Analysis of hospitality industry: Kedar Country Lodge
Kedar Country Lodge
It is a four star lodge with 85 employees, its divided into different department namely Food and Beverage, Front Office, Kitchen, Housekeeping, Maintenance, Garden, Sales, Human Resources, Administration and IT. The property is 640 hectors with antelopes animals, it has Paul Kruger Museum, 65 rooms, 7 conference rooms, Restaurant and Bar. Most of their guests come to do conferencing and as well leisure.
Task 1 Staff Organization
At Kedar Country Lodge they are using Hierarchical structure, where by each department has a leader whom the junior staff report to and then they report to the operations manager then he reports straight to the general manager.
The Roles and Responsibilities of a supervisor
The supervisor at Kedar is second eye for a manager, he/she deals with staff directly. Their roles and responsibilities are as follows:
To check day to day operations
To guide and train staff
To be present all the times if there’s service
To attend to the guest’s complains
To make sure company standards and procedures are being followed
To solve conflict among staff
To motivate staff
To make sure that staff complete their jobs before they go home
To make sure that staff are safe in their working areas
The Roles and Responsibilities of a Manager
She is the one who is in charge for everything going on at Kedar property and makes finally decisions, the roles and responsibilities are as follows:
To do plans to get business
To decide the salaries of staff
To make a finally decisions on hiring
To make sure the target and goals are being reached
To maintain good communication among staff
Planning Staff Rota
The staff rota is being done by supervisors and double checked by the manager whether it’s correct. They do it according to business occupancy and there’s no favoritism. On staff rota there are only four different shifts firstly from 06:00 -15:00, secondly from 08:00 – 17:00, thirdly from 14:00 – 23:00 and lastly from 23:00 – 08:00. Staff rota helps them a lot to see who in and who off.
They are using excel to do the staff rota, on a first column they put the staff names and followed by how many days offs did the company give you, on first raw they put the number of guests in-house followed by the dates and days, at the end there’s a column of days off being owed to staff or days being owed to the company by staff. They save staff rota in computers to keep their records or for later changes. Staff is allowed to request certain days offs if they do have some appointments but it will depend how busy it will be that day. When staff rota is done it will be taken to the relevant department and put them on notice board so that everyone can see it.
The Purpose and Features of Contract of Employment
Contract of employment is an agreement between the employees and the kedar owner, it is presented in a form paper with 5 pages and if they are hiring the employee has to sign as well as the employer. It also contains the code of conducts. At kedar the employees are working during the holidays but in return they will be paid each holiday worked.
Purpose of a Contract – to define both employees and kedar owner’s responsibilities with respect to a desired development outcome to the level of detail necessary to make both comfortable with respect to the relationship and to specify rights, obligations and conditions of employment
Features of Contract of Employment
The job title and description
Which department will employee be working with
Company residential address, post address and phone numbers
To whom the employee will be reporting to
When the employee will start working
For how long is the employee on probation
The entitlements of employee (salary, leave, days off)
The rules regarding sick leave, family responsibility leave and unpaid leave
Which shifts will the employee be working
Financial and Legal Implications of Different Types of Contract
They are using the permanent or fixed term employees and casual employees.
The permanent employees – these are the employees which the company has agreed to keep them forever as long they are still willing to work for the company. They do give them the permanent contract if they have passed the fixed or probation contract for three months and if the company is happy with their performances. Their permanent staff they are entitled to:
Holiday offs – their employees are entitled to it and its either they are off or they will be paid double for each holiday worked for.
Annual leave – they give their employees 21days leave after 12 months and they will be fully paid.
Study leave – they grant them to employees who are doing part time studies when they are writing their exams. The company will give the employee the day off during the day he/she is writing and pay them full.
Compassionate leave – they give them three days off per 12 months and pay them full salary. The compassionate leave applies when the employee has to deal with emergency involving someone who depends on him/her e.g. child, husband or wife.
Sick leave – They are entitled 12 days off sick in a year, if the employee exceeds then they will subtract the days from annual leave and give them full pay. If it may happen that they have taken the entire annual leave they then notify the employee to take an unpaid leave and they won’t pay any salary to the employee.
Time off – they are entitled to off 6 days a month of which they work five and half days and get off. They will be paid full salary.
Worker’s Compensation – If an employee gets injury at work the company will pay hospital bills and pay the employee the employee full salary during those days not at work.
Casual employees – At kedar they use casual employees when it’s too busy and they pay them an hour rate. They are only entitled to worker’s compensation when they can get injured whilst working. If they use them during holiday they pay them double the amount they are being paid.
The Cost of Employing Staff
At kedar there is few cost of employing staff which are:
Time and cost to do advertising about available position
Selecting and interviewing applicants
Type of job and number applicants
To increase the space to accommodate new employees
To buy new equipment for them to use
To pay them their salaries
To feed them
To pay transport for them
To train them so that they can be more skillful and to gain job knowledge
The cost for their entitlements, .e.g. sick leave, worker’s compensation, public holidays
Motivation
It is to make someone believe in himself/herself and like what he/she doing.
The Link between Motivation and Productivity
They motivate their staff to have good productivity. They always do have competition like the employee of the month and the employee of the year, they give prize to the winner, by doing this each employee works harder in order to be a winner and on the other hand there is a good productivity and a lot of job done. There are also the prizes of name of the employee being mentioned most by guests, this makes the employees to get involved with guests or to help them more at the end the guests will be happy for good service and they will spread the word to others by doing so a lot of guests will love the place and visit more often and company gain more profits.
The Characteristics of Effective leader
They do have good leaders who are leading the company, they treat their staff like their children and they are fair, honest, responsible, trustworthy, strong, competitive and confident. They are good motivators to their employees, they are always active in planning ahead and solving any problems amongst the employees. They are good communicators, listeners and also supportive. They do train and grow them to be good leaders as well. They are mentors of their employees and they make the company to be their second home and everyone is happy. They don’t feel bored and they are patience.
An Effective Team
The way Kedar employees are you may think they are brothers and sisters, they are one and they can die for one another because of the good unit they have, the following are the characteristics which makes them a good team:
They sacrifice for each other
They have got clear common goals
They are united
They always rotate the leadership among themselves
Honest to each other
If they do have problems or conflicts they solve them in a civilized manner
They share same stories
They don’t judge or discriminate each other
They discuss or argue about work but at the end they will come to conclusion of which its normal
They all cooperate
They are free to each other
The Principles of equal Opportunities in the Workplace
They treat their staff fair and equal regardless of where are they coming from, gender, race, age, color, physical abilities, status, language and religion.
Equal Opportunities in Employment
They respect and recognize staff’s and customer’s religion and culture
The employees are happy at the workplace all times
The more skillful employees are promoted
They are fairly treated at work
Whatever decision is being made by management it is fair to all employees
They train their employees to be better so that they can deliver good service to customers
No employee is being bullied, harassed and discriminated, they are all free
Diversity
They do understand each other and they have put their differences aside, in a safe, positive and nurturing environment. Their employees are mixed; they do have foreigners, locals, mixed races (whites, blacks, Chinese and Indians), different genders (males, females, gays and lesbians) and different ages. They are one family. They do business with more different countries and all their customers they feel welcome as if they are in their countries or home because of friendly and respectful employees.
Diversity makes their company more attractive, their employees are growing and it helps with alternatives solutions when dealing with issue or ideas to grow business. It also motivates the employees. Since they have more different tribes it helps their business grow.
Purpose of an Industry Code of Ethics
A code of ethics is a vital document for Kedar, as breaches of ethics can land the company in serious trouble with consumers, other organizations or government authorities. Creating a code of ethics makes decision-making easier at all levels for them by reducing uncertainty and considerations of individual perspectives in ethical standards. It is truly a unified effort in which Kedar works to ensure there is no compromise in service, quality, or integrity
Purpose
A code of ethics guides all managerial decisions, creating a common framework upon which all decisions are founded. This helps them to create a cohesive understanding of the boundaries within an organization and the standards set for interacting with external companies. A formal, well-communicated code of ethics helps them to protect their company’s reputation and legal standing in the event of a breach of ethics by an individual employee.
