel and the restaurant department. This linkage between these departments results from the friendly environment that is created by the hotels and the restaurants. The survival of hotels and restaurants entirely depends on the travelling department. Most clients who are on the travelling vocational always seek the services of hotels and restaurants. Hospitality management therefore acts as the link between the relations of these departments. Hospitality helps to boost the low esteem of customers. Travelling is always associated with fatigue and other sorts of exhaustion. The exhaustion and the fatigue are therefore nursed by the hospitality obtained from these hotels and restaurants. Hotel and restaurant departments always strive at the attainment of customer satisfaction. Hospitality management course always emphasizes on the importance nature of the customers and ways of satisfying the demands and needs of the customer. This emphasis is brought about by the perception of the customers by the firms. The customer is treated as the boss always. This is because the success of the business lays on the fate the customers. The talks of one customer towards the service provision by a given firm would either boost its business or lower its business activities. Negative talks by the clients would definitely bring down the firm while on the hand positive talks by the clients would raise the firm business activities (Hodges & Burchell 16). Most of the laws and the regulations that govern the operation of the hotels, restaurant and the travel departments mainly tend to protect the customers. The management of these firms needs to adhere to these laws whether they are political restrictions or general practicing laws. Hospitality management requires the providers of the services in these sectors to maintain high hygiene. The high hygiene protects the workers and the customers. Without these laws, outbreak of common health related diseases would crop up. Some of these diseases are diarrhoea which is transmitted from the contaminated food stuffs to the customers. As a manager therefore, maintenance of hygienic working conditions is vital. The travelling departments also have laws that the hospitality management must adhere to. The management must be able to fully record the details of the traveller so as to be able to make follow up when needs arises. The various departments within the hospitality management are bestowed with the mandate to set up rules and regulations that manages the different departments. The management is required to define the various roles and obligations of the various departments. The success of the various departments depends on the strict follow up of these rules. Besides the laws and the regulations set by the management, these regulations should be in line with the government rules in that particular business environment. Violations of these set rules by either the customer or the workers will results into consequences. These consequences might as well affect the firm’s operation. The management therefore has to fully highlight these set rules and regulations to the customers and the workers .By doing this, the management is able to eliminate the charges or lawsuits which might affect the firm. The success of the firm also depends on the output of these workers (Karen, Norman & Anthony 41). The level and the class of the restaurant and the hotels also determine the number of clients that they receive. The management needs to manipulate the firm system depending on the size and the capacity of the firm. The management system of big restaurants and hotels need to set up different union within the firm so as to ease the management process. The workers may be grouped according to their correspondent works. For example, all the workers in the sanitation and hygiene provision department should be group within their union. These unions assist in the dissemination of the duties and adherence to the set rules and the regulations. The unions also act as the link between the government and the firm. In cases of any problem, these unions would be summoned by the management. The unions would also act on behalf of the workers in cases of the disciplinary. When a worker violates the set rules and the regulations, the union would tend to defend them thereby making it easy for the firm to avoid many lawsuits. The union also agitates the objectives and the recommendations of the workers to the government. Besides the adherence to the common rules, the management would also be required to come up with some essential rules. The hospitality management students are taught other common rules such as the sexual harassment. The relationships rules within the firm premises should be enacted by the management so as to prevent workers from sexual relationships. These sexual harassment rules also protect the customers from the firm’s workers. The workers sexual relationships would result into reduced worker’s output. The outputs of the workers depend on the commitment of the workers. Apart from sexual harassment rules, good management system should also be able to set up other rules such as neatness rules. Neatness rules tend to define the outlook of the employees. Hotels and restaurants are associated with neatness. The neatness and the cleanliness of the workers tend to appeal to many clients. Clients would like to be associated with clean staff (Zerner & Gaurner 32). Proper management system should be able to set lateness and absetism rules. Hospitality management impacts on their students skills of managing workers lateness and absetism. As a manager, hospitality management student would be able to couch it employees on the impacts of lateness and absetism to the output of the firm. Lateness and absetism reduces the general output of the firm and the management should be able to set punishment for workers who constantly miss work. The punishment set should be able to discourage other workers from similar behaviours. The management should also be able to come up with permission rules. Workers need to be exempted from work for some times. The exemption gives the workers time to refresh. Refreshment is vital since it rejuvenates the workers effort. The management should therefore set up leave periods for its workers simultaneously. The management should also be able to come up with necessary working principles that would enable the firm to successfully carry out its mandate. The employees should be properly oriented during their contract assignment period. Proper working principles provide the management with easy time. Since the management deals with both administrative and supervision duties, the workers should be made aware of these mandates of the management. The management should relate well with the workers and the customers. The productivity of the firm depends on the discipline of the workers. Conclusion The management system of the firm determines the output of the firm. The knowledge that hospitality management impacts on its students should be able to assists the students to effectively manage the firm. The adherence of the set rules and the regulations set by the management of the firm is vital for the success of the firm. Additional set of rules such as the sexual harassment rules is vital for the firm. The discipline of the workers also helps the management. Discipline from the workers give the management easy time in the dissemination of the firm’s administrative and supervision duties. Hospitality students are better placed to carry out these set rules because their course offers them with the necessary skills required. The management should ensure that the rules and the regulations that they set within the firm system are in line with the government rules. Works cited Gerber, R. How do workers learn in their work? The Learning organization, 5(4) (1998)168-175. Hodges, D & Burchell, N. Business graduate Competencies: Employers’ Views on Importance and Performance. Asia-Pacific Journal of Cooperative Education, 4(2) (2002)16-22. Karen L. Morris, Norman G. Cournoyer &Anthony G. Marshall. Hotel, Restaurant and Travel Law (A preventive approach). New York: Mac millans publishers (2006):41-48. Zerner, M. & Gaurner, R. The legal implications of hotel management. Belgium: Mourlboure publishers (2012):32-39. Read More