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Table of Contents
Table of Contents.......................................................................................................................1 Table of figures..........................................................................................................................1 QUESTION: ..............................................................................................................................3 1.0 ABSTRACT.........................................................................................................................3 2.0 INTRODUCTION................................................................................................................4 3.0 ORGANISATION PROFILE.............................................................................................5 Figure 1. Lux* Grand Gaube Organisational Chart..................................................................6 High staff turnover and recruitment challenges........................................................................8 Training of staff..........................................................................................................................8 Retention of employees..............................................................................................................8 4.0 SWOT ANALYSIS OF LUX* GRAND GAUBE..............................................................8 5.0 RECRUITMENT AND TURN OVER................................................................................9 Figure 2 Staff Movement .............................................................9 Figure 3 Recruitment Figure 4 Leavers................10 6.0 TRAINING........................................................................................................................11 7.0 RECOMMENDATIONS..................................................................................................13 8.0 CONCLUSION .................................................................................................................14 REFERENCES ........................................................................................................................15 ANNEXED..............................................................................................................................16 Countesy of LUX* Grand Gaube.............................................................................................16

Table of figures
Figure 1. Lux* Grand Gaube Organisational Chart..................................................................6 Figure 2 Staff Movement .............................................................9 Figure 3 Recruitment Figure 4 Leavers................10 Figure 3 Recruitment Figure 4 Leavers................10 Figure 5 Training......................................................................................................................11

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
The authors wishes to acknowledge the continuous support and assistance, at the time of execution of this paper, of his lecturer, Mrs. N.V. Rengasamy Seebaluck through her fruitful and insight lectures. In addition his thanks go to a number of other people namely Mr. Brice Lunot General Manager of Lux* Grand Gaube for granting us the opportunity to undertake this research on Lux* Grand Gaube and all our colleagues for helping us gathering the required information to complete this paper.

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QUESTION:
Identify a tourism or hospitality organization of your choice and conduct an assessment of the key HRM challenges that they face and propose possible recommendations as to how that organization could tackle these challenges. Your recommendations needs to be feasible in the Mauritian context and can also be based on examples driven worldwide.

1.0 ABSTRACT
This paper reviews the literature of managing challenges such as staff turnover and retention, training programs, in Lux* Grand Gaube. It further discusses the issue of motivation, involvement, teamwork, and achievement of quality by staffs at the workplace through staff development and training. This paper will additional discuss the current challenges face by Lux* Grand Gaube followed by recommendations of how to mitigate these challenges or turn them into opportunities. BTHM/10B/PT Human Resource Management for Tourism and Hospitality Industry

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2.0 INTRODUCTION
The tourism and hospitality sector is one of the economic pillars of Mauritius. The government of Mauritius targeted two million touristsarrival by 2015, stated in the Mauritius Sector Strategic Plan (2009-2015). There are some significant Human resources issues such as ability to attract, retain and develop competent and qualified staff in the Hospitality industry in Mauritius. According to analyses by the United Nations World Tourism Organization (WTO, 2003), tourism is one of the largest global export industries (Burns and Holden, 1995). During the latter decades of the twentieth century, tourism developed from a marginal local activity to a global economic giant representing about 6 per cent of the global economy and creating approximately 200 million jobs worldwide. In terms of industry size, these statistics mean that the tourism industry is in the same bracket as agriculture and mining (Weaver and Oppermann, 2000). There are several reasons for this increase in the size of the tourism industry. In a report made upon the request of (AHRIM) Association of Hotels and Restaurant in Mauritius, De Chazal Du Me (DCDM), on August 2004; Study on Demand and Supply Trends in the Tourism Industry, it is stated that direct employment in the tourism sector has evolved significantly over the last 10 years, at an average annual rate of 5.9% (compared to 1% in total employment). Over the same period, the tourism sector share in total employment increased constantly from 3.6% in 1995 to reach 5.4% in 2003. In the last 15 years, while the agriculture and manufacturing sectors have regressed both in terms of their contribution to total employment and the number of people employed, the opposite has been noted for the tourism sector. this shows that employment in the Tourism sector have been one of the major employment sector in Mauritius. Mauritius is over dependant on tourism, following the crisis of the sugar industry reforms and the first fabric export in the textile industry. Government is laying heavy emphasis on the tourism sector as a generator of growth and employment for the coming years. Foreign direct investment of Rs 16 billion is expected for the next 3 years in the various hotels and IRS projects around the island. During the forum of Assises du tourisme held in February 2006, the Prime Minister called for a national effort from all sectors concerned to attain the objective of 2 million tourists by 2015. As mentioned by the Prime Minister during this conference, "Mauritius has the capacity, socially and physically, to receive over two million tourists a year, almost three times the number received in 2005, where this will help to boost the economic growth rate. During the last few years, the Mauritian tourism sector had been stagnant, but growth returned in 2005". Training will be a key element for the optimal development of the tourism industry. Hospitality and Tourism training will play a key role and new strategies will have to be devised to meet this challenge. There are some other significant human resources issues such as ability to attract, retain and develop competent and qualified staff in the Hospitality Industry in Mauritius.

