Attracting and Retaining Staff in Hospitality Industry: Key Strategies and Practices

Managing Human Resources
Essay: Attracting and Retaining StaffStudent Name
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Essay: Attracting and retaining staff
In organisations, human resource management (HRM) is basically concerned with
people management or it can be said that HRM is an employee support junction of
organisations (Ali, 2013). The primary functions of HRM is to consider human resource
related issues or get involved in matter related to line employees for producing organisational
goods and services. In every sector, organisations are comprised of human and to acquire
services, develop necessary skills and motivate for superior work performance, HR managers
play a significant role. Regardless of the sector organisation are working in, whether public or
private, attracting and retaining quality staff is very important for the smooth functioning of
business (Deshwal, 2015). HRM deals with staffing, motivation, development and training of
employees to attain, prepare, stimulate and retain them. While going through the articles
related to attraction and retention of staff in general, it was found that hospitality industry in
every country faced additional challenges as compared to other sectors concerning attraction
and retention of employees. To analyse the same this essay will draw upon key learnings
from the key themes of the semester i.e. selection and recruitment, training and development,
work life balance, performance management and employment relationship management. This
essay will identify and evaluate strategies and practices to plan, recruit, attract, develop and
motivate employees while responding towards external business environment and
understanding contemporary HRM issues especially in hospitality industry.
Composition and size of employees is of great concern in every organisation.
According to Khan, et al. (2011, workforce training and development is a significant issue
that requires critical attention especially in hospitality industry where organisations must
include skill development and training programs. Performance management as well as

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employee relationship is also considered by researchers in literature where the authors
suggest that every individual must be considered especially in workplaces by implementing
practices like rewards, performance appraisals, incentives and bonuses to retain their
employees (Deshwal, 2015). Many contemporary organisations also provide infrastructure,
and additional facilities to attract quality workforce and retain loyal staff. Nevertheless,
hospitality industry workforce in developing and rural countries remain underpaid and often
neglected that develops poor motivation and job dissatisfaction among them. Further, due to
limited human capital, present employees are made to work extra than anticipated which
gives rise in work life balance related issues among them ( Brown, Thomas, & Bosselman,
2015).
Kramar, et al. (2014) has mentioned that recruitment and selection is a practice that is
carried by organisations in which potential employees are attracted and identified to select
them for performing organisation’s desired responsibilities. Recruitment and selection carry
various consequences over the organisation as basic formation of human capital is made
under recruitment and selection criteria (Guachait, Reutzier, Taylor , & Nicole, 2014).
Therefore, contemporary organisations have integrated recruitment and selection in their
HRM strategies where HR managers are responsible for carrying tasks related to it (Talukdar,
2016). HR managers further design and identifies number if individuals who have applied for
a post or likelihood of people who can be appointed for the vacant position in the
organisation. Selection is then made after sorting applicants’ qualification according to the
vacancy. According to Yilmaz & Bulut (2015), the primary role of recruitment and selection
procedure of HRM is to make sure whether organisation have reasonable amount of
workforce along with finding that every vacant job is filled by desired individuals.
HRM policies and procedures is about providing cohesive development and
performance as they are responsible for attracting and retaining employees for strengthening

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organisation’s capabilities to meet desired goals. Significant hospitality industries are usually
based on performance and advantages HRM can deliver through providing organisation with
motivated, knowledgeable and skilled labour (Arasli, Teimouri, Kilic, & Aghaei, 2017). For
the same, HRM deals with hiring and firing roles along with development and
implementation of frameworks to increase work effectiveness among employees. However,
in most of the hospitality organisations, Batarlienne, et al. (2017) have found that the basic
role of HRM is neglected and is not utilised appropriately that leads to workforce related
issues among hospitality industry employees. Deshwal (2015) have further suggested few
effective measures that can attract and retain quality staff by selecting and recruiting
workforce for organisations especially in developing countries. Training and motivation have
been greatly emphasised by the author through which the workforce can get desired
knowledge regarding the job role as well as through incentives which they are provided for
performing efficiently. Nevertheless, before training begins, selection is a critical stage
which proves challenging for HR managers as they have to select people according to the
organisational needs and any wrong selection may turn entire recruitment and selection
process unfavourably. According to Kramar, et al. (2014) there are basically five critical
standards that are followed by organisations in selection process: validity, utility, legality,
reliability and generalisability.
According to Slavic, Berber & Lekovic (2014), “Performance measurement is defined
as the process of quantifying effectiveness and efficiency of actions” (p. 47). It is one of the
HRM features that enables people perform their best and exploit best qualities among
themselves. Indeed, organisations performing in this competitive business environment must
manage human capabilities that can be achieved only if their performance is managed
effectively. Kramar, et al. suggests that performance appraisals are an integrated part of
performance management structure that is enormously utilised in Australian companies