Hospitality Firms Research Articles

Guest editorial: Work-life balance: How can quality of life provisions be integrated with the corporate social responsibility initiatives of hospitality firms?

Guest editorial: Work-life balance: How can quality of life provisions be integrated with the corporate social responsibility initiatives of hospitality firms?

EFFECT OF GREEN HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT PRACTICES AND GREEN WORK LIFE BALANCE ON EMPLOYEE RETENTION IN SELECTED HOSPITALITY FIRMS IN LAGOS AND OGUN STATES, NIGERIA

Employee retention is a strategy of retaining talented employees with a specific end goal to meet business targets. Employee turnover is a symptom of deeper issues that have not been resolved. Hospitality Industry in Nigeria has faced several issues, including poor employee retention and low staff motivation. Part of the reasons for the poor employee retention and high turnover in the Hospitality Sector was owning to issues that border on green human resource management practices and green work life balance, and the inflexible nature of their job. Other certain reasons for poor employee retention include low pay, lack of development opportunities, and bad working conditions with greater efforts by staff and fewer receivables. Therefore, this paper examines the effect of green human resource management practices, green work life balance on employee retention of selected hospitality firms in Lagos and Ogun States, Nigeria. The data collected through the primary sources (questionnaire) were analysed using inferential statistics employing regression analysis. The study revealed that Green human resource management practices, green work life balance (green performance management, green employee relation, green disciplinary management, work family balance and work health balance) had a significant and positive effect on employee retention in hospitality firms in Lagos and Ogun states, Nigeria (Adj. R2 = 0.540, F (4, 669) = 176.897, p < 0.05).<p> </p><p><strong> Article visualizations:</strong></p><p><img src="/-counters-/edu_01/0939/a.php" alt="Hit counter" /></p>

It Takes a Village!: Customer Value Co-Creation Behavior in Restaurant Social Media-Based Brand Community

Customers’ value co-creation behavior plays an essential role on brand pages, which many hospitality firms adopt to create value with customers. However, current understanding of the elements, drivers, and dynamics of such behavior is limited. Based on the value co-creation literature, motivation–opportunity–ability theory, and the dual identification framework, this study sought to bridge this knowledge gap. Specifically, this research clarified customer engagement behavior (CEB) and customer citizenship behavior (CCB) as respective in-role and extra-role behaviors of value co-creation and revealed their positive relationship. Structural equation modeling indicated that motivations (seeking assistance and diversion), social presence, and brand knowledge positively influenced CEB, which then affected CCB directly and indirectly through customer–brand identification. Moreover, functional benefits did not trigger meaningful CEB, and customer–community identification had a minimal impact on CCB. Overall, these insights can help practitioners manage their brand pages more effectively to co-create value with customers.

Risk reduction effect of hospitality philanthropic giving: Theoretical framework and empirical evidence

This study contributes to the philanthropic giving (PG) research literature by proposing a risk reduction effect of hospitality PG based on value enhancement theory and the capital asset pricing model (CAPM) to develop a theoretical framework, and by conducting empirical examinations to provide evidence of and support for the risk reduction effect. To determine whether PG can reduce the risks of China’s publicly traded hospitality firms, the study uses the CAPM to compute the systematic and unsystematic risks of hospitality firms, and conducts dynamic panel regression tests based on the system generalized method of moments. Test results reveal that PG has a significantly negative impact on unsystematic risk but no influence on systematic risk, supporting the risk reduction effect of hospitality PG. Furthermore, this risk reduction effect is asymmetric. Specifically, PG is found to reduce unsystematic risk more during periods of business contraction than during periods of business expansion.

Can both entrepreneurial and ethical leadership shape employees’ service innovative behavior?

