Dissertation Results
(Dissertation Results)
Introduction
The research process using all the above-mentioned research took 10 days. Interviews were conducted with 12 persons, observations took place in 3 hotels and questionnaires were filled out by 42 persons (30 customers and 12 managers). For the documentary analysis documents provided by the staff of 3 hotels have been used, where the observations took place. Most of the results are similar to the expected ones; however there are several alterations. The major groups of the respondents and survey individuals were customers, managers and hotel staff representatives. As it will be seen from the research results, the members of these three groups have slightly different opinions regarding the hotel service, its quality, etc. However, there are also some similarities in their answers that relate mostly to the general matters that are well-known and understood by everyone who is familiar with the process.
In general, the customers usually wish more than the hotel offers and their quality perception is different from the one that the hotel is offering (Sidin, Rashid and Zainal, 2001).
Results of the Research
Questionnaires
As it was planned, questionnaires have been filled out by 12 managers and 30 customers of different hotels. Managers were individuals having over 5 years of managerial experience in the hospitality industry and older than 30 years old. Questionnaires have been distribute between the most experienced and well-performing professionals in order to receive as precise information as possible reflecting the real situation in the modern hotels.
Most of the respondents were 30-39 years old. There was an equal quantity of individuals from every region (4 persons per region), as cultural diversity is among the aspects studied in this dissertation. Most of them have between 5 and 10 years of professional experience in the hospitality industry (hotels). The respondents worked in different hotels having from 3 to 5 stars. Most of the respondents reported that they sometimes discuss the issues with the hotel staff, only some of them do it regularly. They sometimes participate in the issues resolution with the customers, once it is difficult for the hotel staff individuals to cope themselves. Respondents reported that they rarely speak with the customers about their impressions of the hotel, unless clients wish to do it by their own initiative. This means that hotel managers do not play a significant role in the customer relations. According to the existing research, most duties in this respect are performed by the hotel staff members. The findings prove this opinion. Most of the respondents reported that they always observe the work of the hotel departments (reception, food service, etc.) in order to know what is happening. This is a typical duty of managers in the hotels and therefore they do it regularly. This helps them to be effective leaders. Most of the surveyed managers suppose that they do not need to communicate with the customers daily in case there are no problems. They think that it is a hotel staff’s duty. It proves that many managers make insufficient efforts to improve service quality in their hotels. Their participation can be improved. Managers consider that the brands are important for the hotels and suppose that either managers or hotel staff should do their best to create a positive image of the brand. According to the most researchers, the opinion of which is studied, hotel brands proved to be important in customer attraction and retention. Surveyed managers support this idea and contribute to the strong brand creation.
The questionnaires were answered by 30 customers of different hotels in different countries. It was ensured that they all use services of at least 15 hotels per year and have a profound experience in travelling and hotel services. This provides with the best possibility to assess their perception of hotel service quality. The customers were from Asia, Europe and the U.S. (the same as the surveyed managers). As it can be seen from the questionnaires, there are differences in their answers and, consequently, in their expectations and perception of hotel service quality.
There was an equal quantity of customers from every region (10 per region). Most of them travelled more than 5 times a year. During 1 trip they sometimes stay in more than 1 hotel. Most of them answered that they expect average acceptable level of service from the hotel before their arrival. However, researchers suppose that customer expectations are often exaggerated. Most of the clients expect more than the hotel promises to them. Almost every visitor sometimes experiences language differences while communicating with the hotel staff. According to the existing research, one of the ways of dealing with cultural diversity is learning foreign languages. Poor communication or misunderstanding definitely leads to the low customer satisfaction. Many respondents reported that hotel employees often do not take into account cultural differences while communicating with the guests. Thus, the guests can be easily disappointed or even insulted by the inappropriate phrase or even gesture of the hotel staff. Most of the visitors appreciate good facilities/equipment and food quality most of all among all the services offered by the hotel. Many customers do not leave any feedback regarding their stay in the hotel. Some clients use social networks to leave their feedback. Most of the visitors reported that they never discuss issues related to the hotel service with the management. It is recommended for the hotel staff and managers to encourage guests to leave their feedback regarding the hotel services. Researchers state that collecting and taking into account customers’ feedback is very important for the hotel’s success. Approximately 50% of the customers trust their favorite hotel brands. Another 50%, however, prefer to try something new and discover unknown brands. Thus, brands are not the main factor in customers’ perception of hotel service quality; however, their importance is significant. Their significance is proved in the previous research.
