COVID-19 Impact on Marriott Hotel: Challenges and Strategies

This report explores the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the hospitality industry, focusing on the challenges faced by Marriott Hotel and the strategies they adopted to overcome them. The research aims to identify these strategies, including adapting to changing customer behaviors, adopting digital marketing methods, and investing in advanced technologies to minimize human contact and ensure safety. The literature review examines the concept of the COVID-19 outbreak, its effects on the hospitality sector, and the specific challenges encountered by Marriott, such as declined sales, employee turnover, and low occupancy rates. The intended methodology outlines a positivism research philosophy, a survey research strategy, and the use of both primary and secondary data collection methods, with frequency distribution analysis for data analysis, while adhering to ethical considerations. The action plan details the timeline and resources required for the research.

Research Methods

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
Background of the project......................................................................................................3
Research rationale..................................................................................................................3
Research justification.............................................................................................................4
Research aim and objectives..................................................................................................4
LITERATURE REVIEW................................................................................................................5
Explain the concept about the outbreak of global pandemic COVID-19?.............................5
What are the challenges faced by Marriott Hotel during global pandemic COVID-19?.......5
What are the strategies adopted by Marriott Hotel for overcoming the challenges related to
outbreak of COVID-19?.........................................................................................................6
INTENDED METHODOLOGY.....................................................................................................8
ACTION PLAN...............................................................................................................................9
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................10

INTRODUCTION
Background of the project
The outbreak of COVID-19 has created huge disturbance on the business activities
around the world. This has created situation of fear among people and different businesses as
well. Due to the outbreak of COVID-19 the government has taken different measures in order to
minimise negative impact of COVID-19. These measures are lock down, shutting of businesses
and many more (Sigala, 2020) These restrictions have created issues for the hospitality industry
as their business is wholly dependent on their customers and visitors. So the current report is
managed in such a way that impact of global pandemic on hospitality businesses and various
strategies of overcoming with the same. Using secondary source of data collection literature
review is conducted so that information related with the strategies that can be taken out by
hospitality industry to minimise negative impact can be analysed. The current investigation
includes different information related with global pandemic of COVID-19 and its impact over
the business functions of hospitality industry. The organisation selected in order to carry out the
report is Marriott which is an American multinational company having operations in global level.
Research rationale
The major purpose of managing this research is to gaining in-depth information in terms
of COVID-19 on the industry of hospitality industry. This research is going to highlight
challenges which are being faced by hospitality industry due to implication of COVID-19. This
is examined that due to the outbreak and this manner mind set of the businesses are also faced
negativity (Prideaux, Thompson and Pabel, 2020). The research is related with dual status such
as personal and profession status. In the terms of professional status this research will assist the
researcher in managing future researches in appropriate manner. On the other hand, in terms of
personal status the research will increase different skills of researcher such as communication
skills, research skills and many others. By executing the current research I am able to develop
my creativity which is going to assist me in my future. I have learnt regarding different strategies
which are used by the organisation in order to overcome with such situations of pandemic so that
this would help me in my professional career.

Research justification
The current research topic is chosen for the major objective of analysing the situation of
COVID-19 and its impact over the industry of hospitality (Grima, Dalli Gonzi and Thalassinos,
2020). This is analysed that the hospitality industry have seen the highest negative time due to
the implication of COVID-19 as the industry is directly linked with its customers and due to
pandemic the industry has been devastated. The research is going to provide significant
information related with various strategies adopted by hospitality industry in order to deal with
pandemic situation of COVID-19 so that businesses within hospitality industry may include such
measures and regain their market position. The research is essential for the aspect of including
such strategies that can be used by the hospitality industry so that to manage their business
operations.
Research aim and objectives
Research Aim:
To identify the strategies adopted by UK hospitality industry to overcome the challenges
related to outbreak of COVID-19. A study on Marriott
Hotel
Research Objectives:
 To understand the concept about the outbreak of global pandemic COVID-19
 To determine the challenges faced by Marriott Hotel during global pandemic COVID-19
 To evaluate the strategies adopted by Marriott Hotel for overcoming the challenges
related to outbreak of COVID-19
Research Questions:
 Explain the concept about the outbreak of global pandemic COVID-19?
 What are the challenges faced by Marriott Hotel during global pandemic COVID-19?
 What are the strategies adopted by Marriott Hotel for overcoming the challenges related
to outbreak of COVID-19?