PurposeEmployee’s service innovative behavior lays the groundwork for bottom-up innovation and ongoing service improvement in service firms. Therefore, it is vital for service organizations to understand the antecedents of employees service innovative behavior. Drawing upon the social cognitive theory, this study aims to develop a research model that examines the effects of ethical and entrepreneurial leadership on service innovative behavior.Design/methodology/approachData were collected from 178 managers and 415 employees working in 178 small- and medium-sized (SME) hotels in Vietnam.FindingsThe findings showed that ethical leadership has direct and indirect effects on service innovative behavior, while entrepreneurial leadership only influences service innovative behavior via intrinsic motivation. In addition, trust in leader moderates the effect of intrinsic motivation on service innovative behaviorResearch limitations/implicationsThe study advances current scholarly research on leadership by combining the two areas of entrepreneurial and ethical leadership into one theoretical model and examines how these leadership styles generate hospitality employees’ service innovative behavior through the mediating effect of intrinsic motivation and the moderating effect of trust in leader.Practical implicationsThe findings of this research offer significant implications for SME hotels and their managers. In their recruitment processes, hotels should search for particular personality traits, which have been found to predict ethical and entrepreneurial leadership. Hospitality firms also need to encourage communication between leaders and co-workers to enhance employees’ intrinsic motivation.Originality/valueThere are calls for research to examine whether both entrepreneurial and ethical leadership styles can be integrated to enhance employees’ positive outcomes. Evidence about the mechanism linking entrepreneurial and ethical leadership to service innovative behavior is limited. With this stated, the current study makes significant contribution to leadership and innovation literature by filling in these voids.

Consumers’ untrust and behavioral intentions in the backdrop of hotel booking attributes

PurposeThe study aims to investigate how hotel booking attributes (i.e. perceived privacy, perceived certification and perceived assurance) engender consumers’ untrust and consequent behavioral intentions (i.e. altruistic behavior and trusting intentions). It also unveils the role of hotel attributes performance as a moderator between hotel booking attributes and consumers’ untrust.Design/methodology/approachData were collected through an online platform by engaging 454 Chinese respondents. SPSS 25.0 and AMOS 24.0 (structural equation modeling) were used for data analysis and interpretation.FindingsResults demonstrate that hotel booking attributes positively substantiate consumers’ untrust which, in turn, develops altruistic behavior and negative trusting intentions. Moreover, hotel attribute experience significantly moderates the relationships between perceived privacy, perceived certification and consumers’ untrust. Notably, hotel attribute performance insignificantly influences the association between perceived assurance and untrust.Research limitations/implicationsThis study used the Chinese context and examined Chinese domestic travelers and the nonbranded hotel industry. Notwithstanding its limitations, the findings help hospitality and tourism firms, en bloc, to manage their review websites by explicitly disclosing policies regarding customers’ privacy and assurance, winning their trust through third-party certification and employing data scientists to develop algorithms to sieve fake information proactively.Originality/valueThis study develops an original conceptual framework by using the untrust model in this research. Our findings add to the research on consumer behavior, information processing, service management and trust and suggest practical implications for hospitality firms.

Effect of Green Human Resource Management Practices and Green Work Life Balance on Operational Efficiency in Selected Hospitality Firms in Lagos and Ogun States, Nigeria

Operational efficiency is delivering of quality goods and services to clients in the most cost-effective and timely manner. The growing threat of unsustainable use of natural resources is one of the most significant environmental factors, alongside deforestation, biodiversity loss, ozone layer deterioration, global warming, and climate change. Unfortunately, the tourism and Hospitality Industry's in Nigeria is complicit in this regard; hotels are renowned for high water consumption, interior recycling of enormous volumes of garbage, and air quality difficulties, among other things. Observed among the problems in the Hospitality Sector is the reduction on return on assets, return on capital employed and other indicators due to poor operational efficiency stemming from lack of proper green human resource management practices and green work life balance initiatives. Therefore, this paper examines the effect of green human resource management practices, green work life balance on operational efficiency of selected hospitality firms in Lagos and Ogun states Nigeria. The data collected through the primary sources (questionnaire) were analysed using descriptive and inferential statistics employing regression analysis. The study revealed that Green human resource management practices, green work life balance had significant and positive effects on operational efficiency in hospitality firms in Lagos and Ogun States Nigeria (Adj. R2 = 0.372, F (4, 363) = 89.861, p < 0.05).

