The Effects of Globalization on Hospitality

Smartbrief due 2/28/09

“Hospitality Adjusts to Globalization”

http://www.hotel-online.com/Trends/Andersen/global.html

° Small company feel at a global scale

Nobody wants their company to feel like a company, especially if it’s from another country; it should feel like a family. A good way to avoid this is to use architecture and interior design that is familiar to that culture or region. You should also hire people from the area, to help grow some roots. Lastly, management is key. Employees should not have any contact with “Corporate”; it makes employees feel less responsible, like if they make a mistake that corporate will solve it. Every location should be able to function independantly of each other in case of any communication problems.

° Getting information where it needs to be

Corporate needs information from it’s hotels and franchises just as much as they need information from corporate. The difficult part is limiting whos hands the information gets to. You don’t want employees with information that only the manager should have, the same goes for some members of corporate. Not everyone checks their e-mail everyday, there should be a type of inter-company communication such as Instant Messaging for people who are clocked in.

° Communication between countries

Language is probably one of the biggest obstacles a company will face in globalization. If a franchise or satellite speaks a language different from corporate, things could get very complicated. The best solution would be hiring a manager that speaks the native language as well as the language that is found at corporate. That is to avoid hiring a middle-man to translate information that could be vital to your company.

° Global currencies

Nearly every country uses its own system of currency, a simple miscalculation could be cause for a very big error in accounting. If 30,000 yen in Japan are sent to corporate as “30,000”, they might take it as dollars instead of yen. The best solution would be to convert currency before it leaves the franchise/satellite. Or have a system to automatically convert all monetary values to dollars, however this could confuse employees.

° Free Trade and Regional Agreements

Many organizations are concerned about the impacts of agreements such as the European Union and the possible North American Union. These unions create a very strong infrastructure between businesses in these areas. A business originating and staying within one of these areas will likely be more profitable when importing from countries within that union. If they spread outside that area they will probably not receive the same benefits.