hotels have experimented with new approaches to HRM. Secondly, the factors that
influence HRM decision-making and whether these factors are any different in the
hotel industry compared to elsewhere. Finally, he reviewed the relationship
between HRM and performance in the hotel industry. Hoque is able to claim that,
compared to a sample of over 300 greenfield-site manufacturing establishments,
the hotels in his sample where utilizing a number of practices that were very similar
to best practice. Indeed, in illustrating the manner in which academic models
can, in reality, overlap it is also worth noting that there is significant overlap
between Schuler and Jackson’s quality enhancement and innovation approaches
with much of the ‘best practice’ approaches. This point about such overlap is
further illustrated in HRM in practice 1.2.
Hoque’s work remains useful in offering a description of organizational practices
that support a professional, high-quality approach to service. That said, there
are a number of criticisms that can be levelled at the research (Nickson and Wood,
2000). As Hoque himself recognizes his sample of hotels is large by industry standards,
averaging 125 employees per unit compared to an industry ‘standard’ of 81
per cent of establishments employing fewer than 25 people, and thus as Hoque
(2000: 51) himself recognizes ‘patently unrepresentative of the industry as a whole’.
Furthermore his reliance on city-centre hotels with a high proportion of corporate
clients is equally unrepresentative. Lastly, the reliance on managerial voices in his
research, to the exclusion of those on the receiving end of many of the initiatives