ABSTRACT
Employee empowerment creates an impression that the empowerment experience is liberating, driven by a concern for improving the working conditions of hospitality service staff. This chapter argues that whilst there may be benefits for employees, this cluster of changes is management inspired, and aimed at service improvement via a more involved service workforce. ‘Empowerment’ has been used as a term to describe an array of different employee experiences encompassing directive, consultative and participative styles. This chapter suggests a framework of meanings of empowerment that highlight different management meanings and intentions. Changes in working arrangements designed to match the employee job discretion needed to meet service delivery consistent with the different service types are essential. Ultimately, the success or failure of the changes will be judged by how the changes are experienced by the newly empowered, and the extent to which this changes organisational performance. Hospitality managers need to be aware of these different service types so as to better direct employee efforts to meeting the customer expectations of the service experience offered by the hospitality organisation.
