Challenges of Hospitality, Leisure and Travel Industry during COVID-19 Pandemic

This essay discusses the challenges faced by the hospitality, leisure, and travel industry during the COVID-19 pandemic. It highlights the impact of the pandemic on the industry and how The Dorchester, a London-based hotel, coped with the situation. The essay also provides recommendations for the industry to overcome the challenges.

Essay

Contents
Topic: Challenges of hospitality, Leisure and travel industry during COVID-19 pandemic..........3
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Main Body.......................................................................................................................................3
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................5
References........................................................................................................................................7

Topic: Challenges of hospitality, Leisure and travel industry during COVID-
19 pandemic
Introduction
Hospitality industry has its vital role in providing a better boost to once economy in
which the business is being operated. The hospitality sector in business scenario provides various
consumer related products and services which are aimed at increasing once social well-being. It
is an inclusion of hotels, resorts, motels and many more such service providing industries.
Considering today’s pandemic times i.e. COVID-19, there is a noticeable decrease in sales
activities of such sectors. This could be due to increase in social distancing guidelines introduced
by WHO, as it has resulted in increased operational cost of the respective sectors. In the present
report which will be based on an essay format will highlight several challenges faced by
hospitality industries during this pandemic times. For the reference “The Dorchester” is being
taken into consideration. Respective hotel is London based business which was incorporated in
1931 by Brunei Investment Agency. As with other hospitality industries throughout the region,
given firm was also hit hard by this pandemic. The following essay will highlight deep
understanding of the issue followed with reaction of respective company in the given sector
(Chen and et. al., 2021).
Main Body
In words of Vik Krishnan et. al., 2021, appearance of COVID-19 pandemic has led to
huge financial losses and also has contributed in damaging global health as well as economic
crisis throughout the world. It is believed that outbreak have resulted in downfall of operational
activities in hospitality industries. The respective issue all together is an inclusion of less
coordination, lack of investment, less motivation and high operational cost in operational firm.
Reason for such issues were decline in business and personal travel during the session as due to
high paid attention to personal health of various individuals. Therefore, by considering the good
interest of respective individuals residing in the impacted regions, bold decision to impose
complete lockdown was being imposed on 16 March 2020 in UK (Xiang and et. al., 2021). In the
evaluation of guidelines several businesses along with hospitality firms were being strictly
instructed to close their working as on the effective date mentioned in guideline. However,

various businesses in field of groceries, ration shops were being allowed to operate its operations
offline as well as online. With certain timing restrictions these businesses were being allowed to
operate also by following of specific guidelines of social distancing as given by legislation
authority of the given region. With increase in frustration and complexities arise due to
introduction of changes in operational firm unintentionally resulted in missing on employee’s
salary or wages and forced leaving of an employee. This undoubtedly created a bad image on
goodwill of respective business firm. However, with contrast to current business situation was
somehow acceptable in view point of higher authorities of given workforce, as several strategic
plans and techniques was being adopted by chosen firm to undertake several operational work in
an organisation effectively and to welcomes changes positively (Hospitality and COVID-19:
How long until ‘no vacancy’ for US hotels?).
In respect to global pandemic of COVID-19 due to which government of several
countries has to impose lockdown restrictions in once economy. This lead to drastic decrease and
resulted in economy of several impacted regions throughout the world. COVID-19 is a
communicable disease which has its origin from China. As highlighted by WHO, COVID-19
virus majorly impacts on health delivering systems of a human body which decreases once
capabilities to perform respective tasks as demanded by tracking corporate or any personal life
goals and objectives. In present times with relation to chosen hospitality industry i.e. The
Dorchester, managers of the firm while following several social distancing guidelines have to
invest more of the financial resources for enabling organisation to work as per imposed
guidelines given by government of UK with support of WHO (Gkoumas, 2021). This extra
investment of financial resources of the company have resulted in overall decreased profit
margins of given company. Due to other several other related restrictions and guidelines such as
of maintaining social distancing also results in building up of stress and dissatisfaction in minds
of respective employees working in the operational firm. As a result, it causes disputes, conflicts
or gives rise to any other unproductive activities in the given organisational firm. In a hospitality
sector that provides quality hospitality services to several clients or guests visiting the hotel. In
description of the issue, it can be said that lack of enough financial resources, dropping up of
sales and increase in operational cost resulted in hard sufferings of the hospitality firm (Robinson
and Jiang, 2021).

