Towards developing a service delivery improvement model for the Malaysian Hotel sector / Johanudin Lahap, G. Barry O'Mahony and Jim Sillitoe

The Malaysian hotel industry has experienced significant growth in the last 10 years and many hotels in Malaysia are now opulent, new hotels achieving the highest standards of presentation. However, service delivery often lags behind the physical environment, struggles to meet international standards and ergo the expectations ofinternational guests. There are diverse views among service quality researchers as to how to improve service delivery standards. Consequently, this study seeks to develop an appropriate service delivery improvement model that provides a framework that can be used to attract, train, motivate and retain hotel employees. Within the literature many strategies have been presented that are designed to enhance both products and services in a variety of contexts. Among the better known ofthese are Total Quality Management (TQM), Six Sigma (SS), SERVQUAL (SQ), the Relationship Marketing paradigm (RM), Internal Marketing (1M) and Internal Market Orientation (IMO). The general view among scholars, however, is that there is a link between employee satisfaction and job performance. This article examines and analyses the most significant elements of various product and service improvement models, and presents a revised service delivery improvement model as afirst step in customising a modelfor the Malaysian hotel sector. The research concludes that a number of these elements are critical to service improvement, the authors note that the implementation of such a model will need to be further developed with assistance from industry stakeholders in Malaysia

Developing a procurement framework for the Malaysian hospitality industry: a preliminary study / Siti Zalipah Ibrahim... [et al.]

Businesses are made up of many sub-structure of activities. One particular activity that demands high attention is procurement. In the hospitality industry, the procurement department plays a major role in ensuring supply of raw material and goods are planned, purchased, distributed, and consumed efficiently. An influx of activities such as requisition, acquisition, and quality check is done in this department. In estimating the total cost of acquiring goods and services, it is important for organizations to identify unit costs and other costs associated with operations and maintenance that occurs during purchasing and conserving of goods. Recent studies have reported the usage of an Electronic Procurement System (EPS) that replaces the conventional procurement system typically used in Hotels. This paper aims to explore the current practice, effectiveness and efficiency of the procurement systems used in Malaysian hotels through in-depth interviews. Findings of this study will assist hospitality businesses to analyze their procurement activities and develop proper strategies that enables them to reduce costs, increase efficiency, and most importantly, improve their bottom line

The Effect of Perceived Waiting Time on Customer’s Satisfaction: A Focus on Fast Food Restaurant

Past research reveals that perceived waiting time was found to influence customer satisfaction and post-purchase behaviour. However, the present study aims to examine the effect of perceived waiting time on customer satisfaction in the context of fast food restaurant in Malaysia. In this study, simple random sampling method was employed and a total of 384 questionnaires were distributed. Consequently, 205 usable responses were successfully collected, representing 53% response rate. The data were analysed using SPSS software including descriptive analysis, reliability and validity test, factor analysis and correlation analysis. The result reveals that perceived waiting time significantly influence customer satisfaction towards fast food restaurants. Theoretically, this study confirmed the effects of perceived waiting time on customer satisfaction in the context of fast food restaurant. Practically, these findings are invaluable to fast food operators to improve the quality of their service delivery.Keywords: Perceived waiting time, Customer satisfaction, Fast food restaurant

Developing a service delivery improvement model for the Malaysian hotel sector

Tourism contributes significantly to GDP in Malaysia where it is a catalyst for growth and development. Dr. Lahap worked with key government and industry stakeholders and over 300 employees in Malaysian hotels, to develop a service delivery improvement model that will provide a framework to attract, train, motivate and retain hotel employees in Malaysia. The model has the potential to make a significant contribution to the economic development of Malaysia by improving overall demand for tourism, attracting high net worth visitors and increasing the number of hotel staff who are sufficiently experienced and trained to deliver services to international standards

The development of a service delivery improvement model for the Malaysian hotel sector: a focus on the developing, formulating, synthesising and refinement of a new model

