Problems of Employee Retention in Hospitality: Ritz Carlton Study

This research project investigates employee retention issues within the hospitality industry, using the Ritz Carlton Hotel London as a case study. The study examines the importance of retaining talented employees, various strategies for retention (such as compensation, training, and work-life balance), and the problems faced by the industry, including salary dissatisfaction, limited growth opportunities, and workplace relationships. The research utilizes both primary and secondary sources to analyze these issues. The project provides recommendations for improving retention, emphasizing the importance of leadership, communication, and equal opportunities. The project also includes a reflection on the learning experience and the importance of teamwork. The findings highlight the need for competitive compensation, employee well-being, and opportunities for career advancement to improve employee retention rates and combat high turnover within the hospitality sector.

Research project
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SUMMARY
The current project is based on the issues that a hospitality organisation mainly faced in
order to keep its employee’s retention for a longer duration within the organisation that support
in getting an understanding regarding the manner in which strategies must be implemented to
deal with this issue. The study is performed by focusing over the Ritz Carlton Hotel London, a
well know hotel in UK which is facing some competition from the other player which require
them to manage talent effectively so that I can deal with the challenges much effectively. To
investigate about this both primary and secondary sources used in order to perform a quantitative
study that help in analysing the numerical data and provide findings with more accuracy. From
the study it has been found that there are number of strategies must be adopted to retain
employees such as reward and fair compensation, training and development and work life
balance, but to implement this successful within any issue there must be a right choice of
leadership , a free flow of communication and equal opportunities for growth and appreciation.
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CONTENTS
SUMMARY.....................................................................................................................................2
Contents...........................................................................................................................................3
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT...............................................................................................................4
TOPIC: “To critically examine the problems faced by the hospitality industry to retain
employees within organization.”.....................................................................................................5
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION....................................................................................................5
Overview of study........................................................................................................................5
Background of research...............................................................................................................5
Aim and Objectives.....................................................................................................................6
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW.........................................................................................6
The importance of retaining talented employees within hospitality company............................6
The various strategies to retain employees..................................................................................7
The problems faced by the hospitality industry to retain employees within organization..........7
CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY.............................................................................8
CHAPTER 4: DATA ANALYSIS AND FINDINGS...................................................................11
CHAPTER 5: CRITICAL APPRAISAL, RECOMMENDATIONS AND SUGGESTIONS FOR
FURTHER WORK........................................................................................................................20
Critical appraisal........................................................................................................................20
Recommendation.......................................................................................................................21
Suggestion for further work.......................................................................................................21
CHAPTER 6: CONCLUSION......................................................................................................21
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................23
SUMMARY.....................................................................................................................................2
Contents...........................................................................................................................................3
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT...............................................................................................................4
TOPIC: “To critically examine the problems faced by the hospitality industry to retain
employees within organization.”.....................................................................................................5
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION....................................................................................................5
Overview of study............................................................................................................................5
Background of research...................................................................................................................5
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Aim and Objectives.....................................................................................................................6
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW.....................................................................................6
The importance of retaining talented employees within hospitality company............................6
The various strategies to retain employees..................................................................................7
The problems faced by the hospitality industry to retain employees within organization..........7
CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY.........................................................................8
CHAPTER 4: DATA ANALYSIS AND FINDINGS...............................................................11
CHAPTER 5: CRITICAL APPRAISAL, RECOMMENDATIONS AND SUGGESTIONS
FOR FURTHER WORK...........................................................................................................16
Critical appraisal........................................................................................................................16
Recommendation.......................................................................................................................17
Suggestion for further work.......................................................................................................17
CHAPTER 6: CONCLUSION..................................................................................................17
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
First of all I would like to present my many thanks to God who provide me the support to
accomplish my work and achieving my goals and objectives. After that I also want to thank my
mentors who supported me at every stage for completing this project. I would also like to thank
them for the patience they hold throughout my queries and at the time of analysing, reviewing
my work and provided me appropriate guidelines throughout my work.
Despite of this big thanks to the employees of Ritz Carlton Hotel London who supported
me in gathering information for my investigation. At last, I want to thanks my parents for their
love and support which they gave me at every stage of project and motivate me to perform well.
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Reflection 4:
I am very happy that I got this opportuinity for being a part of this project which not only
help in getting me aware about the several kind of bio tecghnology that are used within
agricultural industry for imrproving iots practices but also support me in getting my personal
development doen throughout this project. The experience throughopit this project was great and
I presented my learning and experience with the help of self reflection which is presented below:
Personal reflection
In order to execute this project a team was formnulated which work toward gathering the
infomrtaion and try to provide action that can be takern to overcome the challenges or ixssues
that agricyultural industry is already facing wit
So, to continue with this in future I made certain views abouit the things that I will perform in
ordre to approach a team work.
. Other than this I decide to give equal chance to each individual in team for keeping their view
point nad suggestions toward a particulat and I will value them so that more coordination in team
can be established whichj not only help in reducing the burden of worek but also allow in
perfoming it well.
TOPIC: “To critically examine the problems faced by the hospitality industry to retain
employees within organization.”
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CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION
Overview of study
The employee retention is mainly refers to the capability of an organisation for keeping its
employees working within the organisation for a longer duration. The employee retention is
consider to be a major concern among organisation these days as by keeping the employees
retained within the organisation it become easier to deal with the challenges present in external
environment (Sandhya and Kumar, 2014). This is so because an organisation spends its, time,
cost and effort to make the employees capable of working at particular position which help in
developing their understanding regarding the market dynamics, customer and policies of
company so that they can perform well. But now a days it become difficult for the hospitality
organisation to keep its employees retained as there are number of issues and work pressure over
the employees working in hotel which make them switch their job quickly. Therefore, this study
is conducted to ascertain the practices that can be performed in order to deal with the issues that
an hotel mainly face while retaining its employees (Patro, 2014). In order to perform this study
Ritz Carlton Hotel London is taken into consideration which is one of the oldest hotel and know
for its luxury services.
Background of research
Employee retention has now become a major issue for the hotels due to increasing work
pressures and number of option available in the market place the job switch among the hotels are
becoming more common. Hence, this study is conducted to deeply investigate about it by
considering Ritz Carlton Hotel London (Idris, 2014). It is a 5 star, luxury hotel which is
headquartered in London and operates at international level. This hotel is consider as the symbol
of one of the most prestige and best known hotel which maintain a larger customer base. But in
order to maintain this profitability and customer base it is required to provide with high quality
services which can only be possible when the employees are experienced and have thorough
understanding of the consumer behaviour (Azeez, 2017). Hence, for all this it require Ritz
Carlton Hotel London to retain its employees with them for longer by adopting right method
which is going to be discussed with the help of this study.
Aim and Objectives
Aim
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“To critically examine the problems faced by the hospitality industry to retain employees
within organization. A study on Ritz Carlton Hotel London.”
Research Objectives
 To examine the importance of retaining talented employees within hospitality company.
 To determine the various strategies to retain employees.
 To critically evaluate the problems faced by the hospitality industry to retain employees
within organization.
 To provide appropriate recommendation strategies for resolving issues to retain
prospective employees within company.
Research Questions
 What is the importance of retaining talented employees within hospitality company?
 What are the various strategies to retain employees?
 What are the problems faced by the hospitality industry to retain employees within
organization?
 What are appropriate recommendation strategies for resolving issues to retain prospective
employees within company?
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW
The importance of retaining talented employees within hospitality company
According to the view point of Anitha, 2016, employee retention is consider to be one of
the major management goal that an HR team mainly have within the organisation in order to
ensure the smooth and productive functioning of an organisation. This holds up a huge
importance specially within hospitality organisation and this importance are explained below:
 Improve morale: - The focus of a management toward employee retention work toward
building up a team of confident and dedicated employees who stay with the organisation
for longer. This is so because when employees see more positive and stable working
condition then they become more comfortable and less stressed which in turn help in
building up positive working relationship with the co worker which in turn help in
boosting up confidence and morale.
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 Reduce the acquisition and training time: - The turnover within organisation
require lots of time in term of searching new talent, perform hiring, induction then
training which require lots of time. By focusing toward retaining employees this time can
be cut off and there is a chance to build up such personality that can help in providing on
the job training to new employees’ ad help organisation grow.
The various strategies to retain employees
As per the view point of Halvorson Chad, 2018, the employee turnover is raising at a high
rate which make it difficult for the employers to hang on to a steady workforce. This is one of the
major issues among the organisation as it not only increases the cost but also some where act as a
barrier to the growth of an organisation. There are number of strategies that Ritz Carlton Hotel
may consider are,
Salary and benefit must be competitive: - It has been found that majority of people
leaves their job due to salary and then it is followed with the better benefits, career advancement
opportunities and location. Hence, the financial stability is the main factor that keep an employee
to stay in a job. Therefore, an employee must get a salary which shows a clear and better
comparison with the other organisation offerings so that they get reason to stay in job.
Reduce employee pain: - An organisation must consider employees as a person and not
robot who can work anytime. Such policies must be developed which provide employees with a
work and life balance so that they can live their life without any disturbance due to work.
The problems faced by the hospitality industry to retain employees within organization
Terera and Ngirande, 2014 stated that the employee retention is one of the critical industry
issues which is leaving the employers powerless to resolve these issues. There are number of
challenges to which Ritz Carlton Hotel is required to deal with in order to keep its employees
retained for longer duration. These mainly includes,
Salary dissatisfaction: - One of the major issues that an organisation face in retaining
employees is that their dissatisfaction toward the compensation offered by the company. Every
employee maintains a high salary expectation and when they find it to another organisation they
usually switch and at that time it become very difficult to keep them retained.
Low growth opportunity: - Another major challenges that make it difficult to retain
employees at workplace is lack of opportunity to grow (Aruna and Anitha, 2015). As when
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employees find less chances to move forth and achieve a good position as per their capability. It
become very difficult to keep them satisfied with the organisation in which they are currently
working and they decide to leave to job to find growth opportunity outside.
Workplace relationship: - Sometimes the negative working culture or inappropriate
relationship with the other people working in the organisation may also become a reason to the
dissatisfaction for the job and employee’s turnover get increase. This is considered to be the
biggest challenge as it leads to a huge turnover ratio.
CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
Research methodology is that section of an investigation which represent about several kind
of tools and techniques used for performing an investigation effectively (Kumar, 2019). These
research methods, tools, approaches etc. that are used within present investigation are mentioned
below:
Research philosophy: - It is considered as belief regarding the manner in which the data
must be gathered, evaluated and used for a study. This is further divided into two philosophies
such as interpretivism and positivism (Mackey and Gass, 2015). Among them interpretivism
philosophy will be used as it help in studying the view point of people from whom data is
gathered in effective manner.
Research method: - The method adopted for performing an investigation plays a significant
role in its execution and manner in which findings must get interpreted. The methods of
investigation can be either choose as qualitative or quantitative. Qualitative method is the one
that adopt a theoretical framework in order to explain a particular phenomenon by considering an
in-depth study and presenting information in detailed manner (Omland, and Thapa, 2017). On
other side the quantitative method is one which present the information in more concise manner
and stick to the point by presenting it in form of numerical facts. For this study qualitative
method will be used in order to present more detailed understanding about eth concept.
Research approach: - The approaches are mainly used in support with eth research
methods in order to analyse the gathered information effectively. The inductive and deductive
are two approaches from these inductive approaches will be taken into consideration as it help in
emerging with a new theory from the data gathered. It helps in identifying several strategies for
retaining employees (Scotland, 2012).
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Data collection sources: - It is mainly defined as the bases or the way through which an
information is collected regarding the area of investigation which is under concern. There are
mainly two type of data collection sources that are used for investigation such as primary and
secondary sources. Among them both the methods will be used within present investigation so
that past as well as current knowledge can be combined or critically reviewed to present the most
accurate and best possible findings (Silverman, D. ed., 2016). In this primary information will be
gathered with the help of questionnaire as it help in gathering larger number of data with
minimum possible efforts. On the other hand, the secondary data will be collected using online
sources like books, journal, articles etc.
Sampling: - It is defined as the process of selecting group of people out of whole population
connected with current study phenomenon to gather best possible information. The sampling is
mainly performed with the help of two methods such as probabilistic and non-probabilistic
method (Taherdoost, 2016). Among them probabilistic method will be taken into consideration
where respondents will be selected randomly as it provides an equal chance to individual for
being selected as the respondents. The sample size in this study are 20 employees of Ritz Carlton
Hotel London.
Research strategy: - It is about the method used for gathering the information for an
investigation. There are number of strategy used for gathering information such as questionnaire,
interview, case study, focus group etc. In order to conduct this study questionnaire will be used
by the investigator which is mentioned below:
Questionnaire
Q1 Do think that retention of employees has become major issue for hospitality sector?
a) Agree
b) Disagree
c) Can’t say
Q2 According to you, does retention of employees would support Ritz Carlton Hotel in
achieving competitive edge?
a) Yes
b) No
Q3 What is the main importance of retaining talented employees for Ritz Carlton Hotel?
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a) Increase overall productivity
b) Saves cost
c) More customer experiences
Q4 As per your perception what are main causes behind increasing employee turnover issues
within hospitality organisation?
a) lack of work flexibility
b) Unhealthy work environment
c) Lack of growth opportunity
Q5 What are several forces that influences Ritz Carlton Hotel to keep its employees retained for
longer duration within the organisation?
a) Increasing competition
b) Build up employee’s skills
c) Understanding of organisational setting
Q6. Among the following which one is more appropriate strategy to be adopted for keeping the
employees retain within Ritz Carlton Hotel?
a) Reward and fair compensation
b) Training and development
c) Work life balance
Q7 What are several challenges that Ritz Carlton Hotel may face while implementing the
strategies to retain employees within organisation?
a) Interpersonal employees’ conflicts
b) Lack of guidance
c) Lack of growth opportunity
Q8 According to you what actions must be consider by Ritz Carlton Hotel to deal with
challenges faced while implementing employee’s retention strategy?
a) Free flow of communication
b) appropriate leadership practice
c) Equal opportunity and appreciation
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