Strengths of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake 4
Weaknesses of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake 6
Opportunities which Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake can Exploit 7
Threats to which Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake is Exposed 7
3.0 Strategy Proposed 8
4.0 Critical Evaluation of the Problems Identified 8
Using Six Hats Thinking Approach for Problem Solving 9
Blue Hat 9
White Hat 9
Red Hat 10
Black Hat 10
Yellow Hat 10
Green Hat 11
Application of Mintzberg’s Theory at Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake 11
Interpersonal use of Managerial Skills 11
Informational Role of Managers to Solve Problems 12
Decisional Role of Managers for Dealing with the Issue 13
5.0 Conclusion 13
References 14
Strategic Management Analysis of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake in China from ACCOR Hotels
1.0 Introduction
This research paper is aimed at analyzing Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake in China from different management aspects. First of all, the SWOT analysis of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake is demonstrated by highlighting the business’s internal strengths and weaknesses as well as opportunities and threats for the hotel subsidiary in the external world. Such a SWOT analysis is discussed by considering various aspects of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake. This paper is written from the strategic management perspective where some important theories are discussed for strategic solutions.
The problem identified from SWOT analysis concerns the human resource management practices at Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake. It is identified that even though this entity hires well-educated and highly trained staff, yet it is more prone to frequent employee turnover. Employees who join Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake, regardless of the job position, for shorter term perspective tend to have less motivation to provide high quality services to valuable customers. Due to lower employee morale, customers may not receive hotel and restaurant services they expect. Therefore, other strategic management theories are also employed for dealing with this problem. Not only the problem is presented but its critical evaluation is also presented in terms of two strategic management theories, such as six hat thinking, for possible solutions.
2.0 SWOT Analysis
This section is aimed at identifying different strengths and weaknesses as well as different market opportunities it can exploit and threats to which this hotel subsidiary is vulnerable with the help of following tabular representation:
Strengths of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake
The greatest strength of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake is its location. This is primarily because Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake is able to attract more customer attention since it is located nearby the central business district. Also, Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake is few moments away from Xihu Tiandi leisure and shopping complex. Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake is a market leader in the Chinese hotel industry because not only it provides accommodation and dining services but also includes a wide variety of restaurants and shops in its boundaries.
Another major strength of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake is that its workforce includes well-educated and highly skilful staff members who are always ready and keen to assume new responsibilities and meet challenging tasks. Because of their education, they can advance to higher organizational levels in Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake. This hotel trains and develops skills of its staff members concerning more than one business area. Because of this, even low level staff members are able to provide quality services to incoming customers which is a major strength of human resources practices prevailing at Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake. The hotel, with its flexible workforce, s able to schedule working hours of its staff members to suit business needs. As Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake is managed by well-educated and multi skilled staff members, this hotel has a financial strength that it does not need to employ more people unnecessarily. Same people can get different jobs and responsibilities done which helps Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake save more on its business costs and expenses.
Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake ensures that every customer receives a high quality service with no delay in their orders so that relationship with customers could be strengthened. Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake creates a wonderful and unforgettable hostelling experience for its customers. In true essence, this is one of the major strengths of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake because its staff members continuously facilitate repeated purchase decisions by valued customers.
The ability of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake to accommodate more customers with its extended offers and facilities is another strength that helps this hotel subsidiary more revenue and gain more market attention. The sight-seeing and mind-blowing bank view further enhances customers’ overall experience.
Weaknesses of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake
Because Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake contains a highly educated and skilled staff, the employee turnover is relatively very high. This is because those individuals tend to search for better pay and working conditions compared to what they are offered at Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake. This is a major weakness of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake that despite its market leadership, the hotel subsidiary finds it difficult to retain its quality and talented employees. Because of this, the motivation to provide quality services is low among those employees that aim to work for Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake on a short-term basis.
One major reason behind this weakness is that Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake’s management is overly rigid in its approach. In times of economic and financial adversity or downturn, the management of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake is ready to lay off its workforce without any notice or careful thought to save the entity’s financial position. This is why; employees of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake perceive their employer to provide them with lower job security. Resultantly, their morale keeps declining at a faster pace that encourages frequent employee turnover at Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake.
Another weakness of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake in retaining its employees is that the entity is located as an old construction. Employees have great concerns for their health and life safety for which they refrain from working in a risky work environment where accidents and death may happen at any time. To save themselves from unforeseen events, employees find it more promising to switch to other employers instead of working at Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake for longer hours.
Opportunities which Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake can Exploit
The greatest opportunity for Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake is that there is a growing market for hotel industry in China and India. Actually, these two destinations are highly preferred by the tourism industry for travelling and sight-seeing. Moreover, these two emerging economies are the business and investment hubs in Asian Pacific Region. This is why; there is a growing opportunity for Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake to expand its hotel and restaurant services by entering the Indian market when it is already a market leader in China.
With the rise of technology and internet, Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake also has an opportunity to join online social media network and reach a broader target market. It can earn extra customer attention by launching eHotel services. Here, customers may be facilitated in making reservations online. This will help them save time and energy. The comparative price list may also have a strong appeal to customers when shopping for online services through eHotel.
