The Hospitality Culture Scale: A measure ...

International Journal of Hospitality Management 30 (2011) 290–300

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International Journal of Hospitality Management journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijhosman

The Hospitality Culture Scale: A measure organizational culture and personal attributes Mary Dawson ∗ , JeAnna Abbott 1 , Stowe Shoemaker 2 Conrad N. Hilton College, University of Houston, 229 C. N. Hilton Hotel & College, Houston, TX 77204-3028, United States

a r t i c l e

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Keywords: Hospitality culture Organizational culture Personal attributes Selection tool

a b s t r a c t The hospitality industry has a unique and specific culture when compared to other industries. Because of this, not everyone will want to make this industry a career, as evidenced by the high turnover. Yet, the hospitality industry needs to attract and keep motivated and dedicated employees. This study set out to discover attributes that are unique to hospitality organizations as well as the characteristics and values of a person who would be successful in a work environment that exhibited this culture. This includes determining if a person is a match to the culture of the hospitality industry. In order to identify the variables of hospitality culture, an extensive review of the literature and a panel of industry experts were consulted. The items identified from both groups were used to establish the constructs for a scale, which is called the Hospitality Culture Scale. Seven hundred and forty one hospitality professionals rated the attributes. Principal component analysis determined the final factors for the organizational culture and personal attributes. These constructs included: management principles, customer relationships, job variety, job satisfaction, principles, propitiousness, leadership, risk taker, accuracy, and composure. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

1. Introduction The hospitality industry has a unique and specific culture that can be generalized to multiple organizations that provide accommodations, lodging, and/or foodservices for people when they are away from their homes (Woods, 1989). The components of the hospitality product include not only the physical product, but the service delivery, service environment, and the service product (Rust and Oliver, 1993). This industry is different than any other because of the intangible hospitality product that the personnel are delivering. Unlike most service industries, it is the manner in which the hospitality employee provides the service – as opposed to the service itself – which is critical to the customer’s overall enjoyment of the product or “experience” being purchased. Accordingly, the relationship between front-line hospitality employees and the customer greatly influences customer satisfaction and loyalty. As such, attracting and retaining workers who are able to provide exceptional customer service should be a high priority for any hospitality organization. At the same time, the hospitality industry is often characterized by notoriously poor wages, low job security, long

∗ Corresponding author. Tel.: +1 713 743 2441. E-mail addresses: [email protected] (M. Dawson), [email protected] (J. Abbott), [email protected] (S. Shoemaker). 1 Tel.: +1 713 743 2413. 2 Tel.: +1 713 743 7371. 0278-4319/$ – see front matter. Published by Elsevier Ltd. doi:10.1016/j.ijhm.2010.10.002

working hours, limited opportunities for personal development, and seasonality (Deery and Shaw, 1999; Baum, 2008). Not only is it unlikely that these job attributes will attract the most qualified candidates for exceptional customer service, but they greatly contribute to the industry’s high turnover rate. Yet, hospitality organizations are given the challenge of finding and hiring personnel who hold similar values, and are able to both manage people and the service process under difficult circumstances. Organizations routinely engage in activities to identify and select individuals who are likely to share their cultural values (Schneider, 1987; Lee-Ross and Pryce, 2010). These individuals are hypothesized to share common backgrounds, characteristics, and orientations. By relying on both established recruiting sources (e.g., search firm and/or specific universities for college recruiting) and established screening selection techniques (e.g., specific tests and minimum cut-off scores), organizations are able to narrow the range of characteristics chosen applicants are likely to possess (Bretz et al., 1989). Researchers have made theoretical and methodological advances in understanding the development of cultural values in non-hospitality organizations (Judge and Cable, 1997; Sheridan, 1992). However, little research has investigated what attributes produce a measurably distinctive hospitality industry culture (Dawson and Abbott, 2011). Even fewer studies have examined whether a person is a match to this culture or not. A person’s match is important because as Gordon (1991) argues, the organizational culture is strongly influenced by the characteristics

M. Dawson et al. / International Journal of Hospitality Management 30 (2011) 290–300

(shared meanings) of the industry in which the company operates. He believes that within industries, certain cultural characteristics will be widespread among organizations, and these most likely will be quite different from the characteristics found in other industries. The purpose of this study was to create a scale of hospitality culture by establishing the organizational culture and personal attributes (characteristics and values) of those employed in the hospitality industry. A quantitative instrument was developed and validated in order to measure this. We call this instrument, The Hospitality Culture Scale (HCS). It is intended to measure a person’s understanding of the culture of hospitality organizations and to determine if a particular individual’s values are in-line with those currently working in the industry.

2. Literature review 2.1. The concept of organizational culture Although organizational culture has emerged as one of the dominant themes in management studies for the past 25 years (Gregory et al., 2009; Gordon, 1991; Judge and Cable, 1997; O’Reilly et al., 1991; Schein, 1992, 2004; Schnedier, 1990; Sheridan, 1992), there is still no clear consensus with regard to the definition. Edgar Schein’s abundant research (1985, 1990, 1992, 2004) into the concept of organizational culture is perhaps the most widely cited. Schein (1992) characterizes organizational culture as: “the pattern of basic assumptions that a given group has invented, discovered, or developed in learning to cope with its problems of external adaptation and internal integration, and that have worked well enough to be considered valid, and, therefore, to be taught to new members as the correct way to perceive, think, and feel in relation to other problems” (p. 12). However, many researchers have based their descriptions on the actual principles of culture itself (Crichton et al., 2004; Rashid et al., 2003; Rousseau, 1990; Schein, 1985). These principles range from fundamental assumptions through values and behavioral norms to actual patterns of behavior that form the core identity of people (Rousseau, 1990). A dynamic approach to understanding organizations involves seeing culture as sets of practices in which people engage in order to live their lives, to comprehend their world and to produce and comprehend meaning (Crichton et al., 2004). Organizational culture literature acknowledges the difficulty of measuring and identifying a typology of organizational cultures, mainly, because the shared assumptions and understandings lie beneath the conscious level for individuals (Lund, 2003). Often taken for granted by the members themselves, these assumptions can be identified through stories, special language, norms, institutional ideology, and attitudes that emerge from individual and organizational behavior (Tierney, 1988). The culture of an organization reflects the prevailing ideology that its people carry inside their heads (Cameron and Quinn, 1999). This often happens to the point where they drop out of acute awareness, become unconscious assumptions, and are then taught to new members as a reality and as the correct way to view things (Sathe, 1985). Organization culture conveys a sense of identity to employees, provides unwritten, and often unspoken guidelines for how to get along in the organization (Cameron and Quinn, 1999). Deeply held assumptions often start out historically as values, but as they stand the test of time, gradually come to be taken for granted and then take on the character of assumptions (Schein, 1990). Weiner (1988) explains that values are a type of social cognition that facilitate a person’s adaptation to his or her environment. On the organization side, value systems provide generalized justification both for appropriate behaviors of members and for the

