دخالت گردشگری، مشارکت کار و رضایت شغلی نیروهای صفی هتل

This study examined the relationship among tourism involvement, work engagement and job satisfaction in the hotel industry. Data was gathered from 336 frontline employees of 20 international hotels in Taiwan and was analyzed via structural equation modeling. Findings show that tourism involvement is positively related to work engagement, while both tourism involvement and work engagement are positively related to job satisfaction. Work engagement was found to partially mediate the relationship between tourism involvement and job satisfaction. Implications for hotel managers, limitations and future research directions are discussed.

The core product of hotel firms is services (Kusluvan, 2003, Lashley and Lee-Ross, 2003 and Richard and Sundaram, 1994). Despite services being intangible, hotel frontline employees “produce tangible services” via direct interaction with customers (Gonzalez and Garazo, 2006, Harris, 2012, Kusluvan et al., 2010 and Smith, 1994). It is for this reason that frontline employees are critical elements of service quality. To better serve customers, hotel firms must understand attitudes and values that frontline employees should have in their jobs. Previous research has demonstrated that high performing tourism-related firms were characterized by engaged or satisfied frontline employees (Kusluvan et al., 2010, Lam and Ozorio, 2012, Salanova et al., 2005 and Slatten and Mehmetoglu, 2010). Engaged employees provide better service, which can increase customer loyalty (Salanova et al., 2005). Satisfied frontline employees can maintain high performance and deliver quality services (LaLopa, 1997 and Kusluvan, 2003). Due to the known effect of work engagement and job satisfaction on firm performance, tourism scholars have attempted to identify antecedents of work engagement and job satisfaction (Kusluvan et al., 2010 and Slatten and Mehmetoglu, 2010). The current study, however, explores a factor that has not been widely examined in the tourism literature: tourism involvement. Using tourism involvement to predict tourism employees’ work outcomes is a fair extension of tourism research because work life is correlated to tourism (Dik and Hansen, 2008, McCabe, 2009 and McCabe and Stokoe, 2010). Tourism provides “an alternative experience of time, that is, time off or holiday time, which appears as an alternative rhythm, free from constraints of the daily tempo” (Wang, 2000, p. 216). It has positive effects on tourism participants’ work and overall lives (Dolnicar et al., 2012, Neal et al., 2007, Sirgy, 2001, Sirgy, 2002 and Sirgy et al., 2011). Individuals who enjoy freedom in tourism activities are more likely to feel a great degree of control and to gain a sense of intrinsic motivation (Crane, 2011 and Witt and Ellis, 1987). They are also more inclined to experience satisfaction, pleasure and enjoyment in all domains of their lives, including their work (Gilbert and Abdullah, 2004, Neal et al., 2007 and Sirgy et al., 2011). Therefore, it seems appropriate to consider that highly tourism-involved employees demonstrate better work outcomes than low tourism-involved employees. When investigating the influence of tourism involvement on work-related outcomes, one has to take into account that tourism involvement is not just simple participation in vacations. In contrast to the effect of vacation, which fades out rapidly (De Bloom, Geurts, Taris, Sonnentag, Weerth, & Kompier, 2010), Havitz and Dimanche (1990) define tourism involvement as a person’s perceived relevance of tourism activities and the motivational state with regard to them. Tourism involvement encompasses an individual’s long-term attitudes toward tourism activities. These attitudes in turn influence an individual’s behavior over time. Studies have reported that people with different levels of tourism involvement demonstrate divergent tourism behaviors, such as information searching, decision making and experience sharing (Jamrozy et al., 1996, Park and Kim, 2010 and Zalatan, 1998). Some even adjust their lifestyle, such as travelling and spending more (Clements and Josiam, 1995 and Kim et al., 1997) to become more involved in tourism-related activities. Therefore, tourism involvement has enduring rather than short-term effects on tourists (Havitz, Dimanche, & Bogle, 1994; Havitz & Mannell, 2005). Many studies have found a close relationship between tourism, quality of life and working life of tourists (Dann, 2001, Etzion, 2003, Fritz and Sonnentag, 2006, Kuhnel and Sonnentag, 2011, Lounsbury and Hoopes, 1986, Neal et al., 1999, Neal et al., 2007, Rook and Zijlstra, 2006, Sirgy et al., 2011, Sonnentag, 2003, Sonnentag and Zijlstra, 2006 and Westman and Eden, 1997). In general, positive effects of