تأمین الکترونیکی تجهیزات : یک ابزار نوظهور برای مدیریت زنجیره تامین هتل

In the hotel business, the flow of goods, services, and information should be designed to efficiently transform raw materials into finished products/services with values. Lodging services regularly purchase a large quantity of supplies for which procurement systems play a crucial role in maintaining daily operations and quality. Today, a major goal of a hotel's supply chain management is to efficiently apply information technology to its procurement systems. This research examined Philadelphia area hotel purchasing managers’ views about e-Procurement. Perceived costs and benefits of e-Procurement are identified and the strategic role of IT in procurement is described.

It is generally understood that the use of technology has rapidly changed the lodging industry from a low-tech-high-touch mindset to today's high-tech-high-touch perspective. However, the degree to which the lodging industry has embraced technological innovations appears equivocal. On one hand, Siguaw et al. (2000, p. 22) suggest that the lodging industry lags behind other industries in the implementation of new information technology. Another study conducted by Arthur Anderson (2000) found that fewer than half of the hotels in the United States had widely integrated IT systems in place. On the other hand, some researchers maintain that the adoption of technology within the hospitality industry is extensive. For example, Cho and Olsen (1998, p. 376) reported that it was evident the acceptability and widespread use of IT (information technology) was visible in many aspects of the service industry in general and in the lodging industry in particular. Industry experts argue that the technological applications of the lodging business are innovative and pioneering as compared to other industries (Watkins, 2001). e-Procurement is a good example of the innovative use of technology in the lodging industry. e-Procurement is purchasing goods and services over the Internet. Its further goal is to move the entire procurement process online, bringing operators together with their chosen distributors and enabling a streamlined and automated flow of the purchasing cycle (Hearn & Gibbons, 2001, p. 3, 5). Although this particular technology is still in its infancy in the lodging business, it has drawn much attention from lodging industry practitioners in recent years (Black, 2001; Cline, 2001; Frabotta, 2001; Higley, 2000a and Higley, 2000b; Hotel & Hotel Management, 2002; Marsan, 2001; Scavone, 2002; Tan and Dajalos, 2001; Watkins, 2001; Young, 2001). In 2000, the Aberdeen Group reported that the hospitality sector was estimated to spend $50 billion to $60 billion annually for e-Procurement solutions (Aberdeen Group Inc., 2000, p. 1). It is clear that procurement is an important expense for a lodging operation. In reality, the product price is neither the only nor the major component of the total cost to an organization when estimating procurement spending. Neef (2001, p. 16) reported that the Group Trade in its recent study concluded that although leveraging a company's buying power through online markets and auctions might reduce the price paid for materials by 10–20%, the real value to the company could be realized through reducing transaction costs (associated with manual business process) of up to 70% of total savings. The leaner management of the 21st century requires better management of these costs. e-Procurement offers a great opportunity to reduce costs and contributes to the success of the lodging business. Although for decades the reengineering of procurement has been attempted through various information technologies (e.g., telecommunications), the real opportunity for achieving this reengineering goal may lie in the use of e-Procurement. This is particularly true in a stagnant economy. High revenue growth is often the major concern of corporate executives but such growth may not be always possible in a slow economic environment. Therefore, the cost component, substantially impacted by an e-Procurement strategy, may be the key to continue creating value in difficult circumstances. The classical value of e-Procurement lies in reducing costs that goes directly to the bottom line which has a greater impact than increasing revenue. Despite its importance, a review of literature on the adoption of e-Procurement revealed that, unlike in other service industries, little published research exists (Aberdeen Group Inc., 2000; Tan and Dajalos, 2001) and virtually no academic research has been conducted to investigate supply chain management (SCM) in the lodging industry. Thus, very little has been learned as to where the lodging industry stands in the adoption of e-Procurement in the context of SCM. The purpose of this study was to understand the importance of e-Procurement as a function of supply chain of the lodging industry. It further attempted to understand the importance of adopting technology to improve the traditional purchasing function in the US lodging industry. As the lodging industry grows to be more technology oriented, the urgency of understanding the purchasing revolution becomes apparent and warrants a need for research to further advance the body of knowledge of existing procurement models. This research study attempted to study the adoption of the e-Procurement concept by the hotels’ purchasing departments in the Philadelphia area. It attempted to address two important issues related to SCM by hotels in Philadelphia: (1) understanding costs and benefits of the e-Procurement adoption as perceived by hotels’ purchase decision makers and (2) studying the current or planned adoption of the e-Procurement concept described by the participated hotels. In this article, the authors discuss important procurement strategy in a hotel supply chain and report practical findings such as the purchasing preferences for materials (or products) that hotels in this area were interested in procuring online. The goal of conducting this exploratory study is to help develop pertinent hypotheses or research propositions for further inquiries.