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activities and functions of the system (Enz, 1988). Shared values are relatively stable and interact with a company’s people and organizational structure to produce patterns of behavior (Chatman, 1991). When the members of a social unit share values, an organizational culture or value system can be said to exist (Weiner, 1988). Almost every organization has some core values that are shared across the entire organization (Chatman and Jehn, 1994). Selznick (1957) argued that shared values are essential for organizational survival because they maintain the organization as a bounded unit and provide it with a distinct identity. Characterizing an organization’s culture in terms of its central values requires identifying the range of relevant values and then assessing how much intensity and consensus there is among organizational members about those values (Enz, 1988). Values are fundamental and enduring characteristics of both individuals and organizations (Tepeci and Bartlett, 2002). In an effort to understand the forms and consequences of organizational culture, researchers have explored how the various characteristics of powerful members, such as the organization’s founder (Pettigrew, 1979; Schein, 1985) or groups of members (Schneider, 1987) influence the content and intensity of the consensus that exist about organizational values. “Founders often start with a theory of how to succeed; they have a cultural paradigm in their heads, based on their experience in the culture in which they grew up. In the case of a founding group, the theory and paradigm arise from the way that group reaches consensus on their assumptions about how to view things” (Schein, 1983, p. 14). Pettigrew (1979) characterizes founders as entrepreneurs who communicate the cultural paradigms through their language and style. This paradigm sets the tone for the vision of the company and becomes the ideology throughout the organization. The ideology can impart meaning, demand involvement, motivate the performance of routine tasks, and resolve the concerns of its people. The ultimate organizational culture will always reflect the complex interaction between the assumptions and theories that founders bring to the group initially and what the group learns subsequently from its own experiences (Schein, 1983). Various questionnaire instruments have been developed to measure an organization’s cultural values. Most have been based on prior assumptions regarding the types of values organization members share or the behavioral norms in organizations (Sheridan, 1992). Through interviews, questionnaires, or survey instruments one can study culture’s espoused and documented values, norms, ideologies, and philosophies (Schein, 1990). O’Reilly et al. (1991) proposed a more descriptive approach commonly used to assessing one’s fit to a particular culture or industry, the Organizational Culture Profile (OCP). 2.2. Assessing person–organization fit Previous research on person–organization (P-O) fit concerns the antecedents and consequences of compatibility between people and the organizations in which they work (Kristof, 1996). Fit is considered as the congruence between a diverse collection of applicant and organizational attributes (Judge and Cable, 1997). This involves a correspondence between the norms and values of organizations and the value of persons (Chatman, 1989). Researchers seem to agree that culture may be an important factor in determining how well an individual fits an organizational context (Goodman and Svyantek, 1999; Kilmann et al., 1986; Schein, 1985). Congruency between and individual’s values and those of an organization is at the crux of person–culture fit. P–O fit research has shown that the discrepancy between the actual and ideal organizational culture (i.e. discrepancies between what the organization and the individual values) can influence important organizational criteria (Chatman, 1991). “One way to assess culture quantitatively

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is to focus on the central values that may be important to an individual’s self-concept or identity as well as relevant to an organization’s central value system” (O’Reilly et al., 1991, p. 493). The Organizational Culture Profile (OCP), developed by O’Reilly et al. (1991), contains a set of value statements that can be used to assess both the extent to which certain values characterize a target organization and an individual’s preference for that particular configuration of values. The value statements stemmed from an extensive review of research on organizational values and culture. This comprehensive set of value statements could be used to characterize both individuals and the organization. Key informants, in this case from accounting firms, were asked to sort these items in terms of how characteristic each was of their organization’s culture. Another group was asked to sort the value statements in terms of, “How important is it for these characteristics to be a part of the organization you work for?” Person–culture fit was calculated by correlating the profile of organizational values with the profile of the individual’s preferences. Most of the studies on organizational culture have used the OCP (O’Reilly et al., 1991) to measure person–culture fit through a profile comparison process and then compared (1) job choice decisions by applicants (Cable and Judge, 1996); (2) organizational attraction of applicants (Judge and Cable, 1997); (3) selection decisions make by recruitment personnel (Cable and Judge, 1997); work values of applicants (Judge and Bretz, 1992); and (4) employee job satisfaction, job tenure, and career success (Bretz and Judge, 1994). These studies of have used normative measures of personality to assess individual characteristics and relatively broad classifications of tasks, occupations, or jobs to characterize situations. By placing these into classifications, people can be described with one language, or a set of characteristics based upon different organizations (O’Reilly et al., 1991). 2.3. Personal attributes To examine the cultural make-up of the hospitality industry, it is important to identify the attributes, meaning values and characteristics, of the managers. Several attempts have been made to identify common attributes directly related to the success of hospitality managers. In their textbook, Hospitality & Tourism Careers, Riegel and Dallas (1998) believe that managers need a different set of skills and qualities if they are to be effective in the roles. This involves personal attributes as well as attainable skills such as problem solving, decision making, communication, flexibility, leadership, and entrepreneurship. Personal qualities include a tolerance for other’s mistakes, ethical, fairness in both decisions and actions, a desire to serve others, consistency, and predictability. Worsfold (1989) examined the attributes of hotel managers and managers in other industries. The findings recognized hospitality managers to be more assertive, more venturesome, more competitive, tougher minded, and more independent. It was also shown that hospitality managers experience lower levels of anxiety. While examining a similar topic, Ladkin (1999) found that typical perceptions of a hotel general manager include: people who work long hours, have a high degree of mobility, are highly sociable, and are committed to their jobs and to the hotel industry. Swanljung (1981) identified that the hotel executives have to be determined, hard working, fair, and able to motivate others. Mullins and Davies (1991) found that hotel general managers are more assertive, stubborn, cheerful, competitive, active, independent, cynical, calm, socially bold and spontaneous, harder to fool, and more concerned with self. The currently published literature concerning the attributes of hotel managers has common aims insofar as the research focuses on whether there are particular traits that set hotel managers apart from other professions and whether these specific traits result in career success (Ladkin, 1999). Once