Interviews
With the purpose to receive sufficient information, 15 persons were interviewed (10 hotel managers and 5 hotel staff members. All the interviews were conducted on-line.
Interview questions were as follows:
Pleas describe your hotel in brief.
How many staff members do you have?
How many rooms do you have for guests?
Does your hotel have additional services (pool, shops, restaurants, etc.).
How long have you been working in the hotel industry?
What are your main functions as a manager?
Do you consider close communication with the hotel staff and customers to be important?
Do you consider the brand of the hotel to be important?
Do you think your hotel has a strong brand?
Have you ever faced any cultural differences issues in your work with customers and hotel staff?
How many languages are spoken in your hotel?
Is feedback of the customers important for you and how do you get it / use it?
Do you think managers’ work is important for the overall success of the hotel?
Please describe the ideal hotel manager in brief?
What would be your advice for the other hotels’ managers?
Hotel staff representatives included 3 individuals working at the reception and 2 employees from the food service. The employees of the reception have been asked questions regarding their opinion about guests’ servicing, difficulties arising while communicating with the visitors, cultural diversity issues (both from the hotel staff’s side and the visitors), clients’ feedback and satisfaction, and etc.
The reception area employees informed, as it was expected, that the same level of service is perceived differently by the visitors from various countries of the world that confirms that efficient dealing with the cultural diversity is important. As such, guests from Asia countries are usually more demanding, they expect individual approach and very high level of attention to them. Very often they expect things that are not foreseen by the certain level of hotel. Also they sometimes do not understand that lower price means decreased service level and less individual approach. The matter is that in their home countries it is a tradition that guests are treated very specially and thus they expect it in the other countries too. There are also difficulties with communication as they sometimes do not speak English and it is complicated to understand their needs. It is useful to arrange cultural diversity trainings for the employees in order to increase their knowledge about the behavior and needs of international clients. Most scholars stress on the individual approach to every customer that will ensure their overall positive impression about the hotel.
Regarding the visitors from Europe and the U.S., the interviewees informed that they seem to be less demanding in comparison with the Asian guests. Such guests are usually ready to accept less personal service in case there are no problems and the conditions are quite reasonable. Also they usually explain their requirements more clearly and it is easier for the hotel staff to understand them. As a rule, they do not expect more service than it has been promised by the hotel management and understand the relation between price and service level. Dealing with the customers from Europe and the U.S. requires less trainings and specific knowledge. It is sufficient to know the general etiquette. However, according to the researchers, all the promises of the hotel should be strictly followed.
Observations
Observations were conducted during 3 days in the reception area of 3 different hotels.
First hotel is situated in the centre of the city and visited mostly by the people that come to the city for the business purposes. It is a 3-stars hotel and offers a good value for reasonable price. The communication between the hotel staff members and guests was mostly friendly and calm. Visitors often required much paperwork as they were mostly for business-trips there. There were two cases when the hotel employees could not understand visitors due to the language difficulties. Those two clients were from South Korea and Portugal. However, the staff resolved the issues successfully with the help of the communication in English.
Second hotel is situated in the picturesque area near the large lake where people come for short holidays or for the weekend. This hotel has many rules to be taken into consideration by the guests. For example, it is not allowed to smoke at the hotel’s area; it is prohibited to stay with pets, etc. There were several discussions between the employees and visitors regarding these issues. People tried to explain their dissatisfaction, but employees responded that they are not allowed to breach the rules established by the hotel’s management. As a result, many guests left the reception area in the bad mood. One person complained on the poor choice of dishes for the breakfast. The staff explained that it is a standard choice for the 3-stars hotel.
