Reference no: EM133477078

Mateo and Felix were good friends who worked out regularly at the Muscle Man's Gym. By coincidence, Mateo was the dining room manager in an upscale restaurant in a local hotel, and Felix was the director of housekeeping at a resort on the outskirts of the city. Both of their organizations have a similar business volume. Not surprisingly, their jobs were a frequent topic of conversation at the juice bar in the gym after their workouts.

"Felix, we've talked about this before," said Mateo. "It's hard to believe that our employers are in the same basic business and hire the same types of people, yet their HR philosophies/strategies are so different."

"I agree," said Felix. "At my resort the emphasis is on the guests first, on maximizing profit second, and on the employees third. We churn through a lot of staff members who start out with a positive attitude but whose morale goes quickly downhill as they are confronted with things that shouldn't happen."

"Give me an example," replied Mateo.

"Well," responded Felix, "we use out-of-date job descriptions to recruit employees, and many times there's little resemblance between what new staff think they're going to be doing and what they actually do. Orientation sessions are done whenever there is time, training is done on the job, and if the staff members don't learn quickly, top-level managers conclude that it's because they don't care-not because they haven't been properly trained.

"A lot of supervisors have been there a long time and don't care about the organization or their staff members. They surely don't treat staff the way they would want to be treated.

"Performance appraisals focus on what staff members do wrong-not on what they can do right and how they can improve. There is an ongoing emphasis on 'job' rather then on 'career,' and many employees seem to just mark their time until there is a position vacancy at your hotel."

Mateo had heard Felix talk about these issues before. His hotel was an "employer of choice" where many people in the community wanted to work, and, subsequently, where employee turnover rates were low. In fact, Mateo had agreed long ago to let Felix know when the executive housekeeper position at the hotel became available.

Mateo wondered why Felix's employer didn't seem concerned about the problem and wasn't doing anything to address the concerns. To Mateo, they seemed like "common sense" issues with simple fixes. He realized, however, that attitudes were much more difficult to change than procedures were to revise.

After thinking about it, Mateo said, "Felix, things will have to change at the resort. You've mentioned that business is getting slower. Maybe it's because employees aren't treated well and they, in turn, are less concerned about the guests. We both know that we'll soon have another hotel in town, and the HR people there will be aggressively searching for new staff members. If things don't change at your property, things will get worse than they are."

"You're right, Mateo," said Felix. "Our highest-level managers should already know that they are hurting themselves with their current employee practices. The point will really be driven home ... and it will happen a lot sooner than they think."

Questions

1. How are the results of strategies used to manage HR at Felix's hotel affecting the business?

2. What are possible reasons that top-level managers at Felix's property do not recognize the problems that a lack of focus on HR concerns are creating?

3. What are some things that Felix, as a department head, could do within his own level of responsibility to improve the management of HR within his department?