Desirable Competencies for Middle Managers in the Hospitality Industry

Abstract

The purpose of this thesis was to gain an updated understanding of the needs of the hospitality industry, and the desirable competencies for middle managers. Most previous studies have stated the importance of continuant research on desirable competencies to update hospitality educators and students. This study was conducted to explore what competencies are desirable, why they are desirable, and how one can acquire them. Few, if any previous studies have explored how desirable competencies can be acquired. This thesis adapted qualitative methods to gain a better understanding of the informants’ perception of desirable competencies. The informants were the general, front-office, food and beverage, and housekeeping managers, at three different hotels of three different hotel-chains. The informants were personally interviewed with the use of semi-structured interview guides and fake CV’s the informants had to rank during the interviews. The result demonstrated desirable competencies in seven different competency domains: conceptual/creative, leadership, human resource, interpersonal/communication, finance, technical and culture/language. The first six competencies are similar to Sandwith’s Competency Domain Model (1993); however, this thesis adds another competency domain, culture/language. The competencies were found to be desirable for all manager but were utilized in various ways depending on the manager’s position. According to the informants, most competencies could be taught and developed through a mixture of formal education and work experience, while some competencies were considering part of one’s personality or upbringing. The results provide a better understanding of desirable competencies in the hospitality industry and the importance of cultural/language competencies which has not been highlighted in previous studies.