Human Resource Management in the Tourism Sector

Managing Human Resources

It is a widely held conception that human resource management is an essential operational and strategic concern within the hospitality and tourism industries, with implications for market positioning and quality of tourism at both national and regional levels. All stakeholders, be they private or public sector, visitor or host community, would all benefit from close integration of labor market, human resource and education policies.

The delivery of products and services of value within international tourism reflects a rising focus on intangibles and the role of the human factor. Firms struggle to create lucid distinction and customer recognition of added value based on physical differentiation alone (Amoah, 2003) except within a relatively restricted band of the market. For instance, airline brand re-launches, including first business class products and services, plus the executive floor products and services, within the hotel sector, represent just a small proportion of the global market. Similarly, trends in this direction are offset by the growing strength of economy products, such as affordable hotels and ‘no frills’ airlines in North America and Europe, catering for both the leisure and business consumer, and with prices which fluctuate so widely that customer service is the only remaining differentiator of many of the brands. Across the world, the tourism and hospitality sector often has a strong relationship with the labor market environment from which it draws its skills and as a result, depends on its workforce for the delivery of product and service standards to meet existing and expected demand from its visitor marketplace. This close relationship is, on one hand, one of dependency in the framework of the local labor force, or that which can be established in the local environment, has a direct influence on the character and standards of the tourist offering which can be presented to visitors—if local art skills are not...