Nelson K. F. Tsang

Service quality in China’s hotel industry: a perspective from tourists and hotel managers

Assesses the perceptions of service quality in China’s hotel industry, from the perspective of both international tourists and hotel managers. A questionnaire was used to survey a sample of 90 hotel managers and 270 international tourists who visited China and stayed at hotels in Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou. A descriptive statistics analysis was used (paired t‐test and independent t‐test) to evaluate the service quality of China’s hotel industry from both the tourists’ and the managers’ perspectives, and to investigate the four gaps: between tourists’ expectations and their actual perceptions; between managers’ perceptions of tourists’ expectations and the actual expectations of tourists; between managers’ perceptions of a hotel’s service delivery and tourists’ actual perceptions of the service; and between managers’ perceptions of tourists’ expectations and managers’ perceptions of their hotel’s service delivery. The results showed that tourists’ perceptions of service quality provided in the hotel industry in China were consistently lower than their expectations and that managers overestimated the service delivery, compared to tourists’ perceptions of actual service quality, in the hotel industry in China. From the result of gap analysis, it might be concluded that Delivery Gap and Internal Evaluation Gap were the main reasons contributing to the service quality shortfalls in the hotel industry in China.

The impact of demographic factors on Hong Kong hotel employees’ choice of job‐related motivators

Hospitality companies can increasetheir market share and growth rates by increasing their brand loyal customers. This is a more profitable approach than other marketing activities, such as price cuts or promotional programs. As a mature industry, the hospitality business must pursue market‐share gains, rather than market‐growth gains. Acquiring new customers is expensive becauseof advertising, promotion, and start‐up operating expenses. Besides, it is cheaper to serve current customers. This paper brings together the factors that contribute to brand loyalty in marketing literature and provides strategies to hospitality managers for increasing brand loyal customers.

What Motivates Hong Kong's Hotel Employees?

Asked to rank ten job-related factors that might motivate them in their jobs, a sample of 1,245 hotel employees in Hong Kong listed the following three factors as uppermost: (1) opportunities for advancement and development, (2) loyalty to employees (company treats them with respect and trust), and (3) good wages. While the specific rankings of the top motivating factors changed slightly from department to department, the top factors were remarkably consistent. Moreover, Hong Kong hotel employees had more in common with North American hotel workers than either group did with U.S. manufacturing workers.

Taiwanese tourists’ shopping preferences

Hong Kong has been renowned as a ‘shoppers’ paradise’ for more than a decade. Visitor shopping accounted for more than half of the total visitor expenditure and it is obvious that visitor shopping is an important component of the Hong Kong economy. Taiwanese are one of the most important sources of visitor arrivals and shopping revenue. A survey of 100 Taiwanese visitors to Hong Kong about their shopping experience in Hong Kong and in Singapore was conducted. Results indicated that Hong Kong has an advantage with a wider selection of merchandise but there are not many differences between Hong Kong and Singapore in terms of product and service quality. However, Taiwanese tourists felt that retailers in Hong Kong are not as honest as those in Singapore.

Learning Style Preferences and Implications for Training Programs in the Hospitality and Tourism Industry

Abstract The learning style of an individual plays a significant role in shaping and building important skill attributes and attitudes that profoundly influence a persons management style. Given the wide diversity in the nature and level of managerial tasks in the hospitality and tourism industry, it is important to understand how learning style of students and managers could be used to develop appropriate training programs for creative and innovative service delivery needed by the industry. In addition, while there is substantial evidence of strong managerial and entrepreneurial skills in the industry in Asia, there exists little or no knowledge on how these abilities were developed. The main objective was to investigate the learning styles of the hospitality and tourism students and managers in the Asian region and examine differences and similarities across countries, occupational levels and sectors of the hospitality and tourism industry. Different learning styles, which include Activist, Reflector, Theorist, and Pragmatist, are investigated in this study based on an approach used by Honey and Mumford (1986). The results of this study provide some useful practical information on how Asian students and managers in the hospitality and tourism industry integrate information, perceive risks, make decisions, and commit to courses of action based on their different learning styles. While there was no strong evidence of active risk-taking behavior reflected in their learning styles, the findings in this study revealed the existence of a strong pragmatic attitude and some inclination towards reflective and theorist type behavior among the respondents. An important implication of the study is that with skillful matching of the learning activities to preferred learning styles, useful entrepreneurial abilities could be developed as the respondents mature in the workforce.