The hospitality and tourism industry makes a significant contribution to the economic development of many countries with some being reliant on tourism as a major catalyst for growth and development. This is the case in Malaysia where the tourism industry has been hosting large numbers of tourists arriving for business or vacation purposes as well as transient passengers en-route to other destinations. Indeed in 2009, the hospitality and tourism sector contributed RM26.6 billion towards the Malaysia Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and it was ranked second, after the manufacturing sector, in terms of overall economic contribution (Ministry ofFinance/Central Bank of Malaysia, 2010). The Malaysian hotel industry has experienced signcant growth in the last 10 years and many hotels in Malaysia are now opulent, with new hotels achieving the highest standards of presentation. However, service delivery often lags behind the physical environment and struggles to meet international standards and therefore the expectations of international guests. There are diverse views among service quality researchers as to how to improve service delivery standards. This paper seeks to examine an appropriate service delivery improvement model that provides a framework that can be used to attract, train, motivate and retain employees. The main arguments relate to the means to achieve customer satisfaction and to develop customer loyalty. The general view among scholars is that there is a link between employee satisfaction and job performance. This is evident within the literature where many strategies that have been developed to enhance both products and services in a variety of contexts are presented

Barriers to improving service delivery in Malaysian hotels: Experts views on a proposed model

Tourism is an important industry that contributes at least 9 per cent of the world's GDP, and makes a significant contribution to the economic development of many countries. In Malaysia, for example, tourism is central to economic prosperity and is seen as a major catalyst for growth and development. While many Malaysian hotels are opulent, well-appointed hotels, service delivery tends to be inconsistent often failing to meet internationalstandards. This suggests that there is a need to develop a customized, industry-wide servicedelivery model that could assist hotel operators to improve service quality. A review of literature has found that there are countless service quality models that could be used todevelop an appropriate service improvement model for Malaysia. However, service sector researchers have recognised that businesses that develop motivated, customer consciousemployees achieve better service outcomes because employees who do not have confidencein the service that they are required to deliver are incapable of delivering services in a manner that meets or exceeds customer expectations. This would suggest that a suitable serviceimprovement model should focus primarily on the people dimension of service. The aims of this study were to test this proposition by exploring the current state of play in the Malaysianhotel sector by soliciting the views of key, industry experts. In depth interviews were used toexplore their perceptions of the importance of the people dimension in service delivery. Thedata obtained from this research process was then used to fashion a customised serviceimprovement model by extracting the most appropriate service improvement dimensionsfrom existing, empirically tested models found within the literature

Improving service quality in Malaysian hotels: Exploring the people dimension

In Malaysia, tourism is a major catalyst for growth and development. While many Malaysian hotels are opulent, well-appointed hotels, service delivery standards are inconsistent. The aim of this study was to develop a customized, industry-wide service delivery model that could assist hotel operators to improve service quality. In-depth interviews were used to explore experts' perceptions of the importance of aspects of the people dimension in service delivery. The data obtained from this research process was then used to fashion a customised service improvement model by extracting the most appropriate service improvement dimensions from existing, empirically tested models within the literature

Challenges and Issues of Teaching and Learning during the Pandemic (COVID-19)

This study is conducted to investigate the effectiveness and readiness of teaching and learning among students during the pandemic (COVID-19) towards the online learning among hospitality and tourism students. A quantitative method was employed and students from the Faculty of Hotel and Tourism Management Penang Campus were chosen as the target sample. The sample size for this study was 430 and a total of 360 questionnaires were successfully collected with the return rate of 83.72%. Descriptive analysis was used to interpret the demographic data, Pearson Correlation analysis was employed to examine the correlation among variables, and multiple regression analysis was used to measure the overall relationship between independent and dependent variables. From these analyses, the three (3) variables (social presence, cognitive presence, and teaching presence) were found to have positive relationships with a student’s learning experience. Overall, this study is important to fellow academicians, academic researchers, and practitioners in improving their methods of teaching and learning, assisting the students, and strengthening their teaching techniques in online learning