NTRODUCTION.
Its evidently true that many organizations worldwide nowadays are out-competing each other in the same industry, this has been propelled with their ability to be able to acquire and use human resources. Therefore, organizations need to put into consideration the importance of keeping human resources up-to-date. By doing so managers are required to take into account to all core roles of human resource management, since it plays a vital role towards attaining the goals of the organization and thus its success in the market.
A Singapore based hospitality industry has been facing challenges to cub its slow workforce growth. Its potential labor shortage is expected to intensify since there will be an additional of about 14,000 hotel rooms within a period of three years with a few numbers of local graduates joining the industry yearly (Singapore Tourism Board,2015). However, the outbreak of diseases such as Servere Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) and Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) have led to the closure of educational institutions. This has led to the inability to finish the curriculums, thus forcing the government to stress on the importance of online classes. The country’s ministry of education has been encouraging the use of ICT (Information Communication Technology) by its institutions in order to be able to adopt new ways of teaching and learning (Ministry of Education, Singapore 2013).
Background of the study.
The following factors have contributed to increased competition among organizations, changes advance in technology, political instability, globalization and environmental effects (Evans, Pucik & Barsoux 2002,32), and as a result triggering this organizations to be able train their employees, preparing them towards adjusting to the increase in competition and thus promoting their performance. Its therefore vital to not to take into consideration the prevailing evidence on accumulation of knowledge in the business corporate world, which has been brought about by advancements in technology and increased efforts geared towards development of human resources in an organization.
The tourism industry nowadays has been one of the most productive and powerful sectors of the economy, especially for those nations which rely on provision of services. Therefore, mangers have to devote more in human capital, new technologies and education in order to create and build a viable advantage for their products. In 1998, the Higher Education Funding Council of England has described tourism and hospitality industry as an industry with one of the highest levels of skill shortages and staff turnover. By investing on employee’s skills and education companies enhance quality of their products and services as well as customer satisfaction. E-learning has therefore been born as a result where people can now be trained and educated online as compared to the traditional job training process.in order for a company to achieve and enhance better job performance, effective training and educations of its staff is necessary. It is obvious that employees are a critical resource to consider, thus its vital to enhance their involvement to the organization’s goals and objectives as a way of sustaining its effective performance. Managers should therefore be in a position to guarantee adequate supply of employees who are technically and socially capable of career development (Afshan, Sobia, Kamran & Nasir 2012,646). Its therefore important to consider Training as the only way of developing the organization’s intellectual property through building employees’ capabilities. Therefore, in order to be successful organization, has to acquire and use human resources effectively. Organizations also need to redesign human resource management in a way that it can fit into its structure as this will make the organization achieve its aims and goals. It’s also vital for organizations to aid in their workforce by obtaining the necessary skills needed for better performance. Management of human resources particularly in Asia and Singapore is rather challenging as most organizations have difficulties in finding proper human resources. This may be as a result of the different kinds of problems such as political instability, poor infrastructure, low levels of education and purchasing power, disease and famine that has been prevent in Asian business context (Kamoche 2002, 994-995).
Problem statement.
Taking into consideration that there is an increase on the effects of organizational employee training there still exists less literature on human resource development related issues in the third world countries (Debrah & Ofori 2006,440). However, there being so much known on the economics of training of staff in the developed countries, no studies have been found yet. This study plays an important role toward reducing the gap in literature and thereby establishing the basis that will help understand some aspects of human resource management in general and training particularly in Singapore.
Goals of study.
The main objective of this study is to inspect on the effects of training on staff performance within the hospitality industry in Singapore. In order to achieve the above the following are to be put into consideration; What training programs exists in This industry? What are the training goals? What methods are used and How do they meet the training objectives? How does training affect employee performance? The findings in this study are expected to assist in highlighting the ways in which human resource training can be beneficial to the organization and career development of its staff. The results also pave way for the improvement of human resources needed for the competitive performance of organizations operating in the same business context such as Singapore and Asia generally.
Definition of key concepts.
Human resource management refers to the way organizations manage their employees and help them improve in their career (McCourt & Eldridge 2003.2) thus being able to execute organization’s objectives and goals successfully. Human resource development on the other hand refers to the integration of individual career and organization development for the achievement of maximum productivity opportunity, quality and fulfillment of organization’s employees as they work to accomplish its goals and objectives (Pace, Smith & Mills 1991,6). On the other hand, training is a type of activity which is planned, systematic and its results in enhanced level of skill, knowledge and competency that are necessary to perform work effectively and successfully. Development is a broad ongoing mult-faced set of activities aimed at bringing an organization to another verge of performance. Employee performance can be illustrated as as the contribution of employees to the company’s successful attainment of its goals (Herbert, John & Lee 200), According to Singapore National Development Program (1995), performance can be used to define what a company has accomplished with respect to the results, processes, importance and success. Employee performance can be revealed in order to improve production, easy adoption of new technologies and availability of highly motivated employees.
References.
Braun, P., & Hollick, M. (2006). Tourism skills delivery: Sharing tourism knowledge online. Education + Training, 48, 693-703. doi:10.1108/00400910610710100 Buhalis, D. (2000). Marketing the competitive destination of the future. Tourism Management, 21(1), 97-116. doi:10.1016/S0261-5177(99)00095-3.
Kasavana, M. (1999). Educating and empowering through web-based technology. Lodging, 59-60. Lagus, K., & Kasaki, S. (1999). Keyword selection method for characterizing text document maps. Ninth International Conference on Artificial Neutral Networks Proceedings (ICANN’99)(pp. 371-376). London: IEE Press O’Reilly, T. (2005, September). What Is Web 2.0? Retrieved August 17, 2009, from http://www.oreillynet.com/I.
Cantoni, Kalbaska and Inversini (2009) E-learning in tourism and hospitality: A map Journal of Hospitality, Leisure, Sport and Tourism Education, 8(2), 148 – 156 156 Gretzel, U., Yu-Lan, Y., & Fesenmaier, D. R.
Botterill, D. (2003). Virtual learning environments in hospitality, leisure, tourism and sport: A review. Journal of Hospitality, Leisure, Sports and Tourism Education, 2(1), 75-92. doi:10.3794/johlste.21.36 Higher Education Funding Council for England (1998). Review of ho
