Explaining Hospitality Management - Essay Example

THE HOSPITALITY NAME: INSTITUTION: 1 Explain what is meant by the post-modern view that the provision of hospitality is essentially about providing an experience? Give two examples to illustrate your answer. Hospitality management continues as a field of study continues to struggle for definition due to major tensions, contradictions and debates confronting the hospitality management scholars or educationalists. This failure to understand the phenomenon of commercial hospitality has been a barrier to the development of the industry. According to the post-modernist view, provision of hospitality is essentially about provision of an experience. According to Lashley (2000), hospitality requires that the quest should at all time feel that the host is being hospitable to him or her. This hospitable gesture or treatment is essentially characterized or exhibited by acts of generosity that is desire to please and also a genuine regard to the guest as an individual. This perspective of viewing hospitality centers on such concepts as generosity, friendliness, entertainment, the relationship between host and guest, and experiences given freely. The post-modernist view looks at host -guest relationship in regard to hospitality as more social and cultural definitions. Guest-host relationship is the key distinguishing feature in post-modernist view. The provider of hospitality services ought to have experiences. For example there are expectations and taboos that are connected to hospitality a domestic level. Similarly there are a number of social rules that govern certain situations. Such rules include avoidance of complains. All these aspects of hospitality involve the practice of experience as opposed to mere provision of services. 2. Explain, using examples, why hospitality is considered to be reciprocal in nature. According to Brotherton and Wood, in their text, Hospitality is a human exchange that is so contemporaneous. It is an exchange field that is entered voluntarily by the stakeholders. Hospitality’s design is structured to enhance a state of mutual wellbeing of the various parties that participate in the arena. This mutual wellbeing is attained through the provision of the various accommodation services and also food and/or drinks. Most practices in hospitality have their own antithesis. There is the element of reciprocity which is either way. It can be beneficial to the industry or it can be harmful. A proper provision of accommodation and catering services helps to boost the industry where as other to customers can be perceived as unfriendly and hence causes customers to shy away. For instance when some hospitality business to be dominant in the guest experience they a times reach a level where they appear un friendly and parsimonious. Any single action therefore means that there will at least be a reaction to it. The concept of reciprocal aspect therefore is among the factors that drive the industry. A good management that is able to ensure positive reciprocal terms in their firms are assured of maintaining their customers and hence a success to their business and the entire hospitality sector. 3. Discuss whether women’s role in providing hospitality in contemporary hospitality settings can have an ambiguous nature due to its historical links with sex and prostitution in some societies. Gender and sexuality are the concepts identified as important to organizational dynamics and service delivery. This paradigm is increasingly becoming influential. The significance for sex and gender for hospitality organizations depends principally on their role in creation of identities rather than in what they can say in regards to services provision. Women’s role in providing hospitality in contemporary hospitality settings is not as strange as stereotypes would want to print it. Sexuality and gender relations do not exhaust what people do at whichever field of work including even the service sector as in the case of hospitality. Nonetheless women’s historical links with sex and prostitution in some societies have minimal effects in the roles that the female sex plays in hospitality. Except for a few negligible stereotypic elements in some societies, a greater bulk of the world’s population have moved away from such primitive thinking. Hospitality is basically built on attraction. Such attractions are always directed towards the opposite gender. The attraction is caused by a passion for difference. The women therefore are as crucial in the success of the hospitality industry as they are instrumental in attracting the opposite sex, which is the male sex. Their role therefore does not arouse ambiguity as such but will instead boost the success of the field. 4. In Topic 4 it is argued that the commoditization of hospitality creates a natural tension between hosts/servers and guests in terms of consumption. What are the arguments for and against this statement? There are actions in hospitality industry undertaken by the management in the quest to improve profitability of their businesses. However their motives would always lead to practices that are not intended in actual senses. The motives of hospitality emanates from the conflict of interest between generosity and the economic relationships in commercial hospitality environment. The economic reality of hospitality enterprise is the need to control costs and generate a financial return. This ultimately is not the situation that normally applies to the practice of hospitality in social environments. This is always the source of conflicts and tensions especially when enterprises attempt to a real sense of hospitality. The practice are evidenced in the field of hospitality are actually the opposite, reverse or rather the antithesis of a true sense of hospitality. In fact some hospitality enterprises permit the financial to override the principle of guest experience to such a level that these businesses appear to be unfriendly. The inverse aspect is essentially depicted where the cost and also profit margin elements is factored into the price that is charged for offering the experience. 