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3.0 ORGANISATION PROFILE

Lux* Grand Gaube is located in the fishing village of Grand Gaube, in north of Mauritius. With its 198 rooms and suites, which all sea viewed rooms and built with a Feng Shui concept and ambiance. This hotel have a stunning view on the northern coast islets with three beaches and a serene lagoon. It comprise four swimming pools, beautiful gardens of coconut trees, filaos and banyans there are a choice of 5 restaurants and 3 bars, 24hrs room service, kids and teen clubs and other services. Lux* Grand Gaube is one of the hotel of Lux* Resorts. Moreover, Lux* Grand Gaube is the most romantic hotel, suggested by Trip Advisor. It is near Grand Baie approximately 10 minutes by car. The hotel has nice view on some islands of the north like Coin de Mire & Lle Plate. There are free Yoga and Tai Chi course as well as free wifi and free international call that clients can make full use of it in the telephone booth near the reception. Below is the operational organizational chart of Lux* Grand Gaube clearly showing the structure of the operational organization and the relationships and relative ranks of its parts and positions.

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Figure 1. Lux* Grand Gaube Organisational Chart BTHM/10B/PT Human Resource Management for Tourism and Hospitality Industry

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General Manager

Resident Manager

Food & Beverage Manager

Front Office & Houskeeping Manager

Maintenance Manager

Executive Chef

Human Resource Manager

Assistant Food & Beverage Manger

Assistant Housekeeper

Assistant Maintenance Manger

Chef de Cuisine

Training Manager

Bar Manager

Floor Supervisor

Maintenance supervisor

Sous chef

Payroll officer

Restaurant Manager

Valet and laundry worker

Maintenace technicians

Chef de Partie

Human Resource officer

Restaurant Supervisor

Trainee

Trainee

Cook

Human Resource officer

Waiter & Bar waiter

Trainee cook

Trainee

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Page |8 The motive why we have chosen this resort is that on the 10th January 2011, the murder of Mrs Michaela Harte who was found dead by her new husband John, they were on honeymoon at the former hotel Legends, now rebranded Lux* Grand Gaube. This issue was brought in almost all newspapers around England, Ireland and almost all online destination newspapers. The Lux* Grand Gaube is undergoing many challenges at present and will continue to face many challenges in the near future. The following are a few challenges that will be discussed further:High staff turnover and recruitment challenges Training of staff Retention of employees In order to analyse the challenges mentioned above, it is wise to conduct a SWOT analysis of Lux* Grand Gaube . A situation analysis is a crucial process i.e. identifying the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats facing Lux* Grand Gaube as illustrated below.

