Management Assignment: Business Research On Hospitality Industry
Question
Task:
This management assignment requires you research information on following topics:
- current and emerging products and services in hospitality industry
- current issues in hospitality industry
- career opportunities in hospitality industry
- relationship between hospitality other related industries
- compliance issues and quality assurance in hospitality industry
- new products, technology, techniques and services in hospitality industry
- work ethic required to work in the hospitality industry
- equal employment opportunity (EEO) law
You must use at least three sources from the list below for researching information:
- developers of codes of conduct or ethics
- discussions with experienced industry personnel
- industry accreditation operators
- industry associations and organisations
- industry journals, reference books and seminars
- libraries and media
- networking with colleagues and suppliers
- personal observations and experience
- plain English documents, issued by government regulators, that describe laws relevant to the hospitality industry
- training courses
- unions
You must provide a reference to the source which you have used to research the information on each topic. Identify ways in which you can use the information researched in (new products, technology, techniques and services in hospitality industry) to enhance quality of work performance in daily activities.
Answer
Introduction:
The management assignment covered the information regarding “information about current and emerging services and products in the hospitality industry”, “information about current issues in the industry of hospitality”, “information about Career opportunities in the industry of hospitality”, “information about relationship between the hospitality industry and other industries related to the hospitality industry”, “information about quality assurance and compliance issues in the hospitality industry”, “information about ethical principles, work ethics related to work in the industry of the hospitality”, “information about new technology, products, services and techniques in the hospitality industry”, and “information about equal employment opportunity (EEO) Law”.
Current and emerging services and products in the hospitality industry:
The hospitality industry is a competitive business industry. According to the Current pandemic situation, the followings are the current and emerging services and products offered by the hospitality industry:
Safety and Hygiene:
• Increasing cleaning facility of the particular areas of hotels, restaurants, bars and cafes.
• Policies regarding the provision of using hand gel, sanitizers, using protective equipment, wearing masks and maintaining social distancing.
Contactless payment facility for consumers through Apple Pay, Google Pay, etc.
The facility of Voice searches for consumers to easily search and book hotels and restaurants. Improving the entire structure of the website content of the hospitality sector, so it helps in featuring the services offered by the hospitality sector in Voice Search results (Yang et al., 2020).
Voice control facility for controlling each and every device within the hotel rooms to enhance the guest experience. Such as, Smart speakers helps in giving answers to customers’ doubts and respond to customers’ voice requests to turn on devices and lights within the room.
Enhancing the delivery facility of the Food and Beverages at home, Accepting and improving online orders and telephonic orders and offering contactless delivery services. Increasing the use of suitable and sustainable packaging of food.
Implementing automation services like robots in restaurants and hotels to greet customers, provide information regarding bookings and reservations, providing security facilities, offering room services, performing cleaning and housekeeping chores and managing food services to reduce close contact with customers (Yang et al., 2020).
Offering healthy and organic drinks and foods and re-vamping the menus of hospitality sectors with healthier options like dairy-free, gluten-free, vegetarian, low fat, organic and vegan options
Current issues in Hospitality industry:
Implementation of effective and appropriate technology within the hospitality industry. During the current pandemic situation for Covid-19, self-check-in facilities, online booking and ordering systems, contactless service and payment services become the new norm for consumers and staff of the hospitality industry (Davahli et al., 2020). It is quite challenging for the industry to provide an effective and good customer service experience with a mix of tech-enabled and human interactions.
Managing the reputation of the brand and during this current situation, the hospitality industry across the entire world (including Australia) has been battling for establishing a strong relationship bond with the consumers to increase the brand reputation. It is quite challenging for the industry to maintain the reputation of the industry on an online platform based on online comments, reviews and ratings of consumers.
Expectations of employees and trends for attracting and keeping employees are always changing and growing. It is the current issue of the hospitality industry to recruit appropriate employees with strong skills, knowledge and qualities and provide them appropriate opportunities to meet retain them (Impos. 2021).
It is quite challenging for the industry to maintain sustainable measures and follow the socially responsible guidelines to deal with the business ethically and reduce environmental issues like excessive carbon footprint issue, excessive usage of water, wastage of industry etc.
Providing a greater level of personalising the experience to individual customers according to their expectations is the biggest current issue of the hospitality industry. Implementing a loyalty program to attract the loyal customer base by providing great deals and products offers is a quite challenging issue during this global financial crisis situation .