these traits are identified, an instrument can be developed to test the match between potential employees and the industry. 2.4. Attempts to define hospitality culture While examining industry culture and the effects of industry characteristics on organizations, Chatman and Jehn (1994) found even more generalizations can be made among firms working on the same tasks, using similar procedures, and experiencing similar opportunities to grow than occurs across industries. There may be only minor variations within-industry regarding organizational culture values because firms apply similar standards and similar environmental constraints shape the range of corporate strategies (Sheridan, 1992). To that end, it is imperative to identify and quantify the attributes that make up hospitality industry culture and the people who manage it. Previous research intended to discover the uniqueness of hospitality culture has been very limited. Studies to date have mainly attempted to discover the organizational culture of either restaurants (Ogaard et al., 2005; Woods, 1989) or hotels (Kemp and Dwyer, 2001). These studies have included discovering hospitality culture largely through qualitative methods. Woods (1989) examined the culture of five restaurant companies and laid the foundation of restaurant culture artifacts, norms, rites, rituals, strategic beliefs, and values. Restaurant culture includes characteristics such as high levels of turnover, teamwork, emphasis on the unit level, promotion from within, importance of fun, and burn-out. Kemp and Dwyer (2001) examined the organizational culture of the Regent Hotel, Sydney employing a similar method. The Regent Hotel has a culture which includes being nice to new staff members; exceeding guest expectations; rewarding innovation; putting the guest’s needs first; providing good service and high quality; and being dubbed as “The Smile Factory.” Although both studies identify values that are specific either to the restaurant or hotel industry, it is unknown if these attributes are generalized to the rest of the hospitality industry. Additionally these studies do not offer an instrument to measure one’s fit or match to the industry. Other studies have made progress towards developing quantitative methods to specifically measure the cultural values for the hospitality sector. Ogaard et al. (2005) employed an existing instrument, by Quinn and Spreitzer (1991), to measure the cultural values of a national Norwegian fast food multi-unit franchise system. Their study found that there is a relationship between organizational culture and managers’ individual outcomes. This relationship occurred between commitment and efficacy. The study also suggests that culture may have an important indirect effect on performance. Although these findings demonstrate the need to examine cultural values, it does not offer a specific measurement that is tailored to the hospitality industry. Currently, Tepeci and Bartlett’s (2002) Hospitality Industry Culture Profile (HICP) is the only developed instrument which assesses organizational culture and individual values in hospitality organizations. Their instrument incorporates the Organization Culture Profile and Robert Wood’s (1989) value characteristics as well as the additional dimension of valuing customers, honesty and ethics. The instrument was then used to measure the fit between organizational culture and individual values on hospitality employee’s job satisfaction and behavioral intentions. The main weakness of Tepeci and Bartlett’s (2002) study is that all of the participants for this study were hospitality students who only had an average tenure of 19 months of industry work experience. This sample did not adequately assess the dependent variables of job satisfaction and intent to quit because 64% of these students were not currently employed. Although these studies start to identify hospitality cultures and values of the individuals, none explore the unique constructs of the entire hospitality industry with feedback from all disciplines


that represent the multiple facets of the industry. Instead these studies focus on general themes and non-specific measurements. Our research attempts to address these short falls and the gaps in the previously published literature. Our research further identifies attributes that are unique to the hospitality industry as well as the characteristics of a person who would be successful in a work environment that exhibited this culture. A natural question is why is there another attempt to create a scale to measure organizational culture? The answer is that the definition of hospitality culture must include more facets and stakeholders of the industry rather than the samples used in the previous works, which included only restaurant managers, a small sample of hotel managers, and undergraduate students. It is also necessary to establish identifiers that describe the entire hospitality industry and the attributes of a person who would thrive in a work environment that exhibited this culture. To illustrate why it is important to include the entire industry consider that a person may be hired to work within the rooms divisions of a hotel and then transferred to the food and beverage department. The goal of this study was to develop a scale that can be utilized by all facets of the hospitality industry. The established scale can be a resource for the hospitality industry, as well as future researchers. With this quantitative measure, human resource personnel can use the scale as a recruitment, selection, and training tool in order to match a potential employee with the industry and more importantly their company. Additionally, the scale can be used by educational programs who are selecting students for a career in the industry. The scale was created by examining the multiple perspectives of hospitality culture. This was accomplished by evaluating previous hospitality models and utilizing a sample of respondents who represent various components of the industry. 3. Scale development A considerable amount of research has been devoted to the process of scale development (Clark and Watson, 1995; DeVellis, 2003; Hinkin, 1995). The steps and guidelines for the HCS followed the recommended procedures of scale development that were provided by each of these studies. 3.1. Step 1: identifying hospitality culture A critical first step in the each of the studies on scale development involves specifying the domain of the construct by clearly defining the subject matter. This approach requires an understanding of the phenomenon to be investigated and a thorough review of the literature to develop the theoretical definition of the construct under examination (DeVellis, 2003). In examining hospitality culture, one can examine the uniqueness of the industry into two parts: the words used to describe the industry itself and the words used to identify the people who work within that industry. Virtually every leading firm has developed a distinctive culture that is clearly identifiable by its employees. This culture is sometimes created by the initial founder of the firm (Schein, 1990). In order to identify the cultural dimensions of the hospitality industry, this study examined the various hospitality companies and the literature regarding the attributes of hospitality managers (Fintel, 1989; Ladkin, 1999; Mullins and Davies, 1991; Swanljung, 1981; Withiam, 1996; Woods, 1989; Worsfold, 1989). The culture of hospitality companies was acknowledged by probing the previous works written on the organizations and through the autobiographies of the founders of the organizations. The companies that were specifically examined were Brinker (Brinker and Phillips, 1996), Chick-fil-A (Cathy, 2002), Club Corp International, Inc. (Dedman, 1999), Disney (Budd and Kirsch, 2005), Harrah’s Entertainment

