Detailed Report: MSC Cruises and the Global Cruise Industry

This report provides a comprehensive overview of the cruise industry, focusing on key operational aspects. It begins with an introduction to the industry and then delves into five critical sectors: Human Resources Management (HRM), emphasizing its role in training, performance, and employee relations; Health and Safety, highlighting safety regulations and crew training; Hospitality, exploring its benefits and challenges in customer satisfaction and entertainment; Supply Chain Management, discussing its importance in efficient cargo handling and supplier relationships; and Customer Experience and Satisfaction, stressing its impact on brand image and loyalty. The report uses MSC Cruises as a case study throughout, examining its practices and strategies within each sector. The conclusion summarizes the competitive nature of the cruise industry and the importance of innovation, customer focus, and effective management.

Introduction to Cruise
Industry

Table of Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................3
Main Body..................................................................................................................................3
Human Resources Management (HRM)................................................................................3
Health and Safety...................................................................................................................4
Hospitality..............................................................................................................................4
Supply chain management.....................................................................................................5
Customer experience and satisfaction....................................................................................5
Conclusion..................................................................................................................................6
References..................................................................................................................................7

Introduction
Cruise industry contain a small part of vacation business, which actually itself is a
part of small business portion of leisure business environment. The demand of cruise industry
are increasing, favourable place for guest demographics and fulfilment of high rate within the
customer. The business has been seen large development over the time and now it will
expand in future too (Chen, Lijesen, and Nijkamp, 2017). This is one of the important
example for globalisation with many destination around the world. For this assignment the
chosen organisation is MSC Cruises which is a private organisation founded in 1989. It’s
headquarter is in Geneva, Switzerland and they operate their services in worldwide. In this
assignment, organisation and management of cruise industry are evaluated by dividing five
sectors which are HRM, health and safety, Hospitality, Supply chain management and in last
the experience and satisfaction level of customers.
Main Body
Human Resources Management (HRM)
The cruise is one of the fast developing sector within the industry of hospitality and
travel. Therefore, the management system of the cruise industry is also developed and
complete the increasing demand of human resource management. This is assumed that in the
cruise ships, effective management is the best key to operate functions of cruise ships. The
role of HRM and their relation to other department will be effective. This is very important in
the any organization of cruise industry to work with the effective nature of HRM and operate
services in a good manner. In MSC cruises, the Human resource management style is very
important as they are the one who are responsible for training and development, performance
management, promotion, transfers, conflict resolution, employee’s relation, different form of
policies and procedure for work in the cruises (Weaver, 2017). Further they provide an
assistant to the senior management, on-board management team. The ship management’s
manager are deal directly with the link with the corporate office HR department which help
to take various decisions related to on-board management. The best HRM approach which is
used by the chosen organisation are helpful for them in order to make pure strategic
orientation which are absent in the cruises shipments without HRM. So it is seen that the role
of HRM in the cruises industry are very important and to become successful in this industry
like MSC cruises, the most needed thing is good team of HRM.

Health and Safety
The safety of guest and crew member is the top most priority of the cruises company
and it’s a fundamental process to their operations. With the increasing demand of cruise
industry and increasing capacity they have to maintain an exceptional health and safety
record. According to cruise line international association (CLIA), cruise line is safer than any
other form of travel if the companies maintained proper safety and health regulations.
Worldwide cruise ship capacity are growing by more than 60% from 2009 to 2020) (Tsiotas,
Niavis and Sdrolias, 2018). In the same time, the number of operational incidents are decline
40%. There are various modes which are used by different type of industry to make more
safety and other modes.
Crewmembers Training: The companies provide their members training related to
the safety and security. Furthermore they all know to provide first aid to respond the potential
emergency situation on cruises. In MSC cruises, they provide full training to their ship
members who are present at the time of on-boarding services.
Heavily scrutiny: Ships are the most examined basin at sea and it help to attract more
customer in cruise travel. Its design, construction and many more things are just related to
their classification societies which provide strict safety standards that are necessary for the
operations. In MSC, they always used right structured and top most quality products in order
to prevent some major losses.
Constant improvement: To improve the safety, it is important for all the companies
to review the operational procedures and technologies. They have to make continues
improvement and take measures to remove unnecessary obstacles.
Hospitality
Hospitality, tourism and travel industry are the branches which are interlinked with
each other and they all make up a large service sector industry. Hospitality is the major
concern for the cruise ship management team. There are various benefits and issues which are
facing by cruises industry while focusing on hospitality sectors (Rickly, Hannam, and
Mostafanezhad, 2016). One of the main advantage for having hospitality in the company is
they can easily put on customer expectation and their end-to-end experience is being placed
on the top most priority. They are very successful in satisfying the need of customer. Another
benefit of hospitality nature is that they can easily provide entertainment as most of the cruise
ships like MSC cruises offer various different activities to their customers. The new trends