LITERATURE REVIEW
It is the chapter that mainly focuses on accumulating second-hand information from the
sources such as books, articles, newspapers, journals etc. The present literature review has
covered information about the outbreak of global pandemic COVID-19 along with challenges
faced by hospitality due to same.
Explain the concept about the outbreak of global pandemic COVID-19?
According to Hao, Xiao and Chon (2020), COVID-19 is the situation that has created fear
among people. It is the situation that has created devastation in the whole world. This crises
situation has also forced hospitality organisations to change their every strategy of operations.
This event has created high level of uncertainties and needed quick responses to face its negative
effects. It is being determined that due to COVID-19 people were unable to move out from their
house and Government has put restriction on travelling of people. With the outbreak of global
pandemic, people have also created mind-set that they need to save more for facing such
uncertainty situations. It is identified that with the emergence of global pandemic COVID-19,
occupancy levels and room rates have dropped, high disruption of normal work and operations,
drop in average daily rates and revenue per room, decrease in number of foreign tourists, job
cuts, international travel cancellations, postponed future investment plans, fear among employees
regarding their health and safety, increase in fixed and variable cost, losses in visitors & revenue,
losses in leisure & business travellers and many more (Sanabria-Díaz, Aguiar-Quintana and
Araujo-Cabrera, 2021). In simpler words, COVID-19 has created negative impact over business
operations of the hospitality industry because this industry is largely dependent over visitors and
with the occurrence of global pandemic COVID-19 people were not allowed to travel from one
place to another.
What are the challenges faced by Marriott Hotel during global pandemic COVID-19?
According to Madeira, Palrão and Mendes, (2020), there are various challenges which are
being faced by the hospitality industry due to the implication of global pandemic COVID-19 and
these has created different issues within survival and business operations. The industry is wholly
dependent on their customers but at the same time due to COVID-19 global lock-down was
imposed so that people were not able to enjoy hospitality services and at the same time the
industry has faced irreplaceable losses. The major challenges within hospitality industry is

related with declined sales, employee turnover, minimum occupancies, not meeting break even
point and many other. The COVID-19 has lead to shut down various businesses and due to
which different strategies were required to be framed by the organisation. This is determined
that due to pandemic people were not able to move out of their home due to the reason of
restrictions imposed by the government and this has lead the organisation to face low
occupancies in the hotel. On the other hand, the lock-down in the nations were not planned, it
was spontaneous so that the customers who has pre-booked their trip after the lock-down they
demanded refund from the organisation. This was the major challenge within the organisation
managing their business in hospitality industry as due to refunds they faced higher losses and
they couldn't pay their expenses (Alkasasbeh, 2020). This is the issue which has negatively
impacted over profitability of hospitality industry and due to which overall cost for the
organisation has increased. Another challenge is related with not paying of employee salary as
due to high losses employee had to compromise on their salaries. Besides this, various safety and
hygiene measures were added into the business which has increased the overall cost but at the
same time hospitality industry is always having fear of not getting required number of customers.
What are the strategies adopted by Marriott Hotel for overcoming the challenges related to
outbreak of COVID-19?
According to Li, Yao and Chen (2021), due to global pandemic COVID-19, travel was one
of the things which was stopped and this had negatively impacted whole hospitality industry.
With the emergence of pandemic behaviour of people has changed drastically and this will
continue to impact the path hotels use for acquisition strategies. Managing and handling this
radical shift in the market need great efforts and time. Hospitality industry has focused on
listening and staying close to the needs and requirements of customers so that hotels can adapts
these changes and offer them accordingly. Hotels have focused on placing sustainability and
contributed to the local economy. In simpler words, hotels have focused on achieving deep
understanding of their guests and this has assisted them to recover from the negative impacts of
global pandemic COVID-19. The other strategy adopted by hospitality industry during global
pandemic COVID-19 is adopting digital methods (Khan and et. al., 2021). Hotels have continued
to do its marketing on different social media channels, optimised its web design, invested good
social media and content production management, worked on SEO and many more. The other
best strategy adopted by hospitality industry is that they have invested on advance technologies

so that operations can be done with less human resources. This has also assisted in preventing
and mitigating fear of the pandemic from the mind of people. Hospitality industry has also used
social media for updating information about the strategies adopted by them to prevent the spread
of COVID-19.

