Quality of Work Life in Tourism - Implications for Competitive Advantage of the Tourism Industry

AbstractTourism is an extremely labour intensive and high-contact industry. Competing effectively with rival organizations requires not only a sufficient number of employees but first of all employees equipped with appropriate competencies. Nowadays human capital is of vital importance as it is the critical asset that creates sustainable competitive advantage. The ability to acquire and retain skilled, motivated and engaged personnel depends on the attractiveness of the career offered by employers. The aim of the paper is to identify job characteristics affecting work quality in tourism in the context of gaining competitive advantage of the tourism industry. The paper analyses the results of the fifth wave of the European Working Condition Survey run by Eurofound in 2010. Special attention is paid to facets that may affect significantly job satisfaction and, consequently, constitute key drivers of competitive advantage and tourism industry development; these include: financial conditions of employment, opportunities for vocational development, social relations, and work-life balance.Keywords: Quality of work, human resources, competitive advantage, tourism industry, European UnionIntroductionA firm's success in the market is dependent on whether it has properly selected tangible and intangible resources and whether it is able to use them innovatively and efficiently. This means that the source of competitive advantage is the combination of exceptional resources and capabilities which help create a value for a customer (Evans et al., 2003). Since advantages based on tangible elements of a product are easy to copy, it can be noted that there is a marked increase in the significance of intangible resources. This is especially true for human resources, which are the only resource of entities that has competences to utilize other assets and thus can be recognized as autotelic. Efforts of tourist organizations should aim not only to attract employees with proper skills, but also create conditions that will make them stay with the firm in the long term and actively participate in realizing its strategic goals. Employees enjoying a high level of job satisfaction are characterized by loