The Hotel Industry - Essay Example

?LITERATURE REVIEW Service is a standard component of business strategies for organizations intent in surviving the highly competitive market today. This is the reason why academic interest on the subject has been extensive and this is demonstrated in the sheer expanse of literature on service such as service quality, service empowerment and so forth. This review of the extant body of literature will focus on service recovery. For a comprehensive conceptual explanation on service recovery, the work of Prideaux, Moscardo and Laws (2006) is an excellent resource. It compiled several studies on the subject that are specific to the tourism and hospital industries. For example, the book included the research undertaken by Pegg and Suh, which examined the activities involved in service recovery, planning, responsibilities, outcomes and evaluation. (p. 31-34) What Prideaux, Moscardo and Laws provided for this study was a general framework that contextualized the subject within the hotel industry. There was a clear link between service, recovery and the hospitality business. In line with this resource is another important work, which is that by Young and Burgess (2010). Their research investigated and described service recovery as a form of marketing technology. It provided several empirical evidences that demonstrate how service recovery can address service aberrations. Furthermore, the researchers were also able to describe the relationship between service recovery and positive customer attitude. An understanding of the theoretical paradigm behind the importance of service recovery is critical in making sense of its relations to customer satisfaction or profitability for hotels. In this respect, Bitner, Booms and Mohr (1994) designed a model based on the interaction between an organization and its customers. The investigated almost 800 critical service encounters as reported by employees in several hospitality enterprises such as hotels, restaurants and airline companies. The research revealed how service-related variables such as service recovery collectively dominate the factors that create a high quality interaction, which eventually leads to customer satisfaction. This theme was also the subject of study by Bolton as she investigated how organizations have embraced relationship marketing. This research found that organizations need to address the issues in different stages of their relationship with their customers and that once the customer experiences are not satisfactory; the relationship is likely to be very short. A fundamental element in Bolton’s finding is that the incidence and quality of service encounters are critical indicators of whether an organization’s relationship with the customers will flourish. Literature specific to actual experiences on service recovery include Zeithaml, Berry and Parasuraman’s work on service delivery. This study identified the factors that affect the magnitude and directions of what they called as the “four gaps” on the marketer’s side of their service quality model. (p. 35) In the investigation, the role of service recovery was highlighted. It was found that this component is one of the service-related factors crucial in correcting service-related failures connected with: 1) the difference between consumer expectations and management perceptions; 2) difference between management perceptions of consumer expectations and service quality specifications; and, 4) difference between service quality specifications and the service quality delivered. (p. 35-36) For instance, consumers develop a set of perspectives and expectations based on word of mouth communications, personal needs and past experiences. They collectively underscore the importance of service recovery, especially in instances when service quality or service initiatives fail. Humphrey (2010) cited some actual examples to service recovery at work, which offered invaluable insights for this study. For instance, there is the case study of the Ritz-Carlton’s service recovery strategy. (p. 126) The unique, efficient and successful model adopted shows best practices that can be adopted by other hotels. Cook (2010) also contributed in the similar vein. For example, she detailed the experience of the Hilton Hotels and the way it could resolve a huge number of complaints in a short time. It was explained that the service recovery strategy plays an important role why only 2 percent of complaints are escalated to Hilton Hotels central complaints unit. (p. 156) The case study revealed that an important component of successful a service recovery strategy is the empowerment of both the employees and the customers. For purposes of evaluation and measurement, particularly in determining the numerous theoretical frameworks available in the corpus of literature, one could use Liao and Chuang (2004) work to outline several examples of service recovery-related outcomes in organizations. Their work is a recognized multi-level study that includes thousands of participants, including customers, employees and managers from restaurants and hotels. In the numerous case studies provided, one could identify working models based on actual experiences. The body of the literature on service recovery shows how this particular variable in hotel operations is crucial. It is associated with service failures and value creations. So there are the failure/risk and opportunity dimensions. Being able to develop mechanisms that integrate these factors seamlessly can transform customers from dissatisfied to pleased and, eventually, loyal. Finally, based the review of literature suggests that a working service recovery model should be typified by a complementing organizational culture, a strategy that focuses on customers’ and also the employees’ perspective and a sound organizational structure, which service failures have to navigate in their resolution. RESEARCH QUESTION AND OBJECTIVES The case is clear, service recovery is important for business organizations especially for the hotels, for which service is a fundamental component of the product being sold. This is supported by various studies that detail actual experiences. However, there are numerous service recovery models available and determining the best of these and identifying the components involved may prove to be very challenging. This is now the main concern of this research. The primary aim of this market research is to identify the appropriate service recovery model for one hotel. For this purpose, the following objectives will be pursued: Describe and examine the role played by service recovery in the hotel industry. Explain service recovery in the context of relevant hotel operations such as service delivery systems and in achieving service quality standards; Explain the link between the outcomes of the previous objectives to organizational efficiency, customer satisfaction and customer loyalty; and, Design a service-recovery model tailored to the needs of the hotel. References Bitner, M, Booms, B and Mohr, L 1994, Critical Service Encounters: The Employee's ViewpointAuthor. The Journal of Marketing, vol. 58, no. 4, pp. 95-106. Bolton, R 1998, A Dynamic Model of the Duration of the Customer's Relationship with a Continuous ServiceProvider: The Role of Satisfaction. Marketing Science, vol. 17, no. 1, pp. 45-65. Cook, S 2010m Customer Care Excellence. London: Kogan Page Publishers. Humphrey, D 2010, 21st Century Business Customer Service. New York: Cengage Learning. Prideaux, B, Moscardo, G and Laws, E 2006, Managing tourism and hospitality services: theory and international applications. Oxfordshire: CABI. Young, L and Burgess, B 2010, Marketing Technology as a Service: Proven Techniques that Create Value. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley and Sons. Zeithaml, V, Berry, L and Parasuraman, A 1988, Communication and Control Processes in the Delivery of Service Quality. The Journal of Marketing, vol. 52, no. 2, pp. 35-48. Read More