The function of SCM is to plan, organize, and coordinate all of the supply chain's activities. Today the concept of SCM indicates a holistic approach to managing the entire supply chain. Before a software solution is attempted to fully support e-Commerce initiatives, the supply chain process may require business process reengineering (BPR) that will change the internal organization structure and procedures. For successful implementation of any technology it is necessary that a company redefines its business processes which involve a change in organizational structure and/or redefining of business functions within the organization. By installing and using e-Procurement, a hotel can allow employees who are not very sophisticated in terms of education and salary to handle the purchasing process on their own. At the same time e-Procurement enables the management to audit and discover all the ‘dusty corners’ of its business. This ubiquitous access to product information and self-service transactions through the Internet will make the difference between regular and excellent performers. In summing up the future of e-Procurement Gebauer et al. (1998) and Gebauer and Segev (2001) believe that information technology will support or even automate all different kinds of procurement procedures across entire organizations by routing technical specifications, approval forms and payment instructions according to internal policy constraints, external requirements, and market opportunities. The fragmented nature of the hospitality industry creates inefficiency in the purchasing process that generates a need for embracing hospitality e-Procurement exchanges. The lodging industry in particular is a good candidate for adopting e-Procurement systems because of its complex purchasing procedures required to deal with large quantity and various quality purchases of consumables on a regular basis. The seemingly high switching costs of converting from offline purchasing to e-Procurement can be rewarded in the form of reduced transaction processing costs, increased end-user involvement in procurement transactions, and more effective purchasing decisions. Improved end-user employee access will reduce the need for human intervention by purchasing agents and other support personnel. The study indicates that hotels are expected to restructure organizational processes and corporate culture and in turn, develop ‘entirely new business capacities.’ In one of his interviews Brad Douglas V.P. Strategic Partnership at Choice Hotels International said, “We’re going through behavioral changes with franchisees, and that's a tough thing to go through. The most positive reaction from franchises comes when they realize they can do all of their shopping, complete with comparing prices, in one sitting. On the other hand, the biggest challenge is for people to use the technology often so they become more familiar with it” (Higley, 2000a). Perhaps in the past, hotel chains have focused on productivity and revenue enhancements because these are sources of differentiation when attracting franchisees to their brands. In addition, now they can rely on economies of scale to reduce costs and enhance the brand when developing and providing these types of technologies. Decision makers of the hotels opined that, involving marketing and operations personnel in IT decisions and projects further assures more complete buy-in and successful acceptance of new technologies. Ascertaining that adequate training is provided and that people are able to see the benefit from e-Procurement technology is important. Finally, e-Procurement is a continuously changing area and flexible systems that can be modified and upgraded easily should be selected to maximize the return on investment. Regardless of the current purchasing strategy of a company, the overall consensus is that e-Procurement technologies will become an important management tool to enhance the performance of supply chains. Although e-Procurement is still very much in its infancy in the lodging industry, one may expect to see a rapid increase in its functionality that will assist both buyers and suppliers in the electronic environments over the next few years. The benefits are expected to accelerate the adoption rate of these technologies once remaining uncertainties are reduced to a level that encourages significant resource commitments. The evidence presented in this article should help hotel managers in finance, accounting, information technology, and purchasing departments to better prepare and plan for the future adoption of e-Procurement technologies in their properties. The study suggests that moving away from traditional offline purchase processing to online sequencing presents significant savings, improved productivity and enhanced operational efficiencies. Better communication between hotels and suppliers and support services may provide more favorable price offerings and related activities for the hotels customers. Summary statistics and supplier performance reports generated by various decision-making tools will enable the management to review and utilize for future planning. Ultimately, the most important results of this study on the e-Procurement debate will be to highlight for key executives the importance and strategic nature of the procurement process itself and its integral relationship with the supply chain and a hotel company's bottom line. e-Procurement is a promising research area for future development and competitive positioning. After interviewing the decision makers at the property level, it is apparent that if e-Procurement has to be incorporated as a part of the chain operation the necessary adoption decisions will be made at the corporate level. In such instances, a survey-based case study research involving interviews with a representative sample of the executive board members of the chain hotels would provide a better perspective of what the overall implications of adopting e-Procurement technologies in chain properties are. An alternative approach may be to conduct a case study for a single chain with smaller number of properties and understand the operational and financial implications at both the corporate and property levels. Longitudinal case studies will be beneficial to explore the sequence of implementation and integration of various information technologies at various properties of the hotel chain company being studied. Another promising agenda may include a supplier-side case study to learn about their requirements and intensions to participate in the adoption and implementation of e-Procurement. It is also interesting to access the state of the industry on issues regarding e-Procurement adoption and implementation. A stratified random sample of purchasing decision makers can be drawn from member hotels of the American Hotel & Lodging Association (AH & LA) based on their geographic locations by states. A structured survey can be developed based on the key findings from conducted case studies to collect opinions on e-Procurement adoption and implementation from sampled hotel purchasing decision makers. More research is needed to fully answer the research questions. Close interactions among all market participants (suppliers, buyers and technology vendors) is necessary to continuously identify technology requirements and, subsequently, to develop systems that provide bottom-line value and thus incentives for adoption by all parties. Since currently available systems are far from mature, the advent of a total e-Procurement solution for hotel industry depends heavily on issues like the availability of manageable technology and whether organizations actually realize the benefits of deploying it. Academic research will continue to play an important role in raising awareness and spreading news of innovative applications, as will the trade press and industry associations.