- Email: [email protected]
The morning line…
I
]
False and Misleading Promotional Material: A Word of Caution, by John E.H. Sherry Pages 14-15
How Ritz-Carlton Uses "TQM," by Charles G. Partlow
Pages 16-24 American Concierges Set Service Standards, by Glenn Withiam
Pages 25-29 China's Tourism-Service Failure, by Liping A. Cai and Robert H. Woods
Pages 30-39
In several breach-of-contract claims for inaccurate representations made to guests through advertising brochures, the courts have allowed guests to recover relatively large damages from findings of fraud or intentional misrepresentation. The courts have focused attention on representations that overstep permissible limits of selling behavior and looked at the totality of the statements made. If promises fail to live up to guests' reasonable expectations, the courts may find them actionable. A finding of fraud is necessary to permit recovery of punitive damages.
In the fall of 1992, Ritz-Carlton became the first hotel company to win the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award. Ritz-Carlton implemented total quality management (TQM) as a means of winning the award and improving its service. Patrick Mene, corporate director of quality, explains issues concerning application of TQM to the hotel industry and applying for the Baldrige award. Measurement was a difficult hurdle, because the industry does not have service-quality benchmarks. Team building was also a time-consuming effort. Ritz-Carlton is now requiring its vendors also to apply TQM or a similar process. American hotels originally installed concierge service to remain competitive in the 1980s' guest-amenity race. While recession halted the rapid growth in new concierge desks, many hotels have been loath to cut out their concierge service because concierges have proved their value to hotel guests. Indeed, guests expect hotels at a certain quality level to have a concierge. Concierges have professionalized their calling, through their association, Les Clefs d'Or, which now sponsors a certification process. Moreover, the concierge concept has been adopted by such other businesses as department stores and commercial real-estate concerns. When China opened its doors in 1978, it encouraged international tourism. The government strongly encourages all such tourists to travel with guides, whose ability to provide excellent service is key to a successful tour. After an initial burst of foreign travelers in the early 1980s, the growth rate in tourist traffic gradually leveled off through the decade, even before the Tiananmen Square massacre. Government investment in infrastructure and facilities in the mid-'80s failed to reinvigorate foreign tourism. The authors suggest that the failure lies in the erratic service standards found in the nation's tour guides. As support for that notion, the authors explain the government's overall failure to support the guides and maintain their morale.
THE CORNELL H.R.A. QUARTERLY
Club managers, hotel general managers, and accounting managers (hotel controllers) were surveyed to obtain their opinions on business situations with ethical implications. Seven scenarios described a hypothetical manager's reaction to a situation involving ethics. The three groups were asked to indicate the extent to which they agreed or disagreed with the manager's response. Overall there was reasonably good agreement among the three groups regarding the ethical underpinnings of the seven scenarios. This study of seven scenarios suggests there is a reasonable amount of agreement across the three professional management groups as to what constitutes "ethical behavior."
This article is a compilation of excerpts from the manuscript "Inside View of Hilton Hotels" by Robert F. Quain, and recounts stories from his experiences on the management team at the Stevens Hotel, in Chicago. From graft to accolades and from U.S. presidents to Russian dignitaries, Quain illustrates some of the lessons he learned and the challenges he overcame, including dealing with unions, subduing a crime syndicate, eliminating front-office corruption, easing racial tensions, improving purchasing systems, and applying an early form of yield management.
-An evaluation of the internal operations of this country club allowed the company to (1) identify the areas of business on which it should focus, (2) develop solid knowledge of each market's condition and of the competition, (3) reach conclusions about the general conditions of those markets, (4) develop specific pricing policies and procedures to take advantage of those markets, and (5) effectively communicate its new plans to all the appropriate parties. Two key aspects involved pricing the product so that customers didn't shy away from it and identifying procedures, policies, actions, or services that were actually repellingbusiness. In the end, the club gained more and happier players and additional net revenues from wise price increases. Many resort owners view the operation of their amenities as a necessary expense that must be incurred to improve the marketability of the resort's rental program. In fact, a well-designed club-membership program can turn those amenities into a profit center instead of a loss leader. Recreation clubs have been incorporated successfully into several types of resorts, especially golf resorts, whereby club members pay for privileged access to the resort's facilities. A resort club can also be structured as a vacation club, whereby members can stay at the resort a certain number of days or weeks each year. The resort-club concept needs to be tailored to the particular resort and its locale; no single plan can be used for all resorts. Before planning a clubmembership program, a careful analysis of the target market must be made. A program may be easy to implement and market in a residential-resort community, because the resident neighbors represent a readily exploitable market. As an example, the Boca Raton Resort and Club reorganized its club program with promising financial results.
