Leveraging Social Media
The risks and opportunities of Web 2.0 for HR professionals in the hospitality industry was the subject of a keynote speech, while a large panel of senior-level HR leaders, academicians, attorneys and thought leaders batted around such issues as sexual harassment, union organizing and employee engagement.
By Anne Freedman
While the "bully pulpit" has always had power to influence -- in both positive and negative ways -- an employer's brand, among other things, that power used to be held mostly by government officials and the mass media.
With the advent of social media, that power is widespread, said Jeff Clarke, CEO and president of Travelport, at his Tuesday morning keynote address during the Fourth National HR in Hospitality
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Conference & Expo, held at the Wynn Las Vegas from Feb. 22 to 24.
Clarke personally saw the results of that power when hundreds of trips to Las Vegas were cancelled within days of President Barack Obama making his first negative comment about tourism to the gambling capital. One of Travelport's companies tracked those cancellations, he said. New York-based Travelport provides data and transactional processing services for the travel and tourism industry, including the Web-based travel site, Orbitz.
But, Clarke said, it no longer takes a president to have such a significant impact, citing two YouTube videos that went viral. One highlighted a flight attendant on Southwest Airlines who entertains passengers by using rap music to provide the customary flight information about fastening seat belts and wearing air masks, when necessary. The other was created by an unhappy customer who videotaped the long line he waited in at a Hertz rental car counter in the Fort Lauderdale airport -- a line of customers assisted by a single agent, until she walked away, saying she was "off the clock."
Clarke played both of those videos to the audience at the conference, which drew about 400 registrants. Seen by millions, those videos offer powerful anecdotes about companies that can affect both internal and external stakeholders, he said.
Thus is the "opportunity and ... threat to the brand" from social media, he said.
It's incumbent on HR leaders to take advantage of the opportunity, he said, by utilizing Web 2.0 and social networking to emotionally connect to employees.
"Increasingly, our personal and work lives are intermingling and part of that is this social media phenomenon," Clarke said.
Successful initiatives in that vein will provide transparency to employees, collaboration throughout the organization and the ability for feedback to be given and received.
Some Web 2.0 uses adopted by organizations include Ikea, which uses Twitter to enhance communication with employees; IBM, which "is willing to give up control and editing, and put some risk and opportunity on their brand to let individual employees blog about the company;" and Hilton, which uses podcasts and PlayStation Portable game simulations to train employees.
Clarke also highlighted the use of Facebook by Ernst & Young for recruiting; a pilot program by Sodexho that utilizes Second Life for virtual interviewing of job candidates; and an integrated program by Harrah's that includes Facebook and YouTube, and focuses on charitable giving and environmental leadership.
All of these programs impact the employee brand, differentiate organizations and enhance employee engagement and communication, he said.
The risk of social media -- and the reason many companies are hesitant to utilize it -- is that companies give up control of the message, he said. HR leaders need to respond to that concern by making sure employees understand the corporate culture.
"The employees have to know the brands and what is permissible within those brands," Clarke said.
Executive Thought Leaders
Sexual harassment, union organizing and employment engagement were on the agenda as 20 senior-level HR executives from some of the most well-known hospitality organizations, academicians, employment-law attorneys and other thought leaders gathered for the first Cornell University HR Executive Roundtable held before an audience.
While there is a trend in some locales to lower the standard used to judge whether conduct equates to sexual harassment, HR leaders should not focus too much on the law and instead create an organizational culture that does not accept offensive behavior, said Michael Lebowich, a partner in the Proskauer law firm.
In fact, he said, a good company policy on the subject would probably have an even lower standard than the generally accepted legal provision that such behavior be "severe and pervasive."
From a practical standpoint, said Paul Wagner, a shareholder in the Stokes Roberts & Wagner law firm, HR leaders should emphasize reporting such conduct -- focusing on observers as opposed to victims, noting that such a practice is a "much more potent way to eradicate" sexual harassment.