Threats to which Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake is Exposed
There is a growing threat for Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake as the China’s economic is persistently declining due to slowdown. Because of this, only fewer people would travel to China for business activities. China is also losing its attractiveness in the tourism industry. Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake would lose because it is located nearby business and shopping arena. With few people travelling to China, Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake is prone to losing its profit generation capacity. That’s why; an opportunity is recommended to expand operations in other Asian boundaries, particularly in India.
3.0 Strategy Proposed
4.0 Critical Evaluation of the Problems Identified
In this section, different strategic management approaches would be used to solve issues identified from the weaknesses of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake as well as threats to which this hotel subsidiary is exposed.
Using Six Hats Thinking Approach for Problem Solving
As the strategic thinking process is confusing and complicated, this strategic management approach could be used to restructure and organize human thought for solving problems being faced by Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake. The major importance of using this approach is that it is based on “parallel thinking” pattern where thought processes are divided for solving/addressing the same problem/issue from different angles. There is a specific sequence of using these hats where the management of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake should follow strictly. Also, these six thinking hats should be considered one at a time by forming a group or team. In this extraordinary strategic thinking process, problem solving target is achieved by organizing the human thought into types and colours in the following manner :
Blue Hat
This first hat requires the management of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake to identify the problem or subject of discussion as well as the target to be achieved by looking at a broader picture. In this case, the major problem is frequent employee turnover even though Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake employs talented and educated staff members .
White Hat
In this type of thinking, stakeholders of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake (such as human resource professionals) need to come together to collect and share information concerning employee turnover. Here, instead of causes of this problem, the concerned stakeholders need to just share knowledge and available facts about how many employees have joined Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake this year and how many of them have resigned. Also, the information about the tenure of employment services should also be shared such as how much time did ex-employees served at Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake .
Red Hat
This hat calls for recording the feelings and reactions of concerned professional about the problem and different alternatives presented as solutions. The goal is to record how does every team member feel about the problem and alternatives presented instead of reasons behind such emotions and feelings .
Black Hat
Here, all group members of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake need to think about every solution as pessimists. All members need to think cons of every solution as to the reasons for which a certain solution may fail to help achieve the desired target of retaining talented and educated employees .
Yellow Hat
This is the fifth hat where team members think of the solutions with an optimist’s view for stating their advantages and pros. Those solutions that pass the pessimist test through the black or fourth hat; this hat tends to state the benefits of all those workable alternatives that can help the management of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake in employee retention on a longer term basis. Here, the management of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake should look at the brighter side of every qualifying solution/alternative instead of cons .
Green Hat
This sixth and last hat reflects creative thinking process where solutions are combined to form the most creative alternative to retain employees of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake for longer term. Different techniques, such as brainstorming, could be observed at this stage of the process. Bending the rules and thinking out-of-the –box is done in this sixth hat meeting. This would open new avenues of thinking and introduce new opportunities for the management of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake to reduce employee turnover by increasing their job satisfaction and raising their morale for increased retention .
Application of Mintzberg’s Theory at Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake
Interpersonal use of Managerial Skills
In this category, managers of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake need to keep themselves involved in sharing of information and ideas. It is recommended for the managers of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake to assume their responsibilities and inspire every employee they recruit by acting as a figurehead and person of authority. It is less likely that inspired employees would leave Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake by switching to other businesses. As a leader, team heads should assign certain responsibilities to suitable candidates. It is also recommended to not only manage performance of all employees but also share constructive feedback with each one of them. This would make employees feel valued and raises their morale as well as work productivity in future. As a Liaison, team managers should build cohesive and strong relationship with their members so that they could gain insights about problems and issues faced by every employee .
Informational Role of Managers to Solve Problems
In this role, managers of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake should be concerned about information processing for solving being faced by this hotel subsidiary. First of all, it is recommend to all department heads and team managers to monitor information about their organization (Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake) and industry for identifying changes in norms and practices concerning employee management and retention. At the same time, monitoring the well-being, morale and work productivity of all team members is also recommended so that any gap could be filled before employees start losing their motivation and switch.
For performance management and employee retention, it s further suggested that managers of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake should share constructive feedback and new information, as a disseminator, with all employees to make them feel valued. If there is any gap between expectations and actual employee performance, managers should assume the role of a spokesperson to communicate to all employees about what the employers expects from them and how they could improve their performance at work .
Decisional Role of Managers for Dealing with the Issue
At first, managers of Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake should act as an entrepreneur for change management to solve problems of employees by generating new ideas and implementation of new strategies with active employee involvement. If there is any disturbance or conflict among employees, they are more likely to switch employers and leave Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake. For this, mangers should take full responsibility and charge for resolving conflicts and employs’ issues. Before an employee leaves Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake, it is suggested that managers should assume the role of a negotiator to make constructive discussion with employees for retention in any way .
5.0 Conclusion
After carefully analyzing the internal strengths and weaknesses as well as opportunities and threats that stem from the external world, it is recommended for Sofitel Hangzhou Westlake to employ two strategic management techniques for solving problems regarding employee retention and performance management. The six hat thinking approach will help managers approach the same problem from different angles while Mintzberg’s theory will facilitate managers in dividing their responsibilities into three categories so that they could be effective enough to inspire every staff member and lead by example.
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