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Table 1 Demographic characteristics of hospitality industry employee sample. Sample (n = 741) Gender Female Male Age Under 18 18–25 26–39 40–60 60+ Age Mean Median Education High school Some college College diploma Some graduate Graduate level diploma Undergraduate degree Hospitality Business Liberal arts All other (non-specific) Graduate degree Hospitality Business Liberal arts All other (non-specific) Ethnicity Caucasian African American Asian Hispanic Native American Other Segment of the hospitality industry Hotels Restaurants Casinos Country/business clubs Catering/events Support to the industry Other in industry (non-specific) Not in industry Retired Years in the hospitality industry Less than 5 years 5–10 years 10–15 years 15–20 years 20 or more a b

42% 58% .1% 5.8% 36.3% 50.7% 7% 43.4 43.0 2.6% 17.3% 47.1% 7.6% 25.5% n = 324a 40.1% 41.% 16.% 2.8% n = 168b 51.2% 29.2 13.1 1.5 81.9% 3.9% 5.3% 6.2% .1% 2.6% 49% 10.9% 8.8% 15.5% 3.1% 8.5% 4.2% Excluded Excluded 12.8% 16.6% 18.5% 14.4% 37.7%

Number of participants who have a college degree. Number of participant who have a graduate degree.

(Becker, 2003), Marriott (Marriott and Brown, 1997), and Ritz Carlton (Kent, 1990). 3.2. Step 2: analyzing the item pool At this point it was important to determine those items that should be eliminated or retained in the item pool in order to reduce a more manageable subset for the scale. “Experts can review your item pool and confirm or invalidate your definition of the phenomenon, as well as, determining relevance to the domain of interest” (DeVellis, 2003, p. 32). This stage is most critical in order to create a theoretically based measure of a target construct, so that the goal is to measure one thing, and only this thing, as precisely as possible (Clark and Watson, 1995). The goal of reviewing the item pool is for the sample of experts to help establish a set of identifiers that define the culture of the hospitality. To do this, experts from the industry were asked to review

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Table 2 Factor analysis scores for the organizational culture. Factors and items Factor I: management principles Employee focused Support, empowers, rewards Treat other as I wish to be treated Employee retention Reinforce company culture Training Mistakes as opportunities to learn Enjoys handling unusual challenges Entrepreneurial spirit Cultural diversity Do more than is required Opportunities to relocate Factor II: customer relationships Helping guests celebrate milestones Creating memories for guests Creating a home away from home Develop relationships with customers High percentage of repeat guests To be “of service” a noble profession Factor III: job variety Every day is different Job is challenging Factor IV: job satisfaction High turnover Burn-out Total variance explained = 57.30

Item loadings

Eigenvalues

Variance explained (%)

Scale alpha

Mean for factor

8.26

37.54

.899

5.33

1.78

8.07

.854

5.89

1.52

6.93

.658

6.22

1.05

4.76

.536

3.86

.815 .793 .746 .735 .722 .711 .675 .660 .619 .566 .500 .412 .786 .733 .719 .712 .691 .583 .825 .802 .770 .761

Notes: Principal component analysis Keiser–Meyer–Olkin measure of sampling adequacy = 0.937; Bartlett’s test for sphericity: p = .000 (2 = 5146.46, df = 231). Overall mean for the organizational factors = 5.23.

an initial list of items. They were instructed to review the items to ensure that they were clear, that the list of items was complete, and that all items accurately represented the hospitality culture. The experts were asked to reword unclear items, look for redundancy in characteristics, omit items that were irrelevant or difficult to understand, and develop new items reflecting characteristics of the hospitality culture that were not included. This review was accomplished by contacting the Industry Advisory Board for the Dean of the Conrad N. Hilton College of Hotel and Restaurant Management at the University of Houston. The board consists of 20 hospitality industry members who represent various segments of the hospitality industry. Specifically, these members are presidents, chief executive officers, vice presidents, and owners of major hotels, foodservice operations, casinos, and hospitality consulting companies. In their roles as the leaders, and in many cases the founders of the particular hospitality organizations that they represent, these individuals set the tone with their own views of how things should be, and if they are powerful enough, they will continue to have a dominant effect on the culture of their organizations (Schein, 1990). An email was sent to each board member inviting them to participate in this study. A list of the items to be reviewed was attached to the email. The email was then returned directly to the researcher. Twelve of the twenty board members replied to the email. Based upon the feedback from the advisory board, a final list of cultural identifiers was used to develop the next survey instrument. 3.3. Step 3: construct development Once a final list of cultural identifiers emerged, an on-line survey instrument was developed. It should be noted that Chatman’s (1989) person–organization fit model was not an appropriate measure for the scale analysis because the attributes did not transcend into clear organizational and individual values. Rather, the cultural identifiers were clearly delineated into two parts. The first part included statements that are commonly used to describe the culture of hospitality organizations. This first section was divided into