INTENDED METHODOLOGY
Research Philosophy: It is categorised into two significant forms which are: positivism and
interpretivism philosophy. Researcher will choose positivism philosophy so that statistical data
can be evaluated and examined in a systematic manner (Rutberg and Bouikidis, 2018). The main
benefit of using the positivism philosophy is that it carries out relevancy of statistical figures by
analysing it properly.
Research Strategy: The strategy is the method which helps in collecting appropriate
information so that defined objectives can be attained in a significant way (Basias and Pollalis,
2018). This has different forms which are: action research, case study, survey, interview,
systematic literature review etc. Investigator will choose survey as the strategy so that numerical
information can be taken out and generated outcomes could be easily evaluated and measured.
The main advantage of survey is that it helps in accumulating quantitative piece of information.
On the other hand, systematic literature review is the other strategy that helps in assembling
published data.
Sources of data: Researcher will develop questionnaire for collecting first-hand information
directly from the source of data. 30 managers will be chosen from Marriott Hotel so that they can
offer great piece of information (Ryder and et. al., 2020). The secondary sources will be chosen
such as books, journals, newspapers, publications etc. so that second-hand information can be
accumulated and assembled.
Data Collection: It is the research method that assists in collecting information with the
assistance of two methods which are: primary and secondary data collection method. Research
will use both the methods of data collection so that detailed information can be assembled and
objectives could be achieved (Smith, Date and Taylor, 2020). Primary method will help in
collecting raw information in relation to the selected topic. On the other hand, secondary method
will assist in assembling published information.
Data analysis technique: Frequency distribution analysis will be considered by researcher
for analysing numerical piece of information (Ragab and Arisha, 2018). This method will help in
generating outcomes in numerical manner.
Ethical Consideration: The present investigation will follow certain ethical principles so
that it can be conducted in ethical manner (Bauer and Scheim, 2019). Researcher will not harm

any respondent while collecting data, maintain confidentiality, take informed consent and many
more.
ACTION PLAN
The current investigation will require appropriate time period for carrying out relevant and
accurate piece of information. It will use secondary sources as well as primary source to collect
information so that pre-defined objectives can be achieved. This will also require £70 for
carrying out activities which include travel cost, stationary cost and many more.
Gantt chart will be used by investigator for scheduling every activity of the research in a
systematic way (Dźwigoł, 2018). This divides chart into two sections in which one highlights the
activities need to be undertaken and the other one shows time interval.

REFERENCES
Books and journals
Alkasasbeh, F., 2020. The effects of COVID-19 on restaurant industry: A perspective
article. Journal of Innovations in Digital Marketing, 1(1), pp.16-21.
Basias, N. and Pollalis, Y., 2018. Quantitative and qualitative research in business & technology:
Justifying a suitable research methodology. Review of Integrative Business and
Economics Research, 7, pp.91-105.
Bauer, G.R. and Scheim, A.I., 2019. Methods for analytic intercategorical intersectionality in
quantitative research: discrimination as a mediator of health inequalities. Social Science
& Medicine, 226, pp.236-245.
Dźwigoł, H., 2018. Scientific research methodology in management sciences. Фінансово-
кредитна діяльність: проблеми теорії та практики, (2), pp.424-437.
Grima, S., Dalli Gonzi, R. and Thalassinos, E., 2020. The impact of COVID-19 on Malta and it’s
economy and sustainable strategies.
Hao, F., Xiao, Q. and Chon, K., 2020. COVID-19 and China’s hotel industry: Impacts, a disaster
management framework, and post-pandemic agenda. International journal of hospitality
management, 90, p.102636.
Khan and et. al., 2021. The effect of COVID-19 on the hospitality industry: The implication for
open innovation. Journal of Open Innovation: Technology, Market, and
Complexity, 7(1), p.30.
Li, Y., Yao, J. and Chen, J., 2021. The negative effect of scarcity cues on consumer purchase
decisions in the hospitality industry during the COVID-19 pandemic. International
Journal of Hospitality Management, 94, p.102815.
Madeira, A., Palrão, T. and Mendes, A.S., 2020. The impact of pandemic crisis on the restaurant
business. Sustainability, 13(1), p.40.
Prideaux, B., Thompson, M. and Pabel, A., 2020. Lessons from COVID-19 can prepare global
tourism for the economic transformation needed to combat climate change. Tourism
Geographies, 22(3), pp.667-678.
Ragab, M.A. and Arisha, A., 2018. Research methodology in business: A starter’s
guide. Management and organizational studies, 5(1), pp.1-14.
Rutberg, S. and Bouikidis, C.D., 2018. Focusing on the fundamentals: A simplistic
differentiation between qualitative and quantitative research. Nephrology Nursing
Journal, 45(2), pp.209-213.
Ryder and et. al., 2020. Indigenous research methodology–weaving a research
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Sanabria-Díaz, J.M., Aguiar-Quintana, T. and Araujo-Cabrera, Y., 2021. Public strategies to
rescue the hospitality industry following the impact of COVID-19: A case study of the
European Union. International Journal of Hospitality Management, 97, p.102988.
Sigala, M., 2020. Tourism and COVID-19: Impacts and implications for advancing and resetting
Smith, J., Date, P., Spencer, W., de Tonnerre, E. and Taylor, D.M., 2020. Evolution of
methodology and reporting of emergency medicine quantitative research over a 20-year
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