FACTORS ASSOCIATED WITH HOTEL STAFF RETENTION IN BURIRAM PROVINCE

Abstract

This study aimed to explore managerial factors, both the internal and external ones, associated with long-term retention of the hotel staffs in Buriram Province in which the findings were applied as a guideline for an effective management of hotel staff retention. Attentively, the researcher adopted a mixed research method in which the quantitative data was collected from the questionnaires provided to 225 hotel staffs and the qualitative data was derived from an interview with a group of 10 hotel executives in which the result analyzed by descriptive statistics to find frequency and percentage. Significantly, both external and internal managerial factors affecting the long-term retention of the hotel staffs in Buriram province were processed by descriptive statistics to find the mean score and standard deviation (S.D.); meanwhile, the research hypothesis were proved by t-test, paired comparison test, One Way ANOVA , and f-test. The study outcome indicated that the hotel staffs in Buriram were mostly female between 18-30 years old holding a bachelor degree and currently working as the back-office staff. Most of them have been working for at least 5 years and regularly earning 10,001 – 15,000 Baht per month. They were the locals living Buriram. In term of the internal managerial factors affecting a long-term retention of the hotel staffs, it was found that both single-sided and multi-sided factors were rated with highest scores in which the single-sided factor with the highest score was the organizational management. On the other hand, the external factors associated with the long term retention of the hotel staffs, both single sided and multi-sided, were rated with high score and the one-sided factor with the highest score was the advancement of technology. Apparently, the paired comparison test on the human resource management with the external/internal managerial factors and the individual factors indicated that all the factors, both single-sided and multi-sided ones, had different effects on the hotel staff retention with a 0.05 statistical significance. As a result, the guideline for human resource management to maintain a long-term retention of the hotel staffs should focus on: Career Path - an organization should build up pride in the workplace amongst the staffs so they could be motivated to show off their best performance to complete the assigned jobs; Organizational Interaction - all staffs should be allowed to participate in a process of goal setting, team working, and creating a good work-life balance; Organizational Management – the staff should be freely allowed to rotate their positions or be informed about the vacant position of their interest within an organization; Career Path – the staff participation should be broadly promoted to allow all staffs to fairly share ideas about their work and to be assigned with new challenging jobs; and Organizational Management– Operational plans and clear-cut job description should be well prepared for the staffs in all positions.