four sections: (1) the organization itself, (2) the role of the person completing the instrument, (3) attitudes about other employees, and (4) attitudes about customers. The second part of the survey presented attributes used to describe individuals within hospitality organizations. For each set of identifiers, the second group of experts was asked to rate how the following characteristics described their organization and rate how the characteristics described themselves. A seven point Likert scale ranging from (1) least characteristic to (7) most characteristic was used. The questions were randomized each time someone logged on to the survey in order to remove order bias. Once the survey instrument was developed, employees currently working in all aspects of the hospitality industry were sent a link to the questionnaire. These employees were derived from two sources. The first pool came from approximately 40 companies that represent many facets of the hospitality industry who recruit at the University of Houston Conrad N. Hilton College of Hotel and Restaurant Management. Each of these companies was asked to distribute a link to the survey instrument to unit managers within their organization. The second available source was 2125 alumni from the Conrad N. Hilton College were invited to participate in the study. Alumni came from the hotel industry, the restaurant industry, the catering industry, the country club industry, and the gaming industry. This ensured that results are representative of the entire industry rather than just a segment. The results of the recruiters’ sample and the alumni sample yielded a sample size of 759. Eighteen participants were excluded from the analysis because the participants were either retired or no longer working within the hospitality industry, so the effective sample size was 741. Over 140 companies covering all facets of the industry were represented. This included Darden Restaurants, Inc., Joe’s Crab Shack, Harrah’s Entertainment, Inc., Venetian Hotels/Resorts/Casinos, MGM Mirage, Marriott International, Inc., Hilton Hotels Corporation, Starwood Hotels and Resorts Worldwide, Inc., Four Seasons Hotels, Outback Steak House, and Pappas Restaurants.


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Table 3 Factor analysis scores for personal attributes. Factors and items Factor I: principles Trustworthy Honesty Integrity Truthfulness Keeping promises Beliefs & principles Loyal Lead by example Pride of ownership Dependable Factor II: propitiousness Friendly & warm Love of people Cheerful A sharing person Caring & empathetic Serving others Social Trust others Community focused Positive Culturally aware Factor III: leadership Coach or a mentor Natural leader Strategic in thinking Loss leader into a profit Good business sense Factor IV: risk taker Risk taker Adventurous Takes calculated risks Factor V: accuracy Detail oriented Precise Factor VI: composure Calm Low anxiety (Total variance explained = 59.63)

Item loadings

Eigenvalues

Variance explained (%)

Scale alpha

Mean for factor

10.85

32.88

.902

6.53

2.95

8.95

.877

5.89

2.16

6.55

.793

5.96

1.31

3.98

.780

5.52

1.21

3.65

.690

6.11

1.11

3.36

.595

4.94

.823 .776 .749 .740 .701 .648 .610 .609 .590 .525 .787 .781 .766 .713 .673 .612 .604 .577 .552 .545 .463 .663 .646 .620 .600 .577 .784 .695 .682 .844 .711 .814 .770

Notes: Principal component analysis Keiser–Meyer–Olkin measure of sampling adequacy = 0.937; Bartlett’s Test for Sphericity: p = .000 (2 = 9564.60, df = 528). Overall mean for the personal attributes = 5.82

The demographic characteristics of the sample are displayed in Table 1. Ninety-four percent of the sample was over the age of 26. The mean age was 43.4. Forty-three percent of the sample has completed some type of college degree. Of the sample that has completed a college degree, 40% of those are from a hospitality program. In the make-up of the scale, this study sought to gain the perspective of all segments of the hospitality industry. Although a large percent of the sample came from the hotel industry (49%), it is important to recognize that most hotels include restaurants and catering departments. It was evident that the participants who work in hotels hold jobs within the food and beverage department based upon their responses to the question regarding their current position. When examining the segments of the industry, it was evident that a small percentage (8.5%) was working for companies who support the hospitality industry, such as food distributors and consultants. Since the goal of this step was to identify culture of hospitality organizations and the values of its people, it is worth noting that 37.7% of the sample has more than 20 years experience within the industry.

determined the number of factors selected was consistent across both analysis. Specifically, only items with Eigenvalues greater than one after rotation were included in the analysis. The degree of intercorrelation among the variables was evaluated through an examination of the Keiser–Meyer–Olkin (KMO) statistic. For both the organizational and the personal characteristics data, the Keiser–Meyer–Olkin (KMO) measure of overall sampling adequacy was 0.937, which supported factor analysis of the data (Hair et al., 1998). Bartlett’s Test of Sphericity produced a significance of p < .01 for the organizational and personal characteristics. Factors were rotated using orthogonal rotation. To ensure that the given attribute represented the construct underlying each factor, a factor loading weight of .40 was used as the minimum cutoff. Items that cross-loaded on more than one factor were omitted from the scale. Items that loaded as a single factor were deleted from the scale as well. The reliability for the factors was measured using Cronbach’s Alpha. Hair et al. (1998) suggests that an alpha of .60 or greater is acceptable for the development items. Items with an alpha greater than .50 were reported as well so that those factors can be further developed in subsequent studies.

4. Results 4.1. Identification of organizational factors Principal components analysis (PCA) was used to reduce the large number of organizational and personal attributes into a smaller subset. A separate analysis was undertaken for organizational and personal culture characteristics. The rules that

The analysis for organizational culture yielded four distinct factors with Eigenvalues greater than one after rotation. This solution accounted for 57.3% of the total variance among the data. The

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Table 4 Hospitality Culture Fit Scale: organizational and personal factors. Organizational culture

Personal attributes

Management principles The organization is employee focused The organization supports, empowers and rewards their employees The organization practices the motto: “Treat others as I wish to be treated” The organization has a focus on employee retention The organization constantly reinforces the company’s culture Training is important within the organization The organization treats mistakes as opportunities to learn An organization where there is an entrepreneurial spirit among the managers An organization where cultural diversity is a reality An organization where employees do more than is required of them An organization where there are many opportunities to relocate There is an entrepreneurial spirit among managers Customer Relationships An organization that is in business of helping customers celebrate the milestones in their lives An organization that is in the business of creating memories for its customers An organization that is a home away from home for its customers An organization that develops a relationship with its customers An organization that has a high percentage of repeat guests An organization that believes: “To be of service is the most noble profession Job variety A job where every day is different A job that can be challenging at various times Job satisfaction An organization that has high turnover An organization where burn out is a problem for management