AUGUST1993
Hospitality Professionals' Responses to Ethical Situations, by Raymond S. Schmidgall and James W. Damitio
Pages 40-43
The Old Stevens: Memoirs of Bob Quain, by Robert F. Quain and Michael M. Lefever Pages 44-52
Remarketing: One Club's Response to a Changing Market, by Jeffrey L. Pellissier
Pages 53-58 Enhancing Resort Profitability with Club-Membership Programs, by Michael P. Sire and M. Chase Burritt
Pages 59-62
The Morning Line
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Employment Benefits: A Comparison between Academe and Industry, by Raymond S. Schmidgall and Bonnie J. Knutson Pages 64-68 Hospitality Faculty: A Motivational Challenge, by Jerald W. Chesser, Taylor Ellis, and Robert Rothberg
Pages 69-74 Using Multimedia in Hospitality Training, by Kimberley J. Harris and Joseph J. West
Pages 75-82 Producing Global Managers: The Need for a New Academic Paradigm, by Jack J. Clark and Avner Arbel
Pages 83-89 Graduate-Level Education: A Survey of Stakeholders by Cathy A. Enz, Leo M. Renaghan, and A. Neal Geller Pages 90-95
continued
This article compares 19 employment benefits offered to hospitality educators with those offered to food-service professionals. The 19 benefits cluster into three categories: health, income or life-style, and professional, plus a catch-all group. Educational institutions appear to be more generous than their food-service counterparts, but a larger percentage of industry firms pay the entire cost of those benefits than do institutions. When all 19 benefits are examined for the entire sample populations of both educational institutions and food-service firms, the number of those firms and institutions that pay 100 percent of the benefit appears quite equitable. Administrators can motivate hospitality-faculty members as a group through concern for higher-order needs. Consideration of the individual's goals and values is a cornerstone of an effective motivational plan, especially as experience, age, and job security increase. There are stages in the career development of the hospitality-faculty member. Individuals in the new-faculty stage should move to the authority-congruence stage, where they are expert in the knowledge and skill required. The undesirable authority-incongruence stage comprises expert faculty members whose performance has diminished. Such faculty members may either be revitalized or they may function as persons who are ready to exit, that is, who are "on-the-job retired." Computer-based multimedia presentations combine instructional resources to meet the audience's needs and learning level. Studies have shown that multimedia training increases efficiency, and learner motivation, for individuals and groups. Despite the expense, a few hospitality-education programs successfully use interactive technologies to train students in sanitation, front-desk operations, and marketing strategy relating to travel and tourism. The most successful training programs combine multimedia training with peer-group sessions, questionand-answer time with a supervisor, and textbooks and workbooks that trainees can take home. Always international, the hospitality industry needs managers who consider the long-range impact of their decisions on the global community. Unfortunately, it seems that hospitality schools cannot yet provide the necessary leadership in "going global." To globalize the student body colleges should: accept more international students, develop international studentexchange programs, intensify support for international students, increase scholarship aid, and require foreign-language skills. To globalize their faculty, universities should require more international faculty exchanges and sabbatical leaves, recruit more international faculty members, and increase the use of industry professionals as guest lecturers and executives in residence. To evaluate the school's Master of Professional Studies (M.P.S.) program, the graduate faculty of the Cornell Hotel School surveyed hospitality-industry professionals, M.P.S. alumni, the school's graduate faculty, and incoming graduate students. All groups considered three skills important: leadership, the ability to identify problems, and organizing and writing skills. Four critical" themes for success in the hospitality industry emerged from the executives and alumni: strategic or "big picture" orientation, communication, work and managerial styles, and leadership.
