HND Hospitality: Analyzing HRM Practices at Travelodge Hotels, UK

This report provides an analysis of Human Resource Management (HRM) within service industries, using Travelodge Hotels as a case study. It explores the role and purpose of HRM, its importance in the hotel industry, and strategies for HRM activities including recruitment, selection, and training. Th...Read More

HUMAN
RESOURCE
MANAGEMENT
FOR SERVICE
INDUSTRIES

Table Of Contents
• Introduction
• Role and Purpose of Human resources Management
• Importance of HRM
• Strategies for HRM activities
• HRM Planning
• External environment and statistics
• Supply and demand forecasting
• HR plan
• Effects of Legislation
27/11/18

Introduction
• Human resource management has become a dominant paradigm in every kind
of industry over the past few decades.
• The process of Human resource management (HRM) includes recruitment and
selection, orientation, training and development, maintaining good work
environment and solving problems.
• Of the 75% of people employed in the services industry, only 18.4% works in
the production services which imply the growth of employment rates in the
tourism and hospitality industry.

Role and purpose of Human
Resource Management (HRM)
•The sole purpose of Human Resource
management is to hire staff for the organization
and train them according to the needs of the
company
•The HRM not only manages the new hires for
the company but also deals with termination
and exit regulations of the employees

Importance of HRM
 The hotel industry have been posing as a growing sector
and the power now wielded by this type of services
organizations is quite great.
 The main theory of HRM is to encourage mutuality among
the workers in the company (Markova et al. 2016).
 The key HR management areas that are related to the hotel
industry in this context are the human resources flow
including recruitment, dismissal, promotion and rewarding
system within the organization.
 In order to integrate the work flow of every department, it
is important to apply specific and formulated HRM
policies in the services framework of Travelodge

Activities
• Once the organization is successful in creating a
balance between product market, business strategy
and HRM policies, it has to be easier to achieve
goals in time.
• The general activities in HRM of Travelodge
include selection, recruitment, dismissal,
performance management and training (Pasupathi
et al. 2017)

Strategies for HRM Activities
• The strategies that can be helpful in the context of
employment and recruitment in Travelodge Hotels
may be listed as follows:
• Creating employee empowerment which enables the
employees to function effectively in leadership
roles whenever needed
– Cultivating awareness about the importance of
quality customer services is another way to
increase the performances of the employees.

Strategies
– The organization is mainly looking for a
reduction in costs dedicated to the employees.
– Therefore the company mainly seeks to
reduce labour costs, providing lower
emphasis on job security and promotion.
• A flexible HRM system is also required which
means enhancing the adaptability of the practices
and policies in the organisation with change
(Nasurdin et al. 2015)

HRM planning
• The Human resource management plan for
recruitment in Travelodge hotels, UK include
six steps namely-
– Identifying the human resource
requirements
– Settling with a recruitment strategy
– Selection and induction of the employees

External environment and statistics
• The hotel industry in Europe as well as all around
the world is a labor intensive sector and is fast
growing.
• The company of Travelodge hotels alone holds
almost 3% of the total employees in the services
industry in the UK (Travelodge, 2018).
• Changing government regimes and worldwide
terrorism is some of the political factors that
affect the hotels and hospitality industry in the
UK negatively.
Figure 1: Employment rates
in Hotel industry until 2015
(Source: International Labour
Org., 2018)

External Environment
• Variable BREXIT also affects the hotel
business at Travelodge as well as the
whole hospitality sector negatively with
the decrease in the value of the pound.
• Europe has a high rate of paid
employment in the hotel's sector and the
jobs proved in the UK are stable and
with formal arrangements.

External Environment
• Travelodge hotels HRM has to consider the
competition in the hotel and hospitality industry
and keep updated with the employment offers in
the other companies as well.
• The increase in VAT also puts a limit on the
performance of the organisation since it reduces
the disposable income of all.
• Other external factors affecting the employment
rates in Travelodge include transport facilities
which are not provided to the employees at
lower levels.

Supply and demand forecasting
• Internal and external supply forecasting consists
of employee turnover analysis, skill inventory
analysis and succession planning.
• Population mobility and government policies
have driven Travelodge to consider demographic
changes in population and forecast supply of
skills.
• The main demand generators for the company of
Travelodge include easy transport availability
areas such as airports, train stations and bus
stands.

