Human resources management in the hospitality industry: a case study of the Northern Portugal
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abstract
The concept of Human Resource Management is the most effective and productive
approach to managing organisation’s key assets, its people. It is also vital to the
comprehension of human behaviour complexity.
The aim of this study is to discuss how human resources play a major role in hospitality
industry and, given the working conditions, also explain how important Human
Resource Management practices can be. The study focus on the region of Oporto and
the Northern Portugal, in an survey where the general managers of all hotels of that area
responded to a questionnaire. Significant results were obtained in five major topics:
organization and strategy; recruitment and staffing; training and development;
performance; reward and recognition.
The conclusions reached suggest that hospitality industries have a long way to go in
implementing the right human resources practices. Major findings indicate that there is
room for improvement in what concerns considering “People” a strategic issue in the
long-range planning process. Besides hospitality managers don’t seem to know how to
answer questions about the future, specially in what concerns the best strategies for
human resources retention.
