Hospitality Leadership Essay Examples

Abstract

Hospitality industry has undergone tremendous changes recently – it has become global, mainly due to business rivalry and redefining of new niches by using competitive advantages and improved service supply chains. The success of the industry is highly dependent on the staff work and the quality of services they deliver to the guests. The task of the hospitality leader or hotel manager is to ensure that all the elements of the chain are working properly, that employees are properly trained, technical maintenance of the hotel is carried out in time, services are first rate and guaranteed to every guest entering the hotel. In this paper, I would like to outline the details of my future career direction, priorities in this business and my expectations. As a future hospitality leader I would like to build a flexible system of checks and balances to provide the best guest servicing in my future career path.

Hospitality is providing your guest with the same amount of attention and

service as you would expect if you were in their shoes. 

Jed Arrogante,  Director of Sales and Catering, The Westgate Hotel, 2010

Considering your future career direction and the decisions you will make along the way, identify two class topics you have reflected on the most (that have interested you the most?) and explain why this is the case.
At present hospitality industry becomes more global; therefore, the global touristic markets are accompanied by powerful process of transnationalization, which are manifested through international network of capital, strengthening of monopolies all over the world. Many organizations in hospitality sphere cooperate and unite into global structures, overcome boarders of separate states and crush national barriers. Specialists pay attention that world tourism demand a more close cooperation on local and regional levels in order to increase the quality of a hotel servicing making it more competitive on world arena, which gives birth to a new term of co-competition. I consider these new economic structures promote the distribution of international standards of hospitality service. The best example of such advanced economic structures in hospitality sphere is the world known hotel chains which created first rules of game changing strategies or competitive rivalry by redefining industry and broadening its boundaries (Abdelgawad S.G., et al.,2013).

Considering this, what are your priorities as a future hospitality leader?

Serving the guests should be first rate in every detail. I think that first priority attention should be paid to managing personnel, educating and training of employees. People in hospitality sphere are supposed to be highly involved in the service supply process and their qualification should correspond the international standards while the biggest share of tourists in the hotels are foreigners. It means that the first thing they see is hotel and the service therefore it is extremely important to create reputation of the hotel through motivation of personnel, educational and training programs for all hotel employees. Especially it is important for crisis events when the chief responsibility of a leader is ensuring that employees and guests are on the safe side (Gruman J.A et al., 2011). Since I am highly motivated to become a hospitality leader, I think that it is necessary to find a common language with the team. I would put it as a way to assess the life demands and expectations of each member of the team. I perfectly understand that my motivation as well as that of the employees to go into hospitality business lies in the possibility to realize life values in the future and make a good start for personal development. Therefore working in service and tourism business, we need to solve a double-edged dilemma of how to make a hospitality company attractive for both employees and guests, whereas obtaining the maximum profit from both. This is a milestone task of a hospitality leader. To solve this we need to organize an efficient human resource and service supply management so that employees operated smoothly serving every guest in the hotel. What way to achieve a best guest servicing level should be decided by the manager/leader. Priority attention is paid to technical specifications of responsibilities and level of accountability to all team members, thus personnel can gain certain confidence performing the duties and meeting the challenges (Lan Li et al., 2009).
As you move forward in your career, how will you balance the expectations of the guest and the needs of business?
Hospitality leader should thus be patient and flexible in order to organize a smoothly operating environment and a solidarity atmosphere taking into consideration individual preferences. Judi Brownell (2010) outlined the main element of success in hospitality business as “leaders make a difference”. Leaders in hospitality sphere are defined as servant leaders who challenge the most difficult tasks of dealing with corporate ethics, improper behavior of the guests and employees’ malpractice. Servant leaders exercise the biggest pressure of the hotel industry today struggling to find a balance between guests’ expectations and business demands. In order to achieve a harmony between the two it is extremely important to focus on guest-oriented issues like serving rooms, cleaning, welcoming and assisting in every need and whim, i.e. organizing a consistent and efficient service supply. I think that in my future career as a hospitality/servant leader I will draw a special attention to issues of adequate hospitality management by offering a broad variety of services on front desk including booking of tickets, cars, organizing sightseeing tours, picnics, mother-and-child rooms and all kinds of assistance in a quick and friendly manner.
The chain of the hotels I would like to pursue my career in should be interesting in global aspect because I am highly motivated to spread my entrepreneurial activity on international level by using both creative ideas about improvement of guest servicing and motivating employees to deliver these services in the best way possible. A special hotel, my hotel, should use all the competitive advantages of the industry including human resource, technical infrastructure, new trends in marketing and advertising, and most importantly high rate guest servicing. These factors are significant for business’s profit and impacts positively corporate entrepreneurship in hospitality organizations (Thomas M., 2005). I am sure that I have all the qualities of a hospitality manager and will apply all my knowledge and effort to create a comfortable and friendly atmosphere for the guest. I will try hard to bridge advantages of strategic management and entrepreneurial effort in order to build up a competitive and rewarding system of service supply in a global market of hospitality industry.

References

Abdelgawad S.G. Zahra S.A., Svejenova S., Harry J. Sapienza. (2013). Strategic Leadership and Entrepreneurial Capability for Game Change. Journal of Leadership. Organizational Studies. Baker College. 20(4) 394–407.
Brownell J.(2010). Leadership in the Service of Hospitality. Cornell University. Volume 51, Issue 3 363-378. DOI: 10.1177/1938965510368651
Gruman J.A., Chhinzer N., Smith G.W.(2011). An Exploratory Study of the Level of Disaster Preparedness in the Canadian Hospitality Industry. School of Hospitality and Tourism Management. University of Guelph. Ontario. Canada Department of Business.
Li L., Ching-Yick Tse E., Zhao J.L. (2009). An Empirical Study of Corporate Entrepreneurship in Hospitality Companies, International Journal of Hospitality & Tourism Administration. Consumer and Nutrition Sciences. Northern Illinois University. DeKalb, Illinois, USA. School of Hotel and Tourism Management. Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, The People's Republic of China. School of Hospitality and Tourism Management. Florida International University. Miami, Florida, USA. Print.
Thomas M. (2005). How to Stay In the Game After a Crisis. Observer Tricks of the Trade. Restaurant hospitality. Print.