Career Opportunities in hospitality industry:
The hospitality industry has been identified as one of the “high-growth” sectors in Australia. The hospitality sector provides a wide range of employment opportunities to provide excellent food and beverage and accommodation services. Followings are the career opportunities in the hospitality sector:
Travel Manager, Event Manager, Hotel general manager, sommelier, Executive chef, Casino director, café manager, motel manager, hotel service manager, licensed club manager, Conference and event organiser, restaurant manager, sales assistants, cook, housekeeper, barista, Chef, bar attendant, waiter, kitchen hand, housekeeping head, food and beverage director, gaming worker, front office executive, store manager and other staffs, guest activity management etc. (Myskills.gov.au. 2021).
Relationship between hospitality industry and other related industries:
The tourism and hospitality industry significantly help each other by offering the services like accommodation, food and beverage services, transportation services, leisure and recreation services to their consumers. Lodging, travel and tourism, food and beverages, wine production, events, entertainment, retail industry and recreation are the main other industries that are connected to the hospitality industry. The hospitality industry plays the role of the supplier of the services offered by the tourism sector. Tourism, travel and hospitality industry interrelated with each other to provide proper accommodation and beverage services to their consumers such as restaurants, cafes, takeaway food services, bars and taverns, pubs, motels, hotels, and other accommodation services and hospitality club services (Wu et al., 2018). The hospitality industry generates the revenue for local economies of the country directly when national and international tourists spend money in restaurants, hotels and entertainment venues. The food and beverage industry also contribute a great number of profits in the hospitality industry. F&B industry delivers foods and beverages to the customers of the hospitality industry at a particular location such as hotels, bars, pubs, restaurants etc. They are also responsible for maintaining the high quality of food and beverages to attract and retain customers. The lodging industry helps in providing accommodation services to the customers for a particular period of time in motels, hotels, Etc.
Compliance issues and Quality Assurance in hospitality industry:
Quality assurance plays a significant role in the hospitality industry. Quality assurance is an effective system that ensures processes and procedures of the hospitality sector is systematically monitored by skilled and knowledgeable personnel to detect errors, correct them and ensures that services met the quality standards. It ensures that customers can get guaranteed the highest quality and standard of services and products (Hotelstaff.com.au. 2016). The hospitality industry needs to focus on continuous improvement of services to maintain the highest quality standard of services and products. Continuous improvement helps the hospitality industry to get continuous feedback on the services and products offered by the hospitality industry. It is required to use the feedback as a reference for the business to improve the quality of the services and products. The quality Assurance system helps the industry to incorporate the feedback of the customers into the improvements of the industry services and stay up-to-date with customers’ expectations and needs. Quality assurance policy helps the industry to be a member of the industry association to give assurance to clients and customers that the industry will meet their expectation level. The positive involvements of the industry association and following the rules of the quality assurance helps in building a mutually profitable relationship with clients and customers. It helps in achieving long-term success by meeting the needs of the customers. It also helps in implementing successful strategies and maintain the high standard of the services and products (Hotelstaff.com.au. 2016). It helps in maintaining open lines of communication between clients and staff and maintaining consistency and transparency in the services.
The hospitality industry faces many compliance issues such as 1) Implementing the new technology and structuring the business operations in the market to meet the expectation level of customers and give personalise facilities to individual customers (Bdo.com.au. 2019), 2) Issues regarding the environmentally friendly practices to reduce the environmental footprint, 3) Workplace health and safety issues to protect the employees’ health, 4) Issues regarding the privacy of the data while storing and transmitting data to protect the personal information consumers, staffs and clients, 5) Issues regarding maintaining basic obligations and legal rules etc.
New products, technology, techniques and services in hospitality industry:
Chatbots:It is the new technology in the hospitality industry linked with customer care services. It is helpful for delivering swift responses to the doubts of consumers when the human staffs are unavailable. It reduces the job pressure on employees of the hospitality industry.
Virtual reality tours: It helps in giving the appropriate information regarding surroundings and the experience regarding the nature of surroundings to provide comfort to them. It helps in giving the details regarding the facilities available in the surroundings through videos and still images (Revfine.com. 2021).
Mobile Check-in service: It is associated with accommodation services. It reduces the need for human-to-human contact during the check-in process. The hospitality industry can also give the link on their websites and provides QR Codes to provide mobile check-in services through apps. It enhances the customer experience services.
Sustainability: In recent times, customers are increasingly concerned with environmental issues. Sustainability is the most noticeable new service of the hospitality industry to promote eco-friendly practices. Such as increasing the use of smart bulbs, smart lights and smart heating technology to save energy.
