Study calls for luxury hotels to raise employment standards
Luxury hotels need to raise their employment standards to ensure a more socially responsible approach to staffing, according to a study.
Researchers interviewed hospitality workers and examined HR practices in two high-end hotels in central Scotland for a new paper published in the Journal of Business Ethics.
The study, led by Dr Victoria Walker of Glasgow Caledonian, found low pay often affected the wellbeing of the employees.
All the frontline staff interviewed were paid below the voluntary Living Wage at the time of data collection.
Perks like free taxis, cited as an employee benefit by management, were often only available to permanent members of staff and not those on zero-hour or temporary contracts.
Dr Walker, lecturer in Human Resource Management at Glasgow Caledonian, said: "Low pay was often rationalised by management who argued that wages were supplemented by other benefits, such as free meals.
"However, these benefits did not seem to alleviate the hardship experienced by employees.
"The current situation of staff shortages represents a potential window of opportunity to raise employment standards, as hospitality employers seek to recruit and retain more staff, though it remains to be seen whether employers are willing to grasp this opportunity."
The paper, co-authored with Professor Dennis Nickson, of the University of Strathclyde, examines the treatment of hospitality workers and explores what constitutes a socially responsible approach to HR in the hotel sector.
It concludes that hotels striving to take a responsible approach to human resource management must ensure that pay and working conditions exceed the statutory minimum.