Perception of Key Management Contribution Factos to the Future Development of the Hotel Industry: A Comparative Analysis of British/Irish & Spanish Samples

Abstract

For Spain the importance of tourism both national and international, does not hold any doubts for those versed in the subject. A few general figures suffice to illustrate this. In 1991 a total of 53.5 million people visited Spain, a slightly higher number than the 52 million which did in 1990, and slightly less than the 52 million of the previous year, this meant a revenue of 19,004 million dollars in 1991, 18,593 million dollars in 1990 and 16,174 million dollars in 1989. Tourism achieved a participation in the Gross Domestic Product of 8.74% in 1989. In the last few years 85% of tourists have been from Portugal, followed by West Germany with 13% and the U.K. with 12%, as the major contributors (Secretaria General due Turismo, 1991). This data should be considered with some caution because not all the people that cross the frontier can be considered as tourists, other data such as that which is provided in the input output tables of the Tourist Economy reveal the importance too of the development of the Spanish tourist market (Vid IET 1989 and Alcaide, 1984). However, in the last few years the growth and development of the industry have come into a time of crisis (Figuerola, 1991). These circumstances have been, among others, the driving force behind our study of the attitudes of hotels to their development. Tourism, in the United Kingdom has consistently grown since 1985. There has been in recent years, namely 1990, 18 million overseas tourists in the UK spending around £7.5 bn. The top five countries that visitors come from and the percentage of total visitors represented by that country are the United States of America (USA) (16%), France (13%), West Germany (12%) The Irish Republic (8%) and the Netherlands (5%) (Key Note, Market Review 1991). The similar expenditure by Britons in this time period was around £400m. Of this money 26% was spent in either (un)licensed hotel/motels onguest houses; the figures exclude spending on business trips. Domestic tourism has been the beneficiary of the Gulf War and its repercussions as well as the collapse of the International Leisure Group. The sector is therefore one worthy of investigation not only for its levels of expenditure but also for the management challenge confronting hoteliers by such a dynamic business environment. In terms of employment in hotels and catering between 1971 and 1987 there was a rise at more than twice the rate of employment in service industries as a whole (Robinson and Wallace 1983). More up-to-date indicators (Baty and Templeton) have shown a 26% increase in tourism-related employment compared with 15.8% in all service industries. Unlike Spain the United Kingdom does not have a national minimum wage with the government declining to enforce a social charter for workers. More recently Wood (1992) has highlighted the increased part-time employment, casualisation of work and the increased participation of women and young people. Such fragmentation of the workforce, the authors feel, make it difficult to operate and maintain consistent and effective programmes in training, marketing and general management skills.