4.0 SWOT ANALYSIS OF LUX* GRAND GAUBE

Strengths:Whether it is the HRM or other management at Lux* Grand Gaube,they have created a situational management system over there. There is a positive environment due to thier dedication, team work, know the importance of training as well as human values that why they offer lots of training to the staffs to reduce labour turnover and increase retention. Weakness:Whether for local or international tourism market, the murder at Lux* Grand Gaube will have a negative impact. Even in futur it will be difficult for the hotel to have tourists mainly from Ireland because the victims was from there. Moreover there will be always a risk of high labour turnover due to the particular matter as it has happen at the first six months of the year. Opportunities:Lux* Grand Gaube is not just among the best romantic hotel but also is wellknown for rest and relaxation, marriage ceremony and guest can enjoy the latest technology designed for massage in the spa. Lux* Grand Gaube is a hotel where new comers do have the opportunity to learn more about the tourism industry through training activities organized by the Human Resource Department. The staffs do have the facilities to persue further studies at other institution like university. Hereby the management are flexible in the working hours and encourage the latter to go ahead in the educational fields. BTHM/10B/PT Human Resource Management for Tourism and Hospitality Industry

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Threats: Lux* Grand Gaube is one of the well known hotel in Mauritius for its Feng Shui concept and ambiance and the good marketing strategy they possess. But unfortunately like other hotels, Lux* Grand Gaube hotel do has internal and external threats such as: Internal threat: The risk of high labour turnover. Wastage may increased due to the unexperience employees in the day to day running of the hotel. Spending too much money on training may result in paying less salary and cutting off other benefits to the staff compared to other hotels or even investing less in other profitable departments. External threats: The Ministry of labour may open an investigation due to the high labour turnover which may create obstacles in the running of the business. Other hotels can take full advantage of the crime incident, to market Lux* Grand Gaube clients. The employees may not be satisfied with their earnigs due to the organization long term debts.

5.0 RECRUITMENT AND TURN OVER

Staff is the appearance of a hotel. People working in the hotel sector form the attitude of the client for a hotel. For this reason, the Human Resource Department give lots of its effort to minimize labour turnover in a hotel. Figure 2 below shows the staff movement through the year for Lux*Grand Gaube Hotel.

Figure 2 Staff Movement

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Figure 4 Leavers Labour turnover is the movement of employees in and out of an organization. However, the term is commonly used to refer only to wastage or the number of employees leaving. Figure 3 is illustrating the number of people being recruited from the first 3 months to the forth last 3 months of the year, whereas figure 4 is showing the number of leavers. As illustrated in figure 2 the total number of employees have decreased from 1313 to 1268 due to leavers were higher than recruitment as shown in figure 3 and figure 4. The reasons behind this are as follows: After having their salary and their end of year bonus, these staffs think they have lots of money and starts partying night and day. The staff may have a better offer like cruise, going abroad to work for the UAE hotels or shifting to another hotel. The factor of demotivation also arises from their colleague, managers or supervisors. Using a bad way of communication like foul language or shouting at them make the employees to leave. Some staffs wait till the end of January for the distribution of tips. No increase in salary is another factor of labour turnover. The right person having not being promoted or awarded have created more leavers. Enough training was not given to the new comers due to lack of time because of high occupancy at the hotel. The murder at Lux* Grand Gaube was another factor affecting labour turnover.

Figure 3 Recruitment

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P a g e | 11 Too much overtime, off days are cancelled and too much pressure. However, as from the third three months till the end of year, figure 2 shows an increase in staff. We need to hire the right people and once we get them in the organization we need to train them we need to empower and motivate them and then reward them and thereafter, I guarantee they will stay. (Ben Henry et al., 2004). Based on Ben Henry et al formula, the human resource have rework the hotel structure resulting an increase in employees for the last 6 months as shown in figure 2 as well as figure 3 shows more recruitment than leavers of figure 4. This is due to the following steps: Offering a better package like increase in salary, paying overtime and offering reward to the one who does not absent for the particular month. Training is given to motivate the staffs and thus resulting in less labour turnover. The employees are being briefed by the human resource telling them about their importance for the running of the organization.

6.0 TRAINING
Training is crucial to the ongoing development of the people organization employ and their retention and success. So, the human resource management is creative to provide diverse opportunities for training for both employee and organization to gain. Below the pie chart shows the training review at Lux Grand Gaube Hotel.