The long road to adaptation: Micro and small hospitality firms after the GFC

This study examines the journey of micro and small firm owners/managers of hospitality firms through the global financial crisis. This journey includes measures of firm success and performance supporting firms in the aftermath of the event. The study draws on a sample of mainly hospitality firms in Greece and Cyprus, and considers conceptual tenets of the dynamic capabilities framework. Key dimensions associated with firm success and firm performance following the crisis were revealed. For instance, the ‘value’ dimension emerged through measures of financial management, intrinsic, knowledge-based, strategic, and by adding value to consumers’ experience. Furthermore, strong firm performance was mainly perceived as a result of learning from mistakes or managing time efficiently, while counting on government or financial institutions was associated with poor firm performance. The study has various practical and theoretical implications, including through the proposal of a conceptual framework, where the findings and dynamic capabilities approach converge.

When and how employees cross the line for the job in hospitality firms

The extant studies on workload are replete with outcomes such as job stress and employee burnout as a result of disproportionate job demands and job resources. However, the literature is silent on whether employees may even break rules to achieve job efficiency, especially when they secure support from their coworkers to such behaviors. This study proposes that a high workload can trigger employees’ pro-job rule breaking behaviors, which eventually may lead to their engagement in unethical pro-self behaviors (UPSB). Furthermore, based on the influence of workplace social descriptive norms, employees’ propensity to engage in pro-job rule breaking behaviors is enhanced. The research hypotheses were supported by two multi-wave and multi-source independent studies by drawing data from customer service personnel in two hotel chains. The theoretical contributions and managerial implications are discussed.

Estimation of staff use efficiency: Evidence from the hospitality industry

We analyze the extent to which hospitality firms overuse staff using a production function model which considers firm heterogeneity and accounts for environmental variables in staff use. We decompose overall staff use inefficiency into transient and persistent inefficiency. To do this, we employ a state-of-the-art stochastic frontier model, which is estimated using daily data on 94 Norwegian hospitality firms from 2010 to 2014. The environmental variables, especially the annual time trend, seasonality, and days of the week are found to exert heterogeneous effects on staffing. The mean transient, persistent, and overall efficiencies of the hospitality firms are 69%, 67%, and 46%, respectively. We find that seasonality (days of the week) decreases (increases) transient inefficiency by about 4%, suggesting significant room for improvement in hospitality staff use.

Determinants of capital structure in the hospitality industry: Impact of clustering and seasonality on debt and liquidity

Volatile seasonal demand and geographic clustering of firms are two important factors affecting the capital structure of hospitality firms. In this paper, we investigate the capital structure determinants of hospitality firms regarding the effects of seasonality and geographic clustering. A fixed-effects panel data model was estimated using data on all hospitality firms in Norway from 2008 to 2018. Our empirical findings reveal that the seasonality created by foreign tourists increases the share of long-term debt in the capital structure. Further, the clustering of hospitality firms in a region enhances firm reliance on short-term debt, in that firm liquidity is negatively associated with the degree of clustering, suggesting that severe competition drains cash for which short-term debt serves as a substitute. These findings have important implications for financial management of firms in the hospitality industry as the degrees of seasonality and clustering significantly affect their asset financing and liquidity management behavior.

Top management team gender diversity and firm risk-taking in the hospitality industry