THEMEQUAL—Adapting the SERVQUAL Scale to Theme Park Services: A Case of Hong Kong Disneyland

ABSTRACT Faced with keen competition in the theme park operating environment, operators have realized the necessity of maintaining a high standard of service quality in order to survive. Because of the scarcity of literature on theme park service quality, the present study adapts the SERVQUAL model and modifies it as the THEMEQUAL model to measure the gap between perceived service quality and expected service quality from visitors under the theme park setting. The Hong Kong Disneyland is selected due to its importance to the Hong Kong tourism industry. The impact of the dimensions of the model on visitor satisfaction is also examined. Results expressed visitor satisfaction in terms of physical environment, but signified dissatisfaction on employee performance. Among the six dimensions of the model, “responsiveness and access,” “assurance,” and “empathy” are the critical predictors of visitor satisfaction. Discussions on the findings are presented and managerial implications are explained in detail.

An Examination of the Relationship Between Employee Perception and Hotel Brand Equity

ABSTRACT Brand management stresses the importance of satisfying the needs of external customers. Employee branding management shows an evolving trend as employees begin living the brand. It is, therefore, necessary that employees are convinced by the hotel brand prior to having confidence to “sell” the brand to customers. The present study aims to investigate employee perception toward hotel brand equity, particularly in the Hong Kong hotel industry. Factor analysis is used to identify four underlying factors—namely, employee commitment, employee engagement, employee identification, and service quality. The four constitute the perception of the employee on the evaluation of the brand. Correlation analysis is employed to examine relationship among the underlying factors and three dimensions of hotel brand equity—including brand image, brand awareness, and perceived quality. Moderate association is generally noted, and perceived quality has the most significant relationship with employee perception on brand equity. Managerial implications on employee branding management are introduced to hotel management. Topics for future research are also recommended.

Service quality research on China’s hospitality and tourism industry

Purpose – The study aims to provide an inventory of the existing English and Chinese research on service quality in China’s hospitality and tourism industry. The study aims to identify the reasons for the lack of research on service quality in China’s hospitality and tourism industry and the ignorance of the Chinese language literature in the field. Design/methodology/approach – A synthesis review is conducted of 31 articles published in 11 leading Chinese and English academic journals from 1998 to 2013. Findings – Popular research themes are service quality management and evaluation in the hotel sector. The majority of the reviewed articles are empirical studies that adopt quantitative methods, and none of the English articles use qualitative methods. Recent studies tend to use sophisticated statistical techniques such as confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling. Changes in disciplines, publication trends and statistical techniques are observed. The theoretical and practical contribu...

Perceptions of Tourism and Hotel Management Students on Ethics in the Workplace

Ethics in the workplace has become an increasing concern with the fast development and increasing complexity of the hospitality and tourism industry. However, limited academic credence has been given to the perceptions and reactions of hospitality and tourism students on ethics in relation to their respective workplaces. The current study aims to investigate the perceptions of tourism and hotel management students on ethics. A comparison was conducted among three groups of students, including subdegree, bachelors degree, and masters degree students. The findings of this study show that the students generally possess a high level of ethical standard and acknowledge the importance of ethics in the workplace. The perceptions and reactions of the students toward unethical behavior in the workplace consistently showed their adherence to ethics. Bachelors degree students posited a higher acceptance level on unethical behavior compared with subdegree and masters degree students. Recommendations for improving the ethics course for tourism and hotel management programs and for future research are discussed.

A Holistic Approach to Understanding the Use of Travel Guidebooks: Pre-, During, and Post-Trip Behavior

ABSTRACT This study proposed a holistic approach to understanding the usage of travel guidebooks. Guidebooks were revealed to outperform other travel information sources in the stages of “during” and “post-travel” but lost their competitiveness in the pre-trip planning to the Internet, especially on the search for information on destination and accommodation. A factor analysis on an 18-item instrument concluded that travelers possess six underlying need dimensions when using guidebooks: reflective, security, confirming, destination, itinerary, and functional needs. Therefore, recommendations were provided for practitioners to reconsider the positioning of travel guidebooks when formulating product development and marketing strategies.