In regards to operational working of “The Dorchester”, operational management
department of the firm have adopted the changes due to current pandemic times positively. In the
process being several training and development programs were being introduced which enabled
effective working of several departments to ensure greatest possible services to respective
customers of the company. Changes made in communication or reporting patters in the given
operational firm has also being modified as with respect to COVID-19 times. Several changes
were being made with respect to altering the operational work as per social distancing guidelines
and taking care of any health issues recognised in an employee in the working site. Additionally,
hand sanitizers, touchless dispenses whenever possible were also being made available at the site
of hospitality industry. With making the hospitality industry responsive to health concern of
respective individual, medical support team was also being engaged to operations of the service
firm (Seraphin and Dosquet, 2020). In relation to adopt changes positively several speeches and
seminars were also being organised which were dedicated at motiving employees in respective
industry. Further, it was believed that through motivated employees, managers of the company
can extract best possible outcome of efforts with investment of minimum resources. Guests
visiting the hotel were provided with medical kit including hand sanitizer, masks and COVID-19
awareness card. This showed a positive mind-set of the given company i.e. The Dorchester,
which enabled company to attract more demands of customers and ultimately create better brand
value of products or services being sold by the company in given marketplace. Other supportive
activities like timely room cleaning, sanitising relative areas supported the argument of taking
changes positively by the given hotel industry (Lombardi and et. al., 2021).
Conclusion
From the above presented essay in form of a report document highlighted several aspects
of issues or challenges faced by a hospitality industry while operating its operational activities in
current pandemic times. The following report presented various facts which were in relation to
taking changes in an organisational firm positively. In addition to this, various strategy was being
adopted by hospitality firm which provided them boost to establish better customer relations and
also enhanced better productivity of given firm in respective marketplace. As considering the
nature of change which suggest changes are hard to implement, managers of the respective firm
provided suitable training and development programs. This ensured better motivation of

respective employees working in the given business firm. Lastly, by undertaking several
precautions which were in regards to safety measures also contributed towards better brand
building of the respective company.
On the basis of the above discussion, there are several recommendations which are to be
drawn out for the respective firm. These recommendations are subjected towards extracting
better productivity of firm and to boost of moral of several staff working under high complexities
and uncertainties of business environment. By introduction of innovative technologies in field of
working of a business enterprise will reduce complexities and risk of uncertainties in working
environment of business enterprises. As in the process being several operational tasks of business
firm could be simplified by use of technologies and by arranging suitable training programs
managers can extract best efficiency of staff. Another recommendation for the given firm would
be of spreading suitable awareness programs. This will help in creating a positive approach of
the given firm in terms of its operations and will educate employees and employers about the
cause. Moreover, this recommendation also aims at providing better transparency of given firm
in terms of its operations and will also increase potential of industry in respect with its increased
coordination.

References
Books and Journals
Chen, S., Law, R. and Zhang, M., 2021. Review of research on tourism-related diseases. Asia
Pacific Journal of Tourism Research, 26(1), pp.44-58.
Gkoumas, A., 2021. Developing an indicative model for preserving restaurant viability during
the COVID-19 crisis. Tourism and Hospitality Research, p.1467358421998057.
Lombardi, S., e Cunha, M.P. and Giustiniano, L., 2021. Improvising resilience: The unfolding of
resilient leadership in COVID-19 times. International Journal of Hospitality Management, 95,
p.102904.
Robinson, R.N. and Jiang, Y., 2021. Events Employment Crises’ Impacts and Resolutions
(Richard NS Robinson and Yawei Jiang).
Seraphin, H. and Dosquet, F., 2020. Mountain tourism and second home tourism as post
COVID-19 lockdown placebo?. Worldwide hospitality and tourism themes.
Xiang, Z., Fesenmaier, D.R. and Werthner, H., 2021. Knowledge creation in information
technology and tourism: A critical reflection and an outlook for the future. Journal of Travel
Research, 60(6), pp.1371-1376.
Online
Hospitality and COVID-19: How long until ‘no vacancy’ for US hotels? [Online]. Available
through: <https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/travel-logistics-and-infrastructure/our-insights/
hospitality-and-covid-19-how-long-until-no-vacancy-for-us-hotels>