PART 2 WHO WE EMPLOY MATTERS: SOMETHING MUST CHANGE

Egi Gaisie, a Hotel Educator/Trainer, talks with Kodjo Hazel a former Human Resource Manager of Golden Tulip Hotel, Accra and Alisa Hotel, Accra respectively. He is currently a Human Resource Consultant in the hotel industry.

This session focuses on his general opinions about personnel working in the hotel industry in Ghana.
The discussion has raised various concerns which has been lingering in the industry for far too long. I intend to address them at an appropriate time on this platform. Welcome.

Question: What have you found to be unique in managing personnel in the hotel industry?

Response: Very interesting; you manage all manner of people, i.e. religious groups, ethnic associates, interests groups, etc. The important thing is how the HR person is able to convert them into customer-service providers.

Follow-up: Are these groupings in relation to personnel in hotels?

Response: Yes, there are many informal ‘unseen’ groups that can make organizational behavior difficult to manage.

Question: General observations deduced from talking with heads of departments of hotels give me the impression that current personnel in the hotel industry do not seem ready to commit themselves to learning, thus the high turnover.  Can you confirm this? And why do you think this is a trend?

Response: This assertion may be true to only a limited extent. The reality is that most heads of department do not really commit themselves in making learning and development an organic part of modern day hotel’s organizational and strategic philosophy.

High staff turnovers may themselves not be entirely negative in as much as they can also serve as growth factors for other hotels.

Generally, learning and development is not taken seriously. The caliber of personnel usually hired requires much more attention in training than is given.

Question: How important is language in the hotel industry in Ghana? How do you think we are doing in this area?

Response: Language is a baseline requirement for effective communication. We are not doing well at all; even when statutory regulations require us to do so; not even in our own local languages and dialects let alone the foreign ones.

There is the urgent need to drill deep in the area of language expansion as this is also becoming a universal cultural standard in the industry.

Question: Hotels are in the business of selling intangibles- unique experiences. How do Employers get their personnel to create those unique experiences?

Response: Through

•          Continuous well-designed training programs, at all levels and which will meet market needs

•          Productivity measurements along with desired performance motivational programs

•          Total practical exposure, at all levels, on the workings of the hotel

•          Exchange programs with sister-hotels, both local and abroad

•          Bench marking

•          Continuous research and development on industry trends

Question:  What role do you play in the above?

Response: Virtually any or all of them.

Question: How would you describe the status of the hotel work force in Ghana? 

Response: Very despondent, laid-back and lethargic. A lot of individualism, less teamwork, largely unskilled and unprofessional at all levels; highly mercenary and predatory. However I must add that this is through no fault of theirs. 

Follow-up: Wow, that suggests a lot to be done on us. Where does one start? Who should start it and how? 

Response: It is a huge task. Private hotel owners need to demonstrate care beyond their projects. Once profits are assured they seem to care little about staff development; only a few are committed.

Question: Productivity in most of our hotels seems low yet hotel personnel feel very stressed and exhausted. What are the challenges?

Response: Most of our hotels do not have strategic plans; they are very commercial and developmental, spending on the product and not as required on the staff.

 to be continued.

WHO WE EMPLOY MATTERS-SOMETHING MUST CHANGE

Egi Gaisie, a Hotel Educator/Trainer, talks with Kodjo Hazel a former Human Resource Manager of Golden Tulip Hotel, Accra and Alisa Hotel, Accra respectively. He is currently a Human Resource Consultant in the hotel industry.

This session focuses on the mentality of people towards hotel jobs and towards working in the hotel industry in Ghana.

The discussion led me to various other areas of concern which has been lingering in the industry for far too long and which I intend to address at the appropriate time on this platform. Welcome.

Question: You must have interviewed hundreds of applicants and handled several more application letters over the years as a Human Resource Manager. How would you describe the general attitude of people wanting to work in the hotel industry?

Response: Most new entrants perceive hotel work as basic household daily chores. Thus most applications lack the requisite professional contents for specialized and critical positions. An applicant who has practiced cooking at home feels highly qualified to be employed as a cook in a modern hotel kitchen. This runs through for most of the departments.

Follow up: Are you suggesting there is a general lack of understanding among applicants as to what qualifications are expected of them? Vacancy announcements I have seen have specific and detailed job requirements.

Response: Yes but even when job adverts are well laid out, applicants look at the positions as what they merely do in their respective homes; as in cooking, cleaning rooms or serving food. Often there are pressures from hotel owners and other stakeholders to just place 'their people' irrespective of their qualifications.

Question: How well do applicants know the industry they wish to work in?

Response: Most applicants come in very naïve about the activities/workings of the industry. One of the major contributory factors to high turnovers is the abject lack of the workings of the hotel industry.

 Follow up: Kindly explain further what you mean.."the abject lack of the workings of the hotel industry."

Response: They liken hotel jobs to basic household jobs done in the homes.

Follow-up: Considering all that you have said what kind of orientation is given to those who are employed?

Response: I normally give a three day orientation to the newly employed.

Follow-up: What is the content of such an orientation?

Response: There is a general orientation of the hotel industry, a departmental orientation, a physical tour of the hotel and a session for ‘Questions and Answers’ with all the department heads sitting in. When the newly employed go to their respective departments their departmental heads are expected to conduct on-the-job training. This is where commitment to training is slack.

Question: Outside this country, ‘leads’ such as handshakes, smiles, eye contact have been used to determine whom to shortlist for an interview. In Ghana, what peculiar ‘leads’ guide you to shortlist applicants?

Response: The prevailing culture in the industry is universal. Criteria for selection may, therefore, not be segmented, notwithstanding the fact that a few local standards may be counted during selection. Some of these criteria are also regulated by statutes.

Follow-up: I am not sure I understand what you mean.

Response: First of all, I like to refer to these ‘leads’ as standards. In the hotel industry the culture is the same irrespective of where your hotel is located. So we need to apply international standards; eye contact, positive engagement, smile etc There may be  slight variations  such as the addition of   local flavors e.g. in Japan, bowing rather than shaking of hands. Eye contacts, smiles, mentioning guests’ names, handshakes, etc. are basic ingredients for creating the desired experiences for customers who may have everything that the hotel has but these. In Ghana, if an employee gestures a bow to a Japanese guest, it makes him/her feel at home. But these are little touches the employee should pick up through self development.

Question: Generally, how prepared do you find individuals who are attending an interview? I am making reference to operational personnel (personnel below supervisory status).

Response: Candidates appearing at interviews are mostly ill-prepared even at the higher supervisory and managerial levels.

Follow-up: So perhaps we would devote a session on this, I mean supervisory and management level personnel.

Question: Service cannot be forced out of people. Yet we see people working in specific hotels pushing for their relatives to be employed. What are your views?

Response: This practice is highly unacceptable. In most of the private hotels Ghana, it is commonplace to find the owners populate some or all the departments with close relations believing that they can act as “moles” to protect and safeguard their intended profits. Practical evidence, on the contrary, points to a situation where such nepotistic practices have led to huge losses of revenue through plain and undercover sabotage.

Professionalism, experience and performance should dictate the selection of persons into the industry.

Question: What advice would you give to students going to their first job interview in a hotel?

Response:

•          Professional knowledge and practical skills

•          All-round knowledge of the job-specification bordering the position advertised

•          An in-depth research into the corporate vision, mission and the core values of the industry

•          The extent to which the candidate can impact the position and the hotel within a period of time

•          Presentation on how the candidate intends to chart a growth-path in the Hotel within the space of time

 Thank you for this session.