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to investigate the link between top management team (TMT) gender diversity and firm risk-taking in hospitality companies. The study also links female leadership to risk-taking. Finally, this study examines the moderating effects of TMT incentive pay and TMT age on the relationship between TMT gender diversity and firm risk-taking.Design/methodology/approachThis study uses an unbalanced data set of 81 hospitality firms and 888 firm-year observations over the period of 1992–2020. The study uses fixed-effects regression estimation for primary analyses and addresses potential endogeneity concerns via two-stage least square regression with firm fixed-effects instrumental variable regression. Risk-taking is measured by total firm risk (i.e. the annualized volatility of daily stock returns). Main results are supported with alternative measures of firm risk and estimation methods.FindingsThe study finds that increasing TMT gender diversity leads to a reduction in firm risk-taking in the hospitality industry. Moreover, the study finds that hospitality firms led by a female CEO experience lower firm risk compared to firms led by a male CEO. Finally, the study finds evidence that the relationship between TMT gender diversity and firm risk is contingent on the level of incentive pay awarded to TMT members and the age of TMT members. Increasing incentive pay and aging executive teams decrease the risk reduction effect of TMT gender diversity.Practical implicationsThe findings of this study recommend that firm risk-taking in the hospitality industry is related to gender diversity in TMTs. Hence, the board of directors should pay attention to gender composition for executive positions for risk management. Moreover, the results also suggest that care should be exercised when using incentive pay to align the interests of managers and shareholders. Finally, the board of directors needs to consider both gender diversity and age of the TMT members for TMT composition to manage executives’ risk-taking behavior.Originality/valueThis study fills a research gap in the hospitality literature by providing empirical evidence for the link between TMT gender diversity and firm risk-taking. Additionally, the study introduces incentive pay and age of TMT as contingency factors for the link between TMT gender diversity and firm risk-taking.

The power of internet exposure: influence of online news coverage on restaurant survival

PurposeFew studies on hospitality firm survival consider the impact of online media exposure. This paper aims to investigate how the online news coverage of restaurants, characterized in terms of the number of articles, channel (Web page or mobile app), topic (operations or products) and consistency (mix of news tones), influences their survival.Design/methodology/approachA yearly panel data set covering 682 news-reported restaurants in Shanghai, China, over the period 2011–2019 is analyzed using a Cox model, and an extended cross-sectional data set containing 9,488 restaurants is used for robustness checks.FindingsA larger number of online news articles, regardless of channel or topic, significantly improves restaurants’ chances of survival, and this positive impact of online exposure is greater if that news is published by mobile apps (rather than on Web pages) or reports topics related to operations (rather than products). Although, generally, news inconsistency is not good for restaurant survival, when the number of online news items is eight or more, inconsistency becomes good for survival.Practical implicationsThis research guides restaurant operators to use news exposure in an online marketing environment to increase the firm’s chances of long-term survival.Originality/valueOnline media exposure has hitherto been ignored in the literature on the survival of hospitality firms. This paper provides a new perspective on hospitality firm survival and also contributes to the literature on media exposure by conceptualizing a unique factor, namely, the consistent online exposure.

Economic policy uncertainty and corporate investment: evidence from Indian hospitality firms

ABSTRACT This study explores the effect of economic policy uncertainty on the corporate investment of 180 Indian Hospitality firms for 15 years. Applying generalized methods of moments technique we find that EPU has a negative impact on the investment decisions of Indian Hospitality firms. Additionally, we find that this negative relationship is relevant for firms in the lower quantile of capital investment, and this negative relationship is more pronounced for firms facing higher financial constraints.

Examining the effect of entrepreneurial leadership on employees’ innovative behavior in SME hotels: A mediated moderation model

To achieve their innovation and service quality goals and effectively meet customers’ changing demands, hospitality firms are searching for different ways to encourage employees’ innovative behavior. This study examines the role of entrepreneurial leadership in promoting innovative behavior among hospitality employees through mediated moderation effects. Data were collected from employees and managers working in 178 small- and medium-sized (SME) hotels in Vietnam. The findings revealed that intrinsic motivation and trust in leader mediated the association between entrepreneurial leadership and employees’ innovative behavior. In contrast to our prediction, leader–member exchange (LMX) did not moderate the associations between entrepreneurial leadership and intrinsic motivation and trust in leader. Our findings provide important implications for hospitality firms that are investing in innovation activities and searching for ways to encourage innovative behavior in their employees.

Does the use of big data make the websites more innovative Evidence from the UAE

Information and communication technologies allow companies to obtain massive amounts of data. These data, known as big data, bring new opportunities for companies and give them competitive advantages. Tourism and hospitality firms may use these data to forecast the demand, and propose more personalised services to visitors. This paper aims to explore whether the use of big data can make websites more innovative in terms of service. An empirical approach is used to establish a structured framework of six evaluation criteria for website's innovativeness. Fuzzy logic is employed to objectively evaluate the perceived service-innovativeness and overall e-service quality of United Arab Emirates (UAE) destination marketing organisation (DMO) websites. The findings propose a ranking of the websites according to their perceived innovativeness, providing in-depth information on performance and forming criteria which will allow managers to understand the importance of different web/e-service functionalities, sharing insights concerning why some DMO websites are more innovative than others.