Third hotel is situated in the central district of the city, in the rather calm area and its visitors are mostly individuals with high levels of income around 90% of which are foreigners. It is a 4-stars hotel offering full-board for its visitors. There were fitness club, three restaurants, beauty salon, and water-pool in this hotel. Hotel offered packages including or excluding the above-mentioned additional services. It was evident that the employees try to do their best for the visitors, value their clients and wish to see them in the hotel again. Some visitors, however, were too demanding, complaining on the quality of food, cleaning, view from the window, and etc. Some people even wanted to receive more services than included into their packages. The hotel staff was dealing with such requirements very professionally and most of the guests remained satisfied. The employees were instructed by the management that in case the client wishes something extra and it is not “too much”, they can grant such services for the clients. The reason for this was that the clients are mostly people with high level of income that pay much for their stay and it is good to see them in this hotel again.
It can be concluded from the above observations that most of the hotels take into account their locations, nationality and status of the quests, stay purposes, and etc. and adjust their services for such requirements. Hotel #2 failed to do this and thus they have less loyal customers in comparison with the hotels #1 and 3.
Documentary Analysis
In order to collect more information, existing documents have been investigated. Such documents included mostly questionnaires filled out by the guests of hotels where the observations have been arranged. Most of the feedback was positive; however, there were also complaints. The structure of claims was as follows:
Conclusions from the above can be as follows. Customers assess quality of service by comparing their expectations with their perceptions of the service (Sidin, Rashid and Zainal, 2001). Guests value first of all hotel facilities and equipment. This means that the furniture, devices, textiles, etc. should be new and of good quality. Moreover, this all should be clean. It makes the first impression of the quests when they enter the room. The second place belongs to food. Many hotels offer breakfast to their guests (included into the price of stay). Besides, upon the visitors’ wish, they can order lunch, dinner, drinks and snacks. The expectations of quality and taste are usually very high. Politeness and friendliness of the hotel staff, in spite of the expectations, are on the third place in the rating. Usually the hotel staff, especially those from the reception, is the “face” of the hotel, but it looks like the surveyed individuals valued quality of equipment and food more. The availability and good functioning of the additional services is on the fourth place; however, it is also important for the hotel visitors. Having analyzed the visitors’ statements regarding the overall impression from their stay, they are worse in comparison with those received from the interviews and questionnaires. Almost every surveyed guest found one or more faults in the hotel service.
Discussion and Conclusions
Taking into consideration the conducted research, now it is possible to provide answers to all the questions mentioned in the introduction to this dissertation.
Identification of the possible steps to reach positive consumer perception.
Considering the information receive from both managers and customers, the possible steps can be the following: ensuring all staff’s involvement into customers servicing process, elaborating individuals approach to every customer, organizing cultural diversity trainings for the hotel staff and managers, ensuring that at least 3-4 languages are spoken by the team, trying to respond every requirement of the customer as quickly as possible, being always friendly and ready to help, making efforts to create good reputation of the hotel.
Offering ways of hotel service quality improvement.
The ways of the hotel service quality improvement can be as follows: choosing only professional and qualified staff, observing all the activities in the hotel on the regular basis, considering, discussing and taking into account all the customers’ feedback, following the modern trends of the hotel industry, improving communication with the customers (foreign languages learning, cultural diversity trainings), purchasing the hotel equipment of the high quality and keeping it in the excellent condition.
Suggesting the ways of successful dealing with cultural diversity of the hotel customers and the staff.
The ways of the successful dealing with cultural diversity of the hotel customers and the staff are as follows: improving foreign languages skills, trying to understand other cultures, avoiding discrimination, and professional trainings. It is also important to remember that not only customers, but also hotel staff are diverse nowadays and this may provoke misunderstanding, conflicts, etc. This should also be considered by the hotel management.
