Challenges of Attracting and Retaining Workforce in Hospitality Industry

1The key challenges of attracting and retaining a workforce in the hospitality industry
THE KEY CHALLENGES OF ATTRACTING AND RETAINING A WORKFORCE IN THE
HOSPITALITY INDUSTRY
The key challenges of attracting and retaining a workforce in the hospitality industry
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2The key challenges of attracting and retaining a workforce in the hospitality industry
The hospitality industry gained the attention of many researchers because of its dynamic
nature as a service sector. It requires the optimal human resources management (HRM) to ensure
the delivery of professional service. The challenge is high in the hospitality industry to recruit
and retain talented employees and management staff. The hospitality industry provides intangible
services where the human resource management (HRM) should act effectively in recruiting to
enable the organization to succeed. Many developing countries depend on the tourism and
hospitality to generate revenues and enhance the economic development (Huda, Haque, & Khan,
2014).
The hospitality industry involves all of the characteristics of the service industry. It is
described with intangibility, consumed at the time of production and heterogeneity. Also, it is
considered a human resource-centric industry. The employees become an integral part of the
service. They should provide a high-quality service that meets the customers' needs and ensures
their satisfaction. According to Lashley (1995), as cited in Bharwani & Butt (2012), the
organizations operating in the hospitality industry could establish competitive advantages if they
can effectively manage the service quality that is considered an intangible service. The
competition intense has increased due to the globalization of services that requires the
organization to adopt differentiation strategies. Service development is essential to the success of
the hospitality organizations.
This essay discusses the human resource related issues in the hospitality industry with a
special focus on the employee recruitment and retention. It analysis the ethical issues related to
HRM, theories and models, challenge that faces the hospitality industry and the problem of
diversity, the existence of three generations within the hospitality industry organizations and the
internal marketing.

3The key challenges of attracting and retaining a workforce in the hospitality industry
Hospitality industry refers to the services offered in hotels, licensed clubs, restaurants and
motels also there are many other sub-sectors. Tourism is among the most important industries
worldwide, where hospitality has a significant contribution to it. According to Nivethitha,
Dyaram, & Kamalanabhan, (2014), it is the world's second employer in the tourism industry. The
hospitality industry is heavily reliant on the manpower resources, it is considered the largest jobs
generator that provides more than 212 million job opportunities. One of every nine workers
worldwide is employed in the hospitality industry. Despite these facts, it is hard to attract
talented labor to this sector and it suffers from the high turnover rate that represents a significant
loss in terms of the companies' investment in the human capital. One of the major characteristics
in the hospitality industry is its high mobility. People can easily transfer to a similar job in
another company.
The processes of recruitment and selection are related to the performance of the
employee, work attitude and absenteeism. Employees who are recruited through direct
application to the organization gain accurate information about the job duties and the
organization. They enjoy long staying and better performance compared to those who are
recruited via employment agencies. Recruitment plays an important role through which the
organization is able to select the employees based on their characteristics, knowledge level and
personality in relation to the job requirements. This process is likely to result in an improved
service quality. The practices of the hotel industry reveal that organizations fail to match the job
requirements with the right hiring specifications (Murray et al., 2017).
It is argued by Paraskevas (2000), as cited in Nivethitha, Dyaram, & Kamalanabhan,
(2014), that due to the instability in the environment, the hospitality recruitment process requires
a job-fit rather than organization-fit employees.

4The key challenges of attracting and retaining a workforce in the hospitality industry
Researchers as Walsh, Sturman, & Longstreet (2010), argue that the HR decision making
involves some critical challenges that threaten its strategic implementation. These challenges are
due to the intangible nature of the human characteristics and the value of the brand name of the
hotels and its recognition. These factors are difficult to be predicted, there is no guarantee that
the investment in the human capital will lead to better performance of the employees that
contributed to the better financial performance of the organization. Although, the hospitality
industry relies on the employees to develop and maintain good relationships with the customers
that make them loyal to the brand. These challenges cause the hospitality organizations to
operate with lean margins.
Every organization seeks to satisfy its customers and maintain their loyalty. Listed
companies seek loyal investors to keep providing financial resources. This means that the
retention rate involves both the customers and investors. Kramar, et al. (2013b), argue that the
relationship between the employees and organizational performance is a function of certain
conditions where employees have knowledge that exceeds their managers' knowledge, the
employees are motivated to utilize their skills through discretionary effort and the organizational
strategy can be achieved only if the employees contributed to the discretionary effort. This
argument implies that organizations can only compete effectively if they could ensure that the
high-performance employees are motivated to stay in the organization and continue to contribute
to the discretionary effort and the low performance are required to leave. The significant role that
the high-performance employees do to ensure the success of the organizations, encouraged many
organizations to focus on the retention of the talented employees in order not to voluntary
turnover. They tend to offer the talented employees, many advantages, including flexibility,
career development and salary options. This issue is very important, that is why the expression of