Principles I am very trustworthy I am extremely honest I have a high degree of integrity I value truthfulness I am known for keeping promises I stand firm on my beliefs and principles Others describe me as loyal I try to lead by example I take pride of ownership Others say that I am dependable Propitiousness Others describe me as friendly & warm I have a love of people Other people characterize me as cheerful I am known for being a sharing person I have a caring and empathetic attitude I am culturally aware of others I enjoy serving others I am more social than independent I trust others I am community focused. I am a very positive person Leadership Other people considered me to be a coach I am a natural leader Others consider me to be strategic in my thinking I can turn a loss leader into a profitable organization I have a good business sense Risk taker I am a risk taker I am adventurous I take calculated risks Accuracy I am very detailed oriented I strive to be very precise Composure I am a very calm person I have a love level of anxiety

names for each of the factors were derived from the variables that comprised each dimension. The factors were labeled management principles, customer relationships, job variety, and job satisfaction. Cronbach’s alpha, a measure of reliability, was calculated for each of the derived factors. Table 2 presents the item loadings in each factor along with their respective Eigenvalue, percent of variance explained, and reliability scores. Factor I, “Management Principles,” explained 37.54% of the variance in the data, with an Eigenvalue of 8.26. This factor was associated with the principles related to managing employees including attributes of employee focused; support, empowers, rewards; treat others as I wish to be treated; employee retention; reinforce company culture; training; mistakes are opportunities to learn; enjoys handling unusual challenges; entrepreneurial spirit; cultural diversity; do more than is required; and opportunities to relocate. The reliability for this factor was .899, well over the required alpha of .60 for a new instrument. Factor II, “Customer Relationships,” accounted for 8.07% of the variance in the data, with an Eigenvalue of 1.78. This factor included variables that are commonly associated with guest service and relationships. These attributes included helping guests celebrate milestones in their lives; creating memories for guests; creating a home away from home for our guests; developing relationships with customers; having a high percentage of repeat guests; and considering “to be ‘of service’ a noble profession. Cronbach’s alpha for this factor was .854 which is considered reliable. Factor III was labeled “Job Variety,” which only loaded with two variables “every day is different” and “this job is challenging.” This factor accounted for 6.93% of the variance and had an Eigenvalue of

1.52. This third factor was considered to be reliable with an alpha of .654. Although “Job Variety” only loaded with two variables, it was retained at this point to test the test responses as well. Factor IV, “Job Satisfaction,” included job attributes that are typically negatively associated with the hospitality industry. These attributes included, “High turnover” and “Burn-out among Management.” This factor explained 4.76% of the variance and had an Eigenvalue of 1.05. Job satisfaction only had a Cronbach’s alpha of .536. However, this factor was retained because high turnover and burn-out have been notoriously characterized with hospitality organizations. Yet, even though both high turnover and burnout have negative connotations, they are central to the underlying theoretical constructs our study sought to explore. Given the importance of these attributes to the underlying theory, we chose to retain job satisfaction as a factor, notwithstanding its relatively low Cronbach’s alpha. 4.2. Identification of personal factors The analysis for the personal attributes yielded six factors with Eigenvalues greater than one after rotation, and the solution accounted for 59.63% of the total variance among the data. The names for each of the factors were derived from the variables that comprised each dimension. The factors were labeled principles, propitiousness, leadership, risk taker, accuracy, and composure. Cronbach’s alpha, a measure of reliability, was calculated for each of the derived factors. Table 3 presents the item loadings in each factor along with their respective Eigenvalue, percent of variance explained, and reliability scores.


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Table 5 Multivariate analysis of variance for the organizational and personal factors. Sum of squares Organizational factors Management principles Type III Error Total Customer relationships Type III Error Total Job Variety Type III Error Total Job satisfaction Type III Error Total Personal factors Principles Type III Error Total Propitiousness Type III Error Total Leadership Type III Error Total Risk taker Type III Error Total Accuracy Type III Error Total Composure Type III Error Total

df

Mean square

F

Sig.

1.515 33.198 34.713

2 56 58

.758 .593

1.278

.287

27.310 88.633 115.943

2 56

13.655 1.583 58

8.628

.001

.763 60.949 61.712

2 56 58

.382 1.088

.351

.706

2.092 84.916 87.008

2 56 58

1.046 1.516

.690

.506

2.535 17.097 19.632

2 56 58

1.268 .305

4.152

.021

4.737 50.293 55.030

2 56 58

2.369 .898

2.637

.080

7.587 48.209 55.797

2 56 58

3.794 .861

4.407

.017

6.761 47.344 54.105

2 56 58

3.381 .845

3.999

.024

1.550 55.679 57.229

2 56 58

.775

.780

.464

6.331 115.584 121.915

2

3.165 56 58

1.534

.225

Wilk’s Lambda = F(4, 110) = 3.179, p = .016.

Factor I, “Principles,” explained 32.88% of the variance in the data, with an Eigenvalue of 10.85. This factor was associated with words commonly used to explain someone’s personal beliefs and values. The “Principles” attributes included trustworthy, honesty, integrity, truthfulness, keeping promises, beliefs & principles, loyalty, leading by example, pride of ownership, and dependability. Cronbach’s alpha for this factor was considered reliable at .902. Factor II, “Propitiousness,” accounted for 8.95% of the variance, with an Eigenvalue of 2.95. This factor grouped variables related with someone’s outward displays of service and empathy towards others. This factor included friendly & warm, love of people, cheerful, sharing, serving others, social, trust of others, community focused, positive, and culturally aware. The reliability for this factor had an alpha of .877. Factor III was labeled “Leadership.” This factor contributed towards 6.55% of the variance, with an Eigenvalue of 2.16. “Leadership” includes those personal skills that someone exhibits in the management of business and of others. These skills include being a coach or mentor, a natural leader, strategic in thinking, able to turn a loss leader into a profit, and having a good business sense. This factor was considered reliable with an alpha of .793. Factor IV, “Risk Taker,” accounts for 3.98% of the variance in the data and had an Eigenvalue of 1.31. This factor is associated with those aspects of a person that takes risks. This includes three

attributes, risk taker, adventurous, and take calculated risks. Cronbach’s alpha for this factor was .780. Factor V, “Accuracy,” displays 3.65% of the variance in the data, with an Eigenvalue of 1.21. “Accuracy” includes only two personal attributes which are commonly used to describe a person’s precision in their work. These attributes include, detail oriented and precise. This factor had an alpha of .690. Factor VI, is label “Composure.” This factor explains 3.36% of the variance in the data, with an Eigenvalue of 1.11. This factor is related with someone’s general demeanor. The attributes of “Composure” include, calm and having low anxiety. Composure had a reliability of .595. Given its importance to the underlying theory and the fact that it was very close to the recommended standard of .60, this factor was included in the scale. The organizational and personal factors created the Hospitality Culture Scale (HCS) which are displayed in Table 4. 4.3. Scale interpretation Participants rated items on a 1–7 scale. For both the organizational and personal variables a rating of “1” meant strongly disagree and a rating of “7” meant strongly agree. As there is no statistical test of fit, evaluation of fit indices is somewhat subjective, but Meyer et al. (1993, p. 543) suggested that “higher values indicate a better fit of the data.” As shown in Tables 2 and 3, those currently in the hos-