HR plan
• The first point of HR plan of recruitment in
Travelodge included determining how many
people are required in which department.
• The departments with most employee
requirement include food services and cleaners
in the hotels.
• The next steps include listing the skills that are
required for each hire (Armstrong and Matters,
2017).

HR Plan
• While measuring the amount of time required
for the whole process, the HRM needs to
consider-
– The time required for evaluating the résumés
– Time for interviewing the candidates
– Interview expenses
– Payroll expenses
– Relocation expenses
– Additional insurance or travel expenses

HR Plan
• The compensation rates are to be set after
analyzing the factors such as
– Compensation provided by similar posts
in other hotels
– Additional allowances provided
– Current costs of Travelodge on
employees
– Motivational ranges of remuneration.

Current state of employment
relations
• The characteristics of the existing
workforce are an important determinant of
the approaches that are undertaken by the
HRM in Travelodge Hotels.
• Trade unions, collective bargaining,
workplace representation and health and
safety representation affecting employment
relations in Travelodge Hotels

Effect of employment law on
HRM
• Weak management and independence of the
trade unions in Europe caused industrial chaos
in the matters of employment till the 1970s.
• With the introduction of the HRM in the hotel
industry, the industrial relations of UK was
significantly improved since the
implementation of the Employment Relations
Act (1999).

Effect of employment law on
HRM
• The legislation about the minimum wage
states that the workers in the organisation
have to be within the age of minimum 18 to
maximum 70 years. (Boella, 2017)
• For the workers who are under 25yrs, the
minimum wage declared by the government
was £5.30 per hour and for those who are
over 25, it is £7.20 per hour (UK gov. 2018).

Effect of employment law on
HRM
• The UK government also sets a separate
Holiday law or all employees who are
working full time.
• This law, along with payment for holiday’s
schemes often lead to ultimate losses for the
Travelodge hotels.

Reference List
• Travelodge. (2018). Our company - Travelodge. Available at: https://www.travelodge.co.uk/about/our-company/ [Accessed 26 Nov.
2018].
• Brien, A., Thomas, N. J., and Brown, E. A. (2017). How hotel employee job-identity impacts the hotel industry: The uncomfortable
truth. Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Management, 31, 235-243. Available at:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1447677016300663 [Accessed 26/10/2018]
• UK gov. (2018) Working Futures 2014–2024 Available at: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/
uploads/attachment_data/file/543301/WF_Headline_Presentation_v3.pdf [Accessed 28/10/2018]
• Christy, N. V., and Albert, A. S. (2017). A STUDY ON THE ATTITUDE OF EMPLOYEES TOWARDS HUMAN RESOURCE
MANAGEMENT PRACTICES IN THE HOTEL INDUSTRY OF TAMIL NADU. Available at: https://www.ijasrd.org/wp-
content/uploads/2017/05/A-Study-on-the-Attitude-of-Employees-towards-Human-Resource-Management-Practices-in-the-Hotel-
Industry-of-Tamil-Nadu.pdf [Accessed 23/10/2018]
• Chytiri, A. P., Filippaios, F., and Chytiri, L. (2018). Hotel Recruitment and Selection Practices: The case of Greece. Available at:
https://www.dora.dmu.ac.uk/handle/2086/16061 [Accessed 20/10/2018]
• Ewart-James, J., and Wilkins, N. (2015). The staff wanted initiative: Preventing exploitation, forced labour and trafficking in the UK
hospitality industry. In Vulnerability, Exploitation and Migrants (pp. 256-268). Palgrave Macmillan, London. Available at:
https://universalflowuniversity.com/Books/Computer%20Programming/Software%20Security%20and%20Privacy/Vulnerability,
%20Exploitation%20and%20Migrants%20Insecure%20Work%20in%20a%20Globalised%20Economy.pdf#page=272 [Accessed
29/10/2018]
• Farrell, K. (2015). Work-life Balance Practices Among Irish Hotel Employees and Implications for HRM. Level 3, 12(2), 4.
Available at: https://arrow.dit.ie/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1117&context=level3 [Accessed 23/10/2018]

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