tourism on tourists’ overall life and working life have been found. Despite the positive implications of tourism on working life, examinations of the effects of tourism involvement on specific work outcomes have been limited. The current study focuses on work engagement and job satisfaction as factors of work outcomes due to their known effect on firm performance. Moreover, researchers have made significant contributions to identifying correlates of work engagement (Harter et al., 2002, Schaufeli and Bakker, 2004 and Saks, 2006) but it has been unclear whether work engagement can mediate the relationship between tourism involvement and job satisfaction. The current study therefore aims to close these gaps by investigating the relationship between tourism involvement and work engagement; studying the relationship between work engagement and job satisfaction; examining the relationship between tourism involvement and job satisfaction; and exploring the mediating effect of work engagement on the relationship between tourism involvement and job satisfaction. In developing and testing this model, the current study makes both theoretical and practical contributions to tourism literature. From a theoretical perspective, the current study is the first to explore the direct and indirect relationships among tourism involvement, work engagement and job satisfaction in the tourism domain. Results of the current study can contribute not only to the knowledge regarding the factors that foster employees’ work engagement and job satisfaction but also to literature on both tourism involvement and tourism human resource management. Moreover, a critical review conducted by Kusluvan and his colleagues (2010) found that work engagement and job satisfaction of employees in the tourism industry are mainly influenced by demographic, organizational and work-related factors. Most of these studies took place in the context of the workplace. This may lead to the misunderstanding that work engagement and job satisfaction can only be enhanced in the workplace. However, the positive effect of tourism on attitude and behavior at work is clear (Fritz & Sonnentag, 2006). Such effect is important because it allows managers to enhance work outcomes through tourism. Surprisingly, this issue has gained little attention in the tourism literature. The current study explores whether attitudes toward tourism can influence specific work outcomes in the workplace. It therefore contributes to the tourism literature by linking work and non-work domains. Furthermore, as mentioned above, the positive effect of tourism fades out quickly. It may be argued that, in the long term, employees need other opportunities besides tourism activities to enhance their work attitude and behavior. Until now, however, most of the existing studies emphasize short-term effects of tourism. They regard tourism as a short break from work. In this sense, the current study contributes to tourism literature by examining whether tourism can have enduring effects on tourists depending on different levels of involvement. Moreover, studies on tourism involvement often use tourists as sampling units. Few studies have directly used a sample of hotel frontline employees to investigate their tourism involvement. From a practical perspective, identifying the effects of tourism involvement has direct implications for hotel mangers. If the contributions of tourism involvement on work engagement and job satisfaction can be confirmed, it may be meaningful for hotel managers to encourage frontline employees to get more involved in tourism. Hotels can also organize tourism activities to increase employees’ work engagement and job satisfaction. This article is organized by first presenting the literature review relating to tourism involvement, work engagement and job satisfaction. These are covered first as they provide the theoretical fundamentals for examining the hypotheses. The methodology section describes the sampling, instruments and methods of data analysis. A profile of the respondents and the statistical results are then presented. In the discussion, the implications of the results, limitations of the study, recommendations for future research and final conclusions are explained in detail.

Tourism involvement is a significant, yet under-examined issue with respect to work engagement and job satisfaction among hotel frontline employees. This study identified a significant relationship among tourism involvement, work engagement and job satisfaction, suggesting a new way of managing human resources in the tourism industry. Hotel firms should understand the conditions that contribute to work engagement and job satisfaction, since engaged and satisfied employees can provide enhanced quality of service.