Personalise services: Increasing use of big data technology to set up personalised services for an individual consumer who was already stayed and visited a similar place before. It helps in providing similar services to consumers automatically (Njoroge et al., 2019). It helps in increasing the efficiency of marketing services and streamlined the entire processes.
Facility of Smart hotel: Increasing the use of smart devices, internet-enabled devices, using “Internet of Things” technology, smart speakers and smart hubs services to enhance the customer experience services.
Artificial intelligence: AI-Powered Chatbots, and AI and Voice-controlled tourist information hubs and customer service facility within the hotels helps in enhancing customer care services of the hospitality sector.
Work Ethic required to work in hospitality industry:
According to the Workplace relations law of Australia, to reduce employee health and safety-related compliance issues, the Australian Government set out the Fair Work Act for building a safety net of maintaining minimum terms and conditions of employment. It helps in eliminating the risks related to the health and safety, unfair and unlawful termination of employees. It allows individual employers and workers to make flexible work arrangements to meet the genuine needs of customers. It helps in improving the workplace culture of the hospitality industry. Australian Government also set out the Privacy Act 1988 to protect the personal information of individuals to reduce the issues regarding disclosure of the personal information of customers in the hospitality industry. It helps in following the ethical guidelines to protect the personal information of employees and consumers as well. It helps in developing honest relationships between consumers, clients and employees (Teng and Cheng, 2021). Australian Consumers law also handles the operation regarding sales, product safety issues, pricing strategies, advertising and promotional activities etc. Employees of the Hospitality industry is also responsible for following the rules and regulations of Anti-discrimination laws to reduce unlawful discrimination on the basis of age, race, disability, sex, intersex status, sexual orientation, gender identity. The Australian human rights commission has the power to take necessary actions against the hospitality industry based on unlawful discrimination. These rules and regulations help in maintaining work ethics while working within the hospitality industry.
Equal Employment Opportunity Law:
In reference to the Equal Employment Opportunity Law, everyone has the legal and equal right to work within the hospitality industry and others as well. Everyone has the legal right to be treated fairly and respectfully at work (ag.gov.au 2021-c). According to this Australian Law, everyone should have equal rights to access employment opportunities based on their merit. Under the anti-discrimination act of EEO laws, it is also illegal to discriminate against any employee on the basis of their race, religion, sex, marital status, political affiliation, age etc. In the view of EEO Laws, employees within the hospitality industry are responsible for carrying out positive and fair work activities and work behaviour and be respectful to others to avoid any legal threats. The Australian Hospitality industry is responsible for following the Sex discrimination Act 1984, racial discrimination act, Disability Discrimination Act, Age Discrimination Act and Australian Human Rights Commission Act under the EEO Laws to provide equal respect and opportunity to all and reduce direct and indirect discrimination within the hospitality industry (LegalVision. 2021).
Conclusion:
It concluded that all the relevant information regarding the hospitality industry, their workplace culture and ethics, employment opportunity laws and the responsibility of employees within the hospitality sector has been discussed in this report.
References:
ag.gov.au 2021-c. [online] Available at:
Bdo.com.au. 2019. Compliance issues for the tourism sector. [online] Available at:
Davahli, M.R., Karwowski, W., Sonmez, S. and Apostolopoulos, Y., 2020. The hospitality industry in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic: Current topics and research methods. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 17(20), p.7366.
Hotelstaff.com.au. 2016. [online] Available at:
Impos. 2021. Major Issues Facing the Hospitality Industry | Impos. [online] Available at:
LegalVision. 2021. What is Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) | LegalVision. [online] Available at:
Myskills.gov.au. 2021. Tourism & Hospitality - MySkills. [online] Available at:
Njoroge, M., Anderson, W. and Mbura, O., 2019. Innovation strategy and economic sustainability in the hospitality industry. The Bottom Line. Pp.1-17
Revfine.com. 2021. Hospitality Trends: The Latest Trends in Hospitality for 2022. [online] Available at:
Teng, C.C. and Cheng, S.S., 2021. Hospitality ethics: Perspectives from Hotel practitioners and intern students. Management assignmentJournal of Hospitality & Tourism Education, 33(2), pp.99-110.
Wu, T.P., Wu, H.C., Liu, S.B. and Hsueh, S.J., 2018. The relationship between international tourism activities and economic growth: Evidence from China’s economy. Tourism Planning & Development, 15(4), pp.365-381.
Yang, L., Henthorne, T.L. and George, B., 2020. Artificial intelligence and robotics technology in the hospitality industry: Current applications and future trends. Digital transformation in business and society, pp.211-228.
