Leveraging employee engagement for competitive advantage in the hospitality industry. a comparative study of hotels A and B in Zimbabwe

Abstract

The main thrust of this paper is to explore whether employee engagement contributes to competitive advantage in the hospitality industry. The researchers were inspired to carry out a study in the hospitality industry because of the need to understand how best to place employee engagement as a human resource initiative, as a source of competitive advantage. Of concern was the need to increase the knowledge base on the benefits of good service provision that comes as a result of having a fully engaged workforce. The research is mainly qualitative since it is in descriptive format. However, quantitative approaches are also used through graphs and tables to illustrate data. The research equally used cross case analysis, by comparing Hotel A and Hotel B. A total of 78 respondents participated in the study. The study revealed the contribution of employee engagement to competitive advantage and highlighted how employee engagement acts as a key determinant of competitive advantage. Hotel B is better placed in terms of employee engagement as compared to Hotel A and as a result it enjoys a competitive edge over Hotel A. Hotel B employees are highly satisfied, motivated, committed and fully engaged as compared to Hotel A hence offer better services giving the hotel strategic advantage over A as evidenced by the 43.7% market share against Hotel A’s 17.3% market share.