Figure 5 Training Through the above chart it clearly shows how training needs are determined, how training is viewed by employees, and how training is delivered become critically an important issues for an organization. For instance for the first and second three months the chart shows less people was being given training compared to the following months of the year, this is because of several reasons which are: BTHM/10B/PT Human Resource Management for Tourism and Hospitality Industry

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Normally at the start of the year the hotel wait to achieve a certain amount profit so as to plan his expenditure which training also form part of that expenditure list. There was the problem of staff turnover, resulting other management and the HRM was more concern finding solution to that matter rather than any other projects at the hotel. Due to less staff in the first and second three months, these staffs have to look after the day to day operation of the hotel. There was limitation of time because the staffs were working from morning till evening shift hours. There was language barrier because some of the people were having problem in communicating in English or French language. Thus, they were not attending training.

According to May et al. (2004), the attitudinal problem cannot be taken lightly because wrong attitudes are not easy to train away as many practitioners have been discovering. Organisations can put on training courses and employees go back into their establishments with the happy effect of the training programme, but this only lasts for a short while and then what? It is suggested that more scientific and professional approaches to recruitment are needed, in particular for the frontline. Tangential to this issue is that of the likely migration of workers to more favourable markets, leaving a shortage of labour and possibly compromising the consistency of service quality. However, the Human Resource have managed to build that trust in the employee mind, resulting that staffs are happy with training courses and understand the importance in the last six months of the year as illustrated in the pie chart. Language training like English, French, Italian and German language was the priority of the human resource as to make the staffs at ease with language barriers communication to guest. Training like fire fighting, leadership for supervisors, team member building, and achieving superior service training by Ron Kauffman were organized to boost the employees morale and right attitude towards their duty, which also create trust and reduce labour turnover. According to Sharma (2001), training and development means investing in human capital. Training and development help top executive to better articulate their vision, listen, delegate and train managers or supervisors have to lead, how to involve and empower subordinates more. Employees who are at the bottom of the traditional organizational chart have to learn how to listen to customers, keep records and solve problems.

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7.0 RECOMMENDATIONS
Lux* Grand Gaube Hotel can overcome those challenges through the following recommendations : The management should increased focus in job training and customer service strategies, employee incentives such as shift meals, and showing strong leadership in working side by side with employees which can aid in retaining employees. Managers can learn what kind of motivation factors should be provided to employees from many research.For example the study of Dr Kovach during 40 years concluded that good wages ranked the first through the fifth of the ten items motivational factors (Kovach, 1987).Motivations seems to be the single most important determinant of performance ( Lawler,1973),Jaruphongsa (1998) reviewed Motta (1995) that job performance is the result of motivation and ability. Ensure that the incentives are reviewed regularly so that they remain fresh. Ensure incentives are performance based and the staff are briefed on targets and regularly updated. The bond between management and employees must rest on absolute trust and confidentiality. Management must focus entirely on their employees interests and development. This is the only way that employess can feel safe enough to open themselves to real learning. Questionnaires to be filled in by the working people to gauge what they think about working with the hotel. They will bring up issues that need immediate attention and management should be prepared to address them so that things don't go out of hand. The vision and values of Lux* Grand Gaube Hotel do not need to be formal. But it is important that each and every employee knows where the organisation and the business are going: What's important about the way business is done? What are the organisation's 'guiding principles'?

Values should be clear and everyone in the organisation should know what these values are. Management should discover the values of prospective key employees by finding out:

Whats important to them? Do they fit in with what the company wants? Does the organisational culture allow them to thrive? As career development is on every employees mind. The management must offer advice and help on the employees' career development, highlighting how this job will

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P a g e | 14 cater to that need. This will let the employees know that the management is interested in investing time and money in them provided they stick to their job. Lux* Grand Gaube Hotel must apply mostly all those recommendations so as to reduce high rate of turnover and retain the work force.Each step must be examined so as to be successful in achieving low turnover and gain employee loyalty.