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pitality industry had an overall score of 5.23 on the organizational culture and a mean score of 5.82 on the personal attributes. These two means can be considered a baseline score. Any scores above these means indicate that the person will likely be a good match to the hospitality industry, while scores below indicate the opposite. 4.4. Scale evaluation The HCS was tested by administering the scale to students enrolled in a graduate level negotiations class at the University of Houston. This class comprised three different populations of declared majors. One consisted of students from the Conrad N. Hilton College who are also currently working within the hospitality industry. A second group consisted of students pursuing a law degree. The third sample consisted of M.B.A. students. Since some of the students in both the business school and the law school were currently working in the hospitality industry at the time of the study, they were removed from the analysis. The ending sample consisted of 28 hospitality students, 20 pursuing a law degree, and 11 from the business college. The goal of the test was two-fold. First, to check the instrument for clarity, interpretability, wording, and the ease of completion; and second, to determine if, as expected, the Conrad N. Hilton College student sample would show a higher mean score on the factors of the HCS when compared to mean scores of the M.B.A. students and law students. Multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was used to examine differences between the three student groups (hospitality, law, and business). Significance was tested at the .05 level. The independent variables were the types of educational background of the students; i.e. their major. The dependent variables were the participants self-reported mean scores on each of the components of the HCS scale. Table 5 presents the multivariate analysis of variance for both the organizational and personal factors. The multivariate analysis test of difference between the groups using the Wilk’s Lambda criteria was statistically significant (F(4, 110) = 3.179, p = .016) indicating that there were differences between hospitality, law, and business students. As shown in the table, the factors that exhibited differences were, “Customer Relationships (F = 8.628, p = .001),” “Principles (F = 4.152, p = .021),” “Leadership (F = 4.407, p = .017),” and “Risk Taker (F = 3.999, p = .024).” Scheffe’s post hoc test was then used to identify where specific differences occurred among the three groups. Table 6 displays the mean scores for each group on the organizational and personal factors. As shown, there was a significant difference between the hospitality students and the other two groups of students (law p = .004; business p = .006) on the factor, “Customer Relationships.” The hospitality students differed significantly from the law students on two of the personal factors, “Principles (p = .031)” and “Leadership (p = .033).” With regards to “Risk Taking (p = .025)”, the hospitality students differed significantly from the business students. The law and business students did not exhibit a statistically significant difference on any of the factors. On the overall scale mean for the organizational factors, hospitality students were statistically higher than law students (p = .100) and business students (p = .133). On the overall scale mean for the personal factors, hospitality students again scored significantly higher than law students (p = .054) and business students (p = .012). Lastly, in order to evaluate whether or not this scale truly represented all stakeholders of the hospitality industry, a MANOVA was used to examine differences between the various segments of the industry. These were divided into hotels, food and beverage, casinos, country clubs, support to the industry, and other. As shown in Table 7, there were no significant differences between all segments except for the club industry. The club managers differed in a num-

Table 6 Comparison of mean scores for organizational and personal factors.

Organizational factors Management Principles Customer Relationships Job Variety Job Satisfaction Overall Mean Personal factors Principles Propitiousness Leadership Risk Taker Accuracy Composure Overall Mean

HRM mean A

Law mean B

Business mean C

5.98 6.13BC 6.13 2.11 5.09bc

5.66 4.85 6.00 2.48 4.75

5.67 4.64 5.82 2.50 4.66

6.55B 5.64 5.95B 5.68C 6.23 4.82 5.81BC

6.11 5.12 5.22 5.35 5.88 4.75 5.40

6.19 4.99 5.25 4.76 6.00 3.95 5.19

Capital letters indicate that numbers in column statistically different at p < .05; lower case letters indicate that numbers in column statistically different at p = .06–.10.

Table 7 Comparison of mean scores for organizational and personal factors across segments of the hospitality industry.

Organizational Management principles Customer relationships Job variety Job satisfaction Personal Principles Propitiousness Leadership Risk taker Accuracy Composure

Hotels A

F&B B

Casino C

Clubs D

5.50

5.19

5.75

4.59ABCD 5.31

5.19

5.89

5.76

6.07

6.07E

5.01

5.71

ACE

Support E

Other F

6.32 3.95

6.19 3.97

6.48 3.88

5.88 3.76

6.14 3.39

6.08 3.58

6.52 5.90 6.00 5.61 6.08 5.10

6.54 6.01 5.99 5.44 6.25 4.70

6.67 5.99 6.11 5.80 6.17 5.02

6.54 5.73 5.65C 5.09AC 6.28E 4.87

6.44 5.89 5.96 5.52 5.72 4.56

6.46 5.72 6.10 5.74 5.87 4.81

Capital letters indicate that numbers in column statistically different at p < .05.