Elucidating the effect of information technology capabilities on organizational performance in UAE: a three-wave moderated-mediation model

PurposeThis paper aims to investigate information technology capabilities (ITC)’s influence on organizational performance (OP) within the hospitality industry. Specifically, it analyzes the indirect effects of sustainability practices (SP) and service quality (SQ) on the relationship between ITC and OP. The moderating effect of top management support (TMS) is also examined.Design/methodology/approachUsing a three-wave time-lagged design, 507 UAE hotels' managers took part in the study. Hierarchical regression bootstrapping approach was used to examine the hypothesis.FindingsThis study suggests that ITC are positively related to OP. Furthermore, the study found that SP and SQ mediate the ITC-OP relationship. TMS moderates the positive relationship between ITC and OP and also moderates the relationship between SQ and OP. Additionally, TMS moderates the indirect effect of SQ on the association between ITC and OP, such that the mediating effect is stronger when TMS is at a high level.Research limitations/implicationsThe study shall assist the practitioners of the hospitality firms to focus their attention on ITC to improve SQ and hence achieve optimal performance.Originality/valueThe novelty of this research lies in the presentation of an integrated framework based on a resource-based view to solve the contemporary challenges facing hospitality firms operating in emerging markets in integrating ITC and SP for better organizational results.

Effects of COVID-19 on customer service experience: Can employees wearing facemasks enhance customer-perceived service quality?

Wearing a facemask is an effective part of personal hygiene management (WHO, 2020). Not only can it offer healthy people some protection against coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) infection, but it can also reduce the spread of the virus. Wearing facemasks, as a part of the various regulations and guidelines encouraged by the Chinese government and hospitality firms, has been widely accepted by the public in the post-COVID-19 era in China. But few studies have considered the effects of employees wearing facemasks on the customer service experience. Based on signaling theory, this experimental study explores the effects of hotel employees wearing facemasks on customer perceptions of service quality. The results indicate three main effects. (a) Having employees wear facemasks can improve perceptions of customer service quality. (b) Customers commonly feel that female employees wearing facemasks could provide higher service quality than male mask-wearing employees, but the improvement in customer perception with male employees wearing facemasks is greater than the situation between facemask-less and facemask-wearing females. (c) Customer perceptions of employee expertise, employee trustworthiness, and hotel trustworthiness play serial mediating roles. Recommendations to help hotel managers improve customers’ service evaluations during the COVID-19 pandemic are provided.

Waiter, there’s a fly in my coffee!

Waiter, there’s a fly in my coffee!

The relationship between employer image and employee commitment in family-run hospitality firms

PurposeAmong all forms of commitment, affective commitment has been shown to be the most desirable for enterprises. However, research on commitment among employees in family-run businesses in the hospitality industry is scant. To address this gap, this study aims to analyze the impact of employer image components on hospitality employees’ affective occupational commitment within family-run businesses. As one can assume specific employer image aspects when studying family-run businesses, this paper expects to achieve a better understanding of the relationship between employer image and employee commitment in this context.Design/methodology/approachThis study adopts the employer image framework of Baum and Kabst (2013), emphasizing that in addition to considering potential employees, the commitment of current employees needs to be assessed. Convenience sampling is used to obtain a sample from the target population (Tyrolean hospitality and gastronomy employees) from June to September 2018. Multiple linear regression analysis is applied to test the influence of individual employer image constituents on employees’ affective occupational commitment.FindingsAmong the five components of the employer image framework applied here, working atmosphere, task attractiveness and payment attractiveness show a significant influence on employees’ affective occupational commitment.Originality/valueThis study connects an existing employer image model to employee commitment within the hospitality industry. The findings suggest that the model is applicable to current employees as a key stakeholder group and shows the utility of employer image theory in connection with employee commitment.