8.0 CONCLUSION
There is a saying that one unhappy client will tell 10 friends. Today, with the globalisation of internet and communication , that number could be in the hundreds or thousands. As the economy, technology and guest expectations change, staff must adopt to it. Many consumers now use online travel sites that include reviews by past guest. One wrong word by a dissatisfied customer can make the difference between an organization and its competitors. A positive guest experience is more tha a necessity. Hotels must keep employees in top performance by three or four yearly team-building exercises. Training is not something static that is done the first day and forgotten later. Hotels must be ready to provide training from the start till the end of the year which is a way to reduce labour turnover and motivate the staffs. Communication skill is an important tool in todays life and it should be taken into consideration by the Human resource to provide this training as a must to the employees. So, the human resource management must be creative to provide diverse opportunities for training, reduces labour turnover and gain employee loyalty as success capability rely on the employees performance. According to Qu. et al.(2000), several writers have emphasized the benefits of quality in the form of increased: customer loyalty; customer satisfaction; productivity; profitability and cost saving, together with improvements in the management of human resources. In this above statement, to be competitive the Hotel management must provide the adequate training courses, this will to enhance work efficiency and effectiveness thus increase productivity, profitability and cost saving and on the other side increase custumer satisfaction. The Hotel management must also create the promotion opportunity for employees who are devoted to their work with long track service within the company instead of employing expatriate with the same working experience. Employees should be an asset for the hotel. The new sources of sustainable competitive advantage in the new economy have the people at the center-creativity and talent, their aspirations and hopes, their dreams and excitement. The companies that flourish in this decade will do so because they are able to provide meaning and purpose, a context and frame that encourage individual potential to flourish and grow. Thus human resources management has an important and essential role to play in organizations in the new economy. To fulfill this role, organizations will needs to evaluate their existing human resources functions and adapt them to suit the needs of the new economy and individuals working in organizations in the new economy.

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REFERENCES
AHRIM. (2008), Human Resources in Hotels Brainstorming Report, Maingard & Associates Costa J. (2004), The Portuguese Tourism Sector: Key Challenges for Human Resources Management; International Journal of Hospitality Management, Vol 16; No. 7. Pp.402 407 Draft report August (2004), Study on Demand and Supply Trends in the Tourism Industry; De Chazal Du Me Chatered Accountant. Paul A Whitelaw et al.( 2009) Training needs for the hospitality industry . May Hinds, Yvette Browne, Ben Henry, Chandana Jayawardena, Wismore Butcher, (2004) "Current human resource challenges in the Caribbean hospitality industry", International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, Vol. 16 Iss: 7, pp.415 418 Monica Draayer, Mark Julien (2010). Grapeview wines. International Journal of Wine Business Research Vol. 22 No. 2, 2010 pp. 133-147 Emerald Group Publishing Limited Ministry of Tourism and Leisure, Government of Mauritius. (2009). Mauritius Sector Strategy Plan on Tourism (2009-2015) and its related programme budgeting. June. WTO (2003), World Tourism Organization, available at: www.world-tourism.org, . Kovach, K (1987).What motivates employees? Workers and Supervisors give different answers.Business Horizons.pp.58-65

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ANNEXED Countesy of LUX* Grand Gaube 2011 Mar Apr May Jun Jul
393 50 443 3 446 404 25 429 3 432 395 24 419 2 421 404 8 412 3 415 412 8 420 12 432

Staff Movement
HEADCOUNT Permanent Staff: Casual Staff: TOTAL (Permanent + Casual) NAS trainees: TOTAL HEADCOUNT RECRUITS: Permanent Staff: Casual Staff: NAS trainees: LEAVERS: Permanent Staff: Casual Staff: NAS trainees:

Jan
403 26 429 4 433

Feb
399 32 431 3 434

Aug Sep
425 10 435 11 446 430 9 439 13 452

Oct
424 9 433 10 443

Nov
425 25 450 12 462

Dec
421 20 441 12 453

12 4 0

7 10 0

17

14

13 4

10 0

18 0 12

24 2 1

12 0 0

6 0 0

12 16 0

5 4 0

16 12 2

11 4 0

12 2

30

24 5 1

6 2 0

15 0 3

15 0 1

5 0 0

3 0 1

10 0 0

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P a g e | 17 TRAINING REVIEW
Total number of Team Members trained during the month Total number of hours of training delivered during the month Total number of training hours to date Average number of training hours per team member trained during the month Average number of training hours per total number of team member of the hotel during the month

23

26

17

24

25

128

272

411

75

198

155

11. 5

293. 5

10

11. 5

12

23

46

26

18

92

22

0.5

11.3

0.59

0.5

0.5

0.1 7

0.1 7

0.6

0.2 4

0.4 6

0.14 2

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