ber of areas such as management principles, job variety, leadership, and risk taking. 5. Conclusions 5.1. Discussion The outcome of the study is the developed instrument we call the Hospitality Culture Scale (HCS). This instrument was designed to measure dimensions specific to hospitality. The original goal was to make the attributes as hospitality industry specific as possible. The loading yielded four organizational factors – management principles, customer relationships, job variety, and job satisfaction. Although job satisfaction only had an alpha of .536, it was retained because of its relationship to the underlying theoretical foundation. Six personal factors were identified-principles, propitiousness, leadership, risk taker, accuracy, and composure. Similar to job satisfaction, composure, which had an alpha of .595, was also retained due to its relationship to the underlying theoretical foundation. When examining the attributes that make-up each of the factors on the scale, the uniqueness of the hospitality industry is truly captured. Through this investigation, the determined management principles for hospitality organizations demonstrate a focus towards employee centered philosophies rather than only being bottom line driven. For instance, these principles emphasize values such “treating others as I wish to be treated” and “having an entrepreneurial spirit.” Perhaps the most distinct features of hospitality culture are found within the factor, “Customer Rela-


tionships.” Hospitality organizations strive to be places that are looked upon as “a home away from home,” “creating memories for their guests,” and “helping guests celebrate milestones in their lives.” Organizational culture also included the negative aspects of the hospitality industry with the attributes, “high turnover” and “burn-out.” The key principle of measuring a potential employee is to make sure that their values correspond with the industry. Turnover and burn-out represent the reality of our industry. These are important characteristics for a potential employee to be aware of before starting with an organization or even within the hospitality industry itself. Candidates must have a desire to embrace this known adversity in order to be successful. The personal attributes of the scale include many distinctive hospitality specific traits as well. The factor, “Propitiousness” highlights that someone must posses characteristics that value a service to others in order to fit within the industry. A service oriented person must also have leadership qualities in order to be effective. The attributes of leadership are well defined through the variables of “being a coach or mentor,” “strategic in thinking,” and “turning a loss leader into a profit.” One could argue that the attributes we examined could describe any industry. However, research has shown that services are different than goods and the type of employees who work in a service environment need to be different (Bowen and Ford, 2004). Service employees are “on stage” most of their working time; as such, they need to possess many of the values addressed in our scale. If they do not, they might become frustrated in their job and possibly quit. They quit because they cannot adapt into the service environment. The nature of simultaneous production and consumption require that the employee makes immediate decisions when confronted with a service quality issue. Unlike a manufacturing plant that can shut the line down in order to fix a quality issue, service employees must fix the problem while the customer impatiently waits. We believe the HCS captures this uniqueness. 5.2. Implications This study’s findings offer a number of implications for the hospitality industry. For practice, several potentially relevant contributions for hospitality managers are offered. The HCS scale provides four organizational and six personal dimensions to measurably define hospitality culture. Schein (1992) considered a culture to be valid if it can be taught to new members as the correct way of doing things. The HCS can be used in the selection process. In addition to matching applicant’s knowledge, skills, and abilities, with job requirements, an ideal process might be screening a potential employee on their match with the organizational culture and the personal attributes of a particular organization (Tepeci et al., 2002). The HCS provides traits of a person who would be successful in a work environment that exhibited this culture. This study contributes to the theoretical knowledge regarding hospitality culture. Moreover, it advances previous work and knowledge with respect to the development of scales that measure organizational and personal attributes of hospitality culture. Table 6 displays the final list of the organizational and personal factors that were derived from this study. The previous attempts to identify hospitality culture did not provide a tool that could represent the multiple stakeholders that make-up the entire industry. Woods (1989) only examined the norms and values of restaurants and provided a list of the attributes. The HCS scale is quantifiable and can be applied to the entire industry. Three of the attributes from Wood’s (1989) study, burnout, turnover, and retention are represented within two of the factors included as part of the HCS scale. Tepeci and Bartlett (2002) created the Hospitality Industry Culture Profile, however, the sample only included students with a mean of 19 months experience in the industry. The Hospitality

299

Industry Culture Profile has a factor called attention to detail that includes the attributes: paying attention to detail accuracy, detail oriented, and precise. The organizational factor, “Accuracy,” in this study loaded similarly to Tepeci and Bartlett (2002) with variables of detail oriented, precise, and takes calculated risks. Additionally, the scale offers educational implications. The HCS can be utilized by high school counselors and college recruiters to determine if a student is a potential candidate for the hospitality industry. Although the high school student may not have experience in dealing with customers or possess leadership skills, the scale offers a tool to determine if this person has the propensity to develop and value these traits in the future. 5.3. Recommendations for future research Although employment placement testing is not common for hospitality industry (Berger and Ghei, 1995), further studies can be conducted with the HCS to measure a link between a person’s match with the industry and their job satisfaction, as well as individual retention rates. Given the enormous turnover rate of hospitality employees, it would make sense that the industry would want to hire those who have similar values to those in the industry and who will be satisfied with their organizations. The HCS should be given to graduating college students who are enrolled within hospitality, business, and liberal arts disciplines. The scores from each group of students could be used to measure the differences on each of the factors. The study could have the potential of showing that hospitality programs are adequately preparing students to become part of the industry in which they are preparing them. 5.4. Limitations The HCS instrument will benefit from continued testing and refinement. Although the instrument was tested on a small sample of students, there were statistical differences between hospitality, law, and business majors on some of the factors. Those currently in the hospitality industry had an overall score of 5.09 on the organizational characteristics and a mean score of 5.81 on the personal characteristics. Recall that it was suggested that any scores above 5.23 for the organizational and 5.82 on the personal indicate that the person will likely be a good match to the hospitality industry. While the pilot test is slightly less than the proposed baseline, hospitality students did have statistically higher means. Because of the large number of factors that were included in the initial survey, multiple questions measuring the same concept were not added to the instrument. As a result, the factors Composure and Job Satisfaction had low reliabilities. The low reliabilities were due, in part, to the fact that only two items comprised each factor. These factors were purposely kept in the analysis for two reasons. First, both job satisfaction and composure are important constructs that may help describe hospitality culture. Second, by retaining these constructs we are hopeful that other researchers will be encouraged to engage in research to further define them. This study attempted to define hospitality culture by examining the multiple stakeholders who are part of the industry. However, it was discovered, club managers differed with regards to a number of factors. Previous research supports that there are numerous aspects of club operations that set that segment apart from other operations in the hospitality industry (Barrows, 1994). One could surmise this differentiation is due to the fact that the club industry is working to satisfy the needs of members versus the general needs of guests. When examining the specific differences between the segments, country club managers differed from all segments of the industry in the area of management principles. If you examine the attributes associated with these principles, one could ascertain the unique

300


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