THE CORNELL H.R.A. QUARTERLY
]
False and Misleading Promotional Material: A Word of Caution, by John E.H. Sherry Pages 14-15
How Ritz-Carlton Uses "TQM," by Charles G. Partlow
Pages 16-24 American Concierges Set Service Standards, by Glenn Withiam
Pages 25-29 China's Tourism-Service Failure, by Liping A. Cai and Robert H. Woods
Pages 30-39
In several breach-of-contract claims for inaccurate representations made to guests through advertising brochures, the courts have allowed guests to recover relatively large damages from findings of fraud or intentional misrepresentation. The courts have focused attention on representations that overstep permissible limits of selling behavior and looked at the totality of the statements made. If promises fail to live up to guests' reasonable expectations, the courts may find them actionable. A finding of fraud is necessary to permit recovery of punitive damages.
In the fall of 1992, Ritz-Carlton became the first hotel company to win the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award. Ritz-Carlton implemented total quality management (TQM) as a means of winning the award and improving its service. Patrick Mene, corporate director of quality, explains issues concerning application of TQM to the hotel industry and applying for the Baldrige award. Measurement was a difficult hurdle, because the industry does not have service-quality benchmarks. Team building was also a time-consuming effort. Ritz-Carlton is now requiring its vendors also to apply TQM or a similar process. American hotels originally installed concierge service to remain competitive in the 1980s' guest-amenity race. While recession halted the rapid growth in new concierge desks, many hotels have been loath to cut out their concierge service because concierges have proved their value to hotel guests. Indeed, guests expect hotels at a certain quality level to have a concierge. Concierges have professionalized their calling, through their association, Les Clefs d'Or, which now sponsors a certification process. Moreover, the concierge concept has been adopted by such other businesses as department stores and commercial real-estate concerns. When China opened its doors in 1978, it encouraged international tourism. The government strongly encourages all such tourists to travel with guides, whose ability to provide excellent service is key to a successful tour. After an initial burst of foreign travelers in the early 1980s, the growth rate in tourist traffic gradually leveled off through the decade, even before the Tiananmen Square massacre. Government investment in infrastructure and facilities in the mid-'80s failed to reinvigorate foreign tourism. The authors suggest that the failure lies in the erratic service standards found in the nation's tour guides. As support for that notion, the authors explain the government's overall failure to support the guides and maintain their morale.
THE CORNELL H.R.A. QUARTERLY
Club managers, hotel general managers, and accounting managers (hotel controllers) were surveyed to obtain their opinions on business situations with ethical implications. Seven scenarios described a hypothetical manager's reaction to a situation involving ethics. The three groups were asked to indicate the extent to which they agreed or disagreed with the manager's response. Overall there was reasonably good agreement among the three groups regarding the ethical underpinnings of the seven scenarios. This study of seven scenarios suggests there is a reasonable amount of agreement across the three professional management groups as to what constitutes "ethical behavior."
This article is a compilation of excerpts from the manuscript "Inside View of Hilton Hotels" by Robert F. Quain, and recounts stories from his experiences on the management team at the Stevens Hotel, in Chicago. From graft to accolades and from U.S. presidents to Russian dignitaries, Quain illustrates some of the lessons he learned and the challenges he overcame, including dealing with unions, subduing a crime syndicate, eliminating front-office corruption, easing racial tensions, improving purchasing systems, and applying an early form of yield management.
-An evaluation of the internal operations of this country club allowed the company to (1) identify the areas of business on which it should focus, (2) develop solid knowledge of each market's condition and of the competition, (3) reach conclusions about the general conditions of those markets, (4) develop specific pricing policies and procedures to take advantage of those markets, and (5) effectively communicate its new plans to all the appropriate parties. Two key aspects involved pricing the product so that customers didn't shy away from it and identifying procedures, policies, actions, or services that were actually repellingbusiness. In the end, the club gained more and happier players and additional net revenues from wise price increases. Many resort owners view the operation of their amenities as a necessary expense that must be incurred to improve the marketability of the resort's rental program. In fact, a well-designed club-membership program can turn those amenities into a profit center instead of a loss leader. Recreation clubs have been incorporated successfully into several types of resorts, especially golf resorts, whereby club members pay for privileged access to the resort's facilities. A resort club can also be structured as a vacation club, whereby members can stay at the resort a certain number of days or weeks each year. The resort-club concept needs to be tailored to the particular resort and its locale; no single plan can be used for all resorts. Before planning a clubmembership program, a careful analysis of the target market must be made. A program may be easy to implement and market in a residential-resort community, because the resident neighbors represent a readily exploitable market. As an example, the Boca Raton Resort and Club reorganized its club program with promising financial results.