Determine the role of management in hotel service quality improvement.
Even though the communication with the customers is performed mostly by the hotel staff, the role of management proves to be also very important for the successful functioning of the hotel. Thus, employees are always in a position of acting in accordance with the orders of management, therefore in some case they just cannot do something that is not allowed by the managers. Therefore managers should use a very responsible approach to their role in the hotel and try to find options of making the work of the hotel better for the customers. Managers should more often participate in the resolution of the conflicts and issues with the customers and not to stay aside in any case.
Identification of the most suitable ways of getting feedback from the customers.
There are several ways of the receiving feedback from the customers nowadays: in-person speaking, distribution of questionnaires, guest-books, web pages and social networks. However, the results of the research show that modern customers prefer to use mostly on-line ways of leaving feedback. Therefore it is useful to create hotels’ pages on the social networking websites (e.g. Facebook), conduct on-line surveys, encourage individual to visit hotel’s official webpage and use the feedback forms to leave their comments, etc.
Overall, the research shows that all of the elements of hotel service are important for the guests. It is not possible to concentrate only on something specific (e.g. food service or equipment). As it is a service industry, the human factor is extremely important. Therefore it is required to ensure that the hotel staff is highly professional, well-trained and shares the values of the company in terms of creating a positive image and strong brand of the hotel.
Questionnaire for Customers
Background information
__________________
25-30
31-39
40-49
50+
Asia
Europe
U.S.
How often do you travel abroad (per 1 year)?
1-5 times
6-10 times
11-15 times
15+ times
How many hotels do you stay in (per 1 year)?
Less than 5
6-15
15-20
21+
What is the most important factor when you chose the hotel to stay?
Stars
Feedback of other customers
Price
What do you expect from the hotel service before arrival?
Good price-quality relation
Excellent service level
Acceptable service level
How often do you face language difference issues in the hotels?
Always
Sometimes
Rarely
Never
How often do you feel cultural difference while communication with the hotel staff?
Always
Sometimes
Rarely
Never
What do you think is the most important in the hotel?
Attitude and friendliness of the hotel staff
Facilities and equipment
Food services and quality
Additional services
Other (please specify)
How do you prefer to leave feedback regarding the hotel service?
Using questionnaires
On the hotel’s webpage / social network page
Using guest-book in the hotel
I do not leave any feedback
How often do you wish to discuss the outstanding service issues with the hotel management?
Always
Sometimes
Rarely
Never
Do you consider the brand of hotel while choosing where to stay?
Yes
No
Sometimes
Do you have any favorite hotel brands?
Yes
No
Questionnaire for Managers
Background information
__________________
30-39
40-49
50+
Asia
Europe
U.S.
How long have you been working as a manager in the hotel industry?
0-5 years
6-10 years
11-15 years
16+ years
What is the level of hotels you worked for?
0-3 stars
4 stars
5 stars
How often do you communicate with the hotel staff regarding the outstanding issues?
Always
Sometimes
Rarely
Never
Do you participate in the issues resolution with the customers?
Always
Sometimes
Rarely
Never
Do you speak with the customer regarding their feedback?
Always
Sometimes
Rarely
Never
Do you observe the functioning of hotel staff (reception, food services, room cleaning etc.)?
Always
Sometimes
Rarely
Never
Do you suppose you need to participate in the communication with the customers?
Yes
No
I do not know
Do you think the brand of hotel is important?
Yes
No
I do not know
Do you take any efforts to create a strong brand for your hotel?
Yes
No
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Sidin, S., Rashid, Z. and Zainal, R. (2001). Measuring Customers' Perceived Service Quality in Hotel Industry. Soc. Sci. & Hum., [online] 9(2), pp.83-85. Available at: https://core.ac.uk/download/files/452/12222627.pdf [Accessed 10 Mar. 2016].
