Service Recovery through Empowerment: HRM and Performance in the Hotel Sector

Abstract

This thesis examines the relationships existing between human resource (HR) practices, management style, employee empowerment and service recovery performance (SRP) in the three to five-star hotel sector in Sri Lanka. Because service recovery refers to how firms respond to service failures, this study focuses on the SRP of employees. Both qualitative and quantitative data were gathered through interviews, and a large-scale survey was conducted in thirty hotels with a sample of 104 managers and 625 workers. The data were analysed using content analysis and structural equation modelling. The conceptual model proposed in this thesis integrates the ability–motivation–opportunity (AMO) theoretical framework empowerment theory and self-determination theory. This thesis tells a subtle story in relation to hotel employees in Sri Lanka. Empowerment theory has relevance for service recovery performance in this hotel sector, but only if we appreciate the multi-dimensional nature of empowerment. The thesis suggests that empowerment is important in the hotel context but it is strongly related to the job level in the organisational hierarchy. The analysis of employee surveys and manager performance ratings of the SRP of employees revealed that supervisory employees reported a higher degree of job autonomy and job impact, and were seen by managers as having a higher level of service recovery performance than service workers. The thesis confirms that context-relevant HR practices and management styles help to develop job competence, which is related to job satisfaction and SRP. However, management style does not appear to encourage a sense of job impact, although job impact is important in SRP. The thesis suggests that service workers occupy low-autonomy jobs, but supervisors are granted a somewhat higher level of involvement in decision-making, resulting in higher SRP. HR practices enable employee job competence, job autonomy and job impact. Therefore, training, rewards, management style, job competence and job impact are significant factors in better handling service failures and prompting problem resolution in the hotel context.