AUGUST1993
Hospitality Professionals' Responses to Ethical Situations, by Raymond S. Schmidgall and James W. Damitio
Pages 40-43
The Old Stevens: Memoirs of Bob Quain, by Robert F. Quain and Michael M. Lefever Pages 44-52
Remarketing: One Club's Response to a Changing Market, by Jeffrey L. Pellissier
Pages 53-58 Enhancing Resort Profitability with Club-Membership Programs, by Michael P. Sire and M. Chase Burritt
Pages 59-62
The Morning Line
.
.
.
.
.
.
Employment Benefits: A Comparison between Academe and Industry, by Raymond S. Schmidgall and Bonnie J. Knutson Pages 64-68 Hospitality Faculty: A Motivational Challenge, by Jerald W. Chesser, Taylor Ellis, and Robert Rothberg
Pages 69-74 Using Multimedia in Hospitality Training, by Kimberley J. Harris and Joseph J. West
Pages 75-82 Producing Global Managers: The Need for a New Academic Paradigm, by Jack J. Clark and Avner Arbel
Pages 83-89 Graduate-Level Education: A Survey of Stakeholders by Cathy A. Enz, Leo M. Renaghan, and A. Neal Geller Pages 90-95
continued
This article compares 19 employment benefits offered to hospitality educators with those offered to food-service professionals. The 19 benefits cluster into three categories: health, income or life-style, and professional, plus a catch-all group. Educational institutions appear to be more generous than their food-service counterparts, but a larger percentage of industry firms pay the entire cost of those benefits than do institutions. When all 19 benefits are examined for the entire sample populations of both educational institutions and food-service firms, the number of those firms and institutions that pay 100 percent of the benefit appears quite equitable. Administrators can motivate hospitality-faculty members as a group through concern for higher-order needs. Consideration of the individual's goals and values is a cornerstone of an effective motivational plan, especially as experience, age, and job security increase. There are stages in the career development of the hospitality-faculty member. Individuals in the new-faculty stage should move to the authority-congruence stage, where they are expert in the knowledge and skill required. The undesirable authority-incongruence stage comprises expert faculty members whose performance has diminished. Such faculty members may either be revitalized or they may function as persons who are ready to exit, that is, who are "on-the-job retired." Computer-based multimedia presentations combine instructional resources to meet the audience's needs and learning level. Studies have shown that multimedia training increases efficiency, and learner motivation, for individuals and groups. Despite the expense, a few hospitality-education programs successfully use interactive technologies to train students in sanitation, front-desk operations, and marketing strategy relating to travel and tourism. The most successful training programs combine multimedia training with peer-group sessions, questionand-answer time with a supervisor, and textbooks and workbooks that trainees can take home. Always international, the hospitality industry needs managers who consider the long-range impact of their decisions on the global community. Unfortunately, it seems that hospitality schools cannot yet provide the necessary leadership in "going global." To globalize the student body colleges should: accept more international students, develop international studentexchange programs, intensify support for international students, increase scholarship aid, and require foreign-language skills. To globalize their faculty, universities should require more international faculty exchanges and sabbatical leaves, recruit more international faculty members, and increase the use of industry professionals as guest lecturers and executives in residence. To evaluate the school's Master of Professional Studies (M.P.S.) program, the graduate faculty of the Cornell Hotel School surveyed hospitality-industry professionals, M.P.S. alumni, the school's graduate faculty, and incoming graduate students. All groups considered three skills important: leadership, the ability to identify problems, and organizing and writing skills. Four critical" themes for success in the hospitality industry emerged from the executives and alumni: strategic or "big picture" orientation, communication, work and managerial styles, and leadership.
THE CORNELL H.R.A. QUARTERLY