and innovation in the cruises management are helpful for achieving goal oriented. One of the
most notable things are the constant approach to traveling which increase the demand of
customers in the cruises industry. The cruises industry are growing and helping in managing
the footprints of cruise travel companies and preserve the nature of local tourist and
communities in their areas. Another trend which is increasing in the companies is to make the
suitable approach and use travel insurance policies while making plan (Peručić, 2020). The
nature of hospitality is increased and beneficial for the growth of companies to increase their
demand in market and satisfied the need of customer. All these are helpful for the companies
work environment friendly and using most of the technologies to provide a support in
hospitality sector.
Supply chain management
Supply chain management is one of the important part of cruise operations, this is
important to know that most of the companies are rarely involved in the supply chain
management process (Safety at Sea, 2021). The cruise supply chain is efficient in order to
developed efficient Cargo on time. Now here Cargo means, passenger, clients good and many
more. As a result the need of supply chain is very important and valuable for them. Hence the
new and improved supply chain is added competition among the cruise companies as it will
show the sign of safety and management. Due to increasing competition, in tourism industry
so most of the companies are focusing on elements of cruise supply chain management.
Furthermore, most of the companies are trying to build their relation with other companies in
order to make strong supply management. In addition with the supply management it is said
that this sector will try to make the positive contributes to serve best quality in cruise
industry. Furthermore the nature of relationship between a major cruises companies and their
suppliers. By adopting right strategic management technique in order to use best supply chain
related to food and spare parts of supply management techniques (Larsen and Wolff, 2016).
To overcome the issues facing while ordering with some another company, now most of the
companies are ready to invest and make their own supplying chain. Supply chain
management is helpful for the companies to work in an organised manner and help the
cruises companies to work effectively and reduce wastage.
Customer experience and satisfaction
Customer experience is important an important element of the company as it will
create the image in the market. It will include the experience of customers, either before,
during and after a journey in cruise. To make an exceptional case for the customer and

provide them full satisfaction is helpful for the company to strategies for the cruise industry
and make their own company in high position. When a company start to make loyal customer
then they are able to having high position in market. It seems that companies serve more for
the first visit of customer and try to complete their need and satisfying their wants (Hsu and
Li, 2017). Within the cruise industry rating of customer satisfaction are very helpful and
make a powerful impact on the industry and their competitors too. MSC cruises are mainly
focusing employees on making importance to the choice of customer. Expectation of
customers are the main factors which comes up with completing satisfaction. So all the
cruises companies are always try to do something new and innovative which complete the
desired of customer and bring a competitive advantage for itself in market.
Conclusion
From the above report it is concluded that the cruises industry are become more
competitive and growing in the industry. There has been increasing nature and development
of cruises business with having the latest and innovative ideas and technologies in ships.
Furthermore the addition of many clients and customer who are demanding more in the
cruises. After having so much demand, there are increased in strains that are being faced by
the companies. In this sector the clients and customer are the main source of their profit
earning, and this will increase the sales volume. With the help of HRM team they can easily
manage their challenges and issues which are occurring while operations. And now
companies are expanding their business to earn more profit and ratios.

References
Books and Journals
Chen, J.M., Lijesen, M.G. and Nijkamp, P., 2017. Interpretation of cruise industry in a two-
sided market context: An exploration on Japan. Maritime Policy &
Management, 44(6), pp.790-801.
Hsu, C.H. and Li, M., 2017. Development of a cruise motivation scale for emerging markets
in Asia. International Journal of Tourism Research, 19(6), pp.682-692.
Larsen, S. and Wolff, K., 2016. Exploring assumptions about cruise tourists' visits to
ports. Tourism Management Perspectives, 17, pp.44-49.
Peručić, D., 2020, April. Analysis of the world cruise industry. In DIEM: Dubrovnik
International Economic Meeting (Vol. 5, No. 1, pp. 89-100). Sveučilište u
Dubrovniku.
Rickly, J., Hannam, K. and Mostafanezhad, M. eds., 2016. Tourism and leisure mobilities:
politics, work, and play. Routledge.
Tsiotas, D., Niavis, S. and Sdrolias, L., 2018. Operational and geographical dynamics of ports
in the topology of cruise networks: The case of Mediterranean. Journal of Transport
Geography, 72, pp.23-35.
Weaver, A., 2017. Representation, Commerce, and Consumption: The Cruise Industry and
the Ocean. " Framing the Ocean, 1700 to the Present": Envisaging the Sea as Social
Space, p.117.
Online
Safety at Sea, 2021. [Online] available through:<
https://cruising.org/en/about-the-industry/policy-priorities/safety-at-sea>.