5. Explain what is meant by the statement that consumption of food is related to identity? Give two examples to illustrate your answer. Consumption of food has a great connotation on the identity. The type of food consumed by different people all over the world reflects greatly on their identity. The aspect of culture is exhibited in the hospitality industry where different people consume various food and other accommodation services according to their backgrounds. This is an element of identity, for instance, there are specified locations that are frequented by specific groups of people as these venues provide food that suit their cultural values. For example, there are designated places that provide Chinese meals. Further more food consumption is an element around which various groups of people can identify themselves with. Individuals can identify themselves as having a common identity based on the type of food they consume as well as other accommodation services they access. Secondly, the element of class identity is also depicted in food consumption. Different classes of people identify themselves with different types of food. Economic factor is also exhibited in hospitality industry as far as consumption of food is concerned. There is an element of fundamental differences in the economic power and culinary preferences in the various hospitality facilities available. Individual will always consume according to their financial and economic capabilities. This element of identity is also witnessed in the aspect of gender. Men and women frequently have varied spending power and different values concerning food. For example there are some foods that are preferred more by men than by the women. Likewise men prefer some specific types of food compared to women. This therefore means there is some element of identity in consumption of food. More over there exist some specific venues in the hospitality industry which are dominated by either sex. This is due to the element of identity 6. What did Jack Carlzon mean when he coined the phrase moments of truth Ja Carlzon was the Chief Executive Officer of Scandinavian Airlines in the 1980s. He coined the term Moment of Truth. His intention or rather implication was to label the interaction between employee and customer. “Just that quickly, individuals will make a “yea or nay” decision about you and what you represent. They are either won over or turned off”. Carlzon encouraged his employees to make use of their moments or opportunities of truth so as to be capable of winning customer confidence and even loyalty. As a result, his airline became a leading industry. Such acts of compassion such as the moments of truth highlighted described above can have a profound impact in the hospitality industry. 7. Describe the different types of performative labor introduced in topic 7 and provide an example of each. There are different types of performative labor that the hospitality industry can reach out to provide services to the industry in order to enhance success in the field. The first set of labor is the hourly employees. These are individuals who work on hourly basis. Their wages are calculated in terms of the time spent in house. They can be temporarily employed to work in the industry as this can convenience the firm in several ways. First their terms and conditions for work are so flexible to the industry. In most situations these employees are not entitled to such costly services as retirement and pensions as they are mostly employed on temporary basis. Examples of these set of employees are manual workers who offer such services as cleaning the company’s premises. There are also professional workers who work on hourly basis. These employees offer sort term services such as auditing, advertisement, marketing among other services. Those working in catering may also offer services on hourly basis. This set of hourly employees can be maintained by the industry by offering increased benefits, allowances, transportation among other encouraging gestures. The second set of potential employees at the industry’s disposal is the group that comprises the immigrants. Both legal and illegal immigrants are potential employees in the industry. The supply of this group of employees is so huge that the industry can depend on this group as they are not likely to furnish any time soon. They are in fact an essential source labor source in specific parts of North America. Examples of these potential employees are the Hispanic and Asian workers in the America. The Latin Americans working in North America also gives a good example of this bulk of employees at the industry’s disposal. The final essential group is formed by the part-time employees. A good example is the workforce that deals with food service. They interestingly form one-half of the entire food service force. The percentage of part timers in the industry is almost twice the proportion of the entire labor force. 8.) Hofstede’s values of cultural variability and its usefulness in explaining how the etiquette of eating in one culture may be different or similar from another. Culture variability help in understanding why there exists different eating etiquette among different cultural groups. Culture is dynamic a vary with different groups of people. This result in varied eating etiquette since there people determine or derive their eating etiquette based on their culture. This means that there can never be a uniform eating habit or etiquette among different groups of people since there is always different cultural norms among people. These norms vary among people. It’s therefore important to understand the different cultures in order to understand and appreciate the different eating etiquettes. 9.) Three ways in which service labor may be sexualized in a hotel setting Different services exist that are gender specific. This makes some of the services labor sexualized. Some tasks are best performed by certain sex like the PR services are best performed by women while men are good at handling labor intensive jobs in a hotel setting. The other way 10.) What do you think will be the innovations that offer greater customer satisfaction in the year 2020? By striving to provide the finest food and beverage services to the customers helps in improving the level of customer satisfaction. This will go a long way in making sure that guests always enjoy a warm, relaxed but yet refined ambiance. Customers' satisfaction, retention and loyalty should be the key driving forces which can be achieved through warm and sincere greeting while welcoming the guests. Their specific needs and food and beverage preferences must be complied with. This is done by providing personal services through identification and recording of individual guest preferences. A fond farewell should be given to the customers in order to make sure they come back again. Having uncompromisable level of cleanliness among the employees is also critical in making sure that the customers while making sure that the personal appearance of the employees conveys a professional image. REFERENCES Peter F. Drucker, The Age of Discontinuity (New York: Harper & Row, 1968), p. 264. Work in America (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, n.d.), p. 3. Peter F. Drucker, Management. Tasks, Responsibilities, Practices (New York: Harper & Row, 1974), pp. 80—86. Young, C., Cajga, y Herald, 10 November 1989, p. AS. Cornish, E.S., Planting Seeds for the Future, Champion International Corporation, Stamford, Connecticut, Kirkland, R.l., "Who Gains from the New Europe", Fortune, 120 No. 15, 1989, p. 83. Forbes, RJ., "The US Mature Market for uvel & Touns,n Analyst, November 1987 p. 37. Harris, L., Inside Amenca, Vintage Books, New York, 17-21. Go, F., "Resorts in North America: Problems and Prospects", T*uvel & Tou,is,n Analyst, No.1,1989, p. 34. Go, F., "Toward A New Century", Canadian Hotel & Restaurant, Mi 65 No.8, August 1987, p. a Current Mamet Outlook, Boeing Corporation, February 1988, p. 35. Read More