Focus on cultural issues when putting together employee or manager training, said Carolyn Clark, senior vice president of human resources for Fairmont Hotels and Resorts.
In an industry that includes so many diverse ethnicities and cultures, where "so many things mean different things to different people," HR leaders "have to go beyond the law ... to get people to understand what sexual harassment means -- and it's a cultural issue."
John Longstreet, president of Hospitality Leaders Group, noted that ignoring such behavior can create a domino effect that can put an organization's success at risk. The focus for HR training should be on employees doing the right thing, not legal definitions. With the right value system and culture, with reporting mechanisms and transparency, sexual harassment can be eliminated.
David Sherwyn, associate professor of law at Cornell University's School of Hotel Administration -- who moderated the session along with J. Bruce Tracey, an associate professor of human resource management at the school -- noted that "at the end of the day, the people file charges not just because of the [offensive] action but because they are unhappy with the company."
Insensitive management is also an argument often used by union organizers, said Chuck Conine, founder and president of Hospitality HR Solutions. If HR executives ensure that performance-review processes are taken seriously and poor management is addressed, many issues that could lead to acceptance of a union could be eliminated.
With the potential passage of the Employee Free Choice Act riding high last year -- a potential that has seemed to fade, although it is not totally eliminated -- some hospitality organizations -- including Loews, Crestline Hotels & Resorts and Aramark -- opted to hold sessions to educate employees and/or supervisors about the act, said the HR leaders of those organizations.
But, noted Arte Nathan, a former HR leader of the Wynn and now president and COO of Strategic Development Worldwide, "EFCA won't bring unions in. It's our own behavior and we have got to learn to modify that."
Even without passage of that act, the National Labor Relations Board -- once it's fully staffed -- could decide to shorten the time permitted for companies to respond to union campaigns, which might make it harder to keep workplaces nonunion, some of the panelists said.
Regardless of the time period, Nathan said, "you can't win [a union-organizing campaign] unless you have been talking to your employees all the time and talking to your managers and making sure they are doing the right thing all the time."
To make sure employees do the right thing, HR executives need to focus on their leadership, said Wagner. "It's not wages. It's not benefits. It's leadership or the lack of leadership."
If an organization's leadership is good, the "by-product is nobody can get in our door." Sometimes, he added, a company's only move to prevent a union from being approved by employees is to terminate a general manager.
Clark of Fairmont Hotels said her organization links the results of employee surveys to the managers of those workers -- using a heat map of green, yellow and red colors -- to provide insight into potential trouble spots. In that way, the organization can quickly respond to problems.
Employee surveys can also be a good indicator of retention -- and many of the panelists were concerned about retention, both at the hourly level and at the managerial level, as the industry continues to struggle.
A recent survey of employees at the Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts resulted in many positive satisfaction scores, said Debbie Brown, vice president of human resources for the Americas. But, in the comments attached to those survey results, she found a lot of workers who said they were "burned out."
HR needs to find ways to boost the morale of employees, she said. Increased compensation and incentivization are part of that effort, she said.
Rosalyn Smith, corporate director of human resources at Omni Hotels, said her organization's response to concern about "the frozen middle" resulted in an enhanced commitment to training and development, especially around core competencies.
Such career development and growth is especially important to Generations X and Y, said Diane Turek Pire, senior vice president of human resources for Wyndham Hotel group. "I think that's what we have to leverage in order to attract and retain," she said.
HR also needs to devise ways to retain hourly workers in an industry that includes many low-wage/low-skilled jobs. "I think it's incumbent on all of us," said Robert Mellwig, senior vice president of human resources for Lowe Enterprises Destination Hotels & Resorts, "to find ways to create value in these jobs. Otherwise people are going to leave this industry."
The HR in Hospitality
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Conference and Expo is produced by Human Resource Executive Conferences
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in conjunction with Cornell University's School of Hotel Administration and its ILR School.
Click
here
to see a report from the first day of the conference.
February 24, 2010 Copyright 2010© LRP Publications
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