Importance of Ethics
Public image
Productivity and Teamwork
Asset protection
Retain good skillful employees
Industry Code of Practice
Industry code of practice its rules or guidelines to be followed, they are there to protect their customers and Kedar owners. It makes it clear to public or customers what they are allowed to do and what is prohibited. These rules or guidelines are made by the owners to let the customers know how they run their business some by government protecting locals or internationals.
Need for industry code of practice
To deliver a certain standard of practice
To encourage consumers confidence in a particular industry
To avoid customers or owners taking advantage
Use of IT in Tourism and Hospitality
IT stands for information technology, it is the application of computers and telecommunications equipment to store, retrieves, transmits and control data, it can be people who are well trained working with those technologies. Kedar they do have their own permanently hired IT that are responsible for programming the systems, repairing and to assist with technical related issues.
Importance of IT in Hospitality Industry
To store their important information and history of previous customers
To communicate with customers via email
To market their lodge through website
To use it for checking in and checking out of the guest
To do bookings online
To do function sheets
To do staff roasters
To capture and keep records of stocks
To print necessary documents
To show the prices and customers still to pay
To show the forecast and occupancy
For guest to access internet
The following are the IT applications used from Kedar:
Computer systems – to do various different jobs, .e.g. doing emails, writing their menus etc
Aloha system – they use it to show prices of different food, beverage and to show them what has been sold when doing their stocks.(Product mix)
Reservation system – they are using room master to check in and check out their customers, it also makes it easier to check the availability and it shows how many guests are arriving, departing and staying so that the kitchen can know how many to carter for and housekeeping to know which rooms to prepare and how.
Internet – for guest to access or to do money transfer. They have made easier for their customers by having Wi-Fi.
Mobiles – managers contact the customers using mobile
Business Letters
At Kedar they write their business letters using word program from Microsoft office 2003 of which they purchased it from Microsoft company to owner it and they installed into their computers. Their business letters are straight forward. In the letter it contains contact details on the top left and underneath contains the initials of the owners. The general manager is the one who gives the finally decision, she firstly check it.
The following are some types of letters being written at Kedar:
Apologizing letters
Welcoming letters guest on their arrivals
Welcome back letters for guests who are coming for the second or third time at Kedar
Confirmation letter for booking
Quotation letters
Anniversary letters if the guests have told them prior to arrival
Birthday letters if the guests have informed them
Spread sheet
A spreadsheet is a paper sheet that shows data in rows and columns, it is mostly used by accounts doing variances to show how company does, sales department use it to show how are they doing with bringing in the clients and to show forecast, kitchen using it to keep the records of their menus and to do their menus of the week and stock controller for capturing, displaying and controlling data. They use it mostly when doing their stocks takes. The software that has this is Microsoft offices excel.
Benefits of using spreadsheet
It does have formulas to calculate
You can keep as many as you can the data on spreadsheet as long you save it
You can do the changes and save your work
It allows you to put yours inputs indifferent colors
It does have futures that allow you to control data on how you want to put it.
The Use of PowerPoint and Access Database
PowerPoint – it is mostly used by sales and marketing doing presentation to their clients, managers or human resources doing training with employees and the managers presenting what are they planning about the company to the Director, CEO and Chairman.
Access Database – they use it to store contacts of clients,
Email is another way of communicating; it is done through electronic exchanging messages through the use of internet and networks.
The use of Email in Hospitality Industry
It is cheaper than using telephone, e.g.it will be to cost full using a phone for internationals than just sending an email
It can be used as a means of marketing by sending them the information booklets and special about your hotel or lodge
It is fast and efficiency
Limitation of Email
They must be careful when using humour – it is often misunderstood
Avoid sarcasm and colloquialisms
It’s not safe or private wrong people can hack
It may happen that the receiver may not have seen the email and it was urgent
Internet
Internet is a worldwide system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard internet protocol suite to link several billion devices worldwide, it carries an extensive range of information resources and services and it consists a lot of private, public, business and government packet switched networks. Internet makes it easier for marketing and doing online bookings. If there was no internet it was going to be difficult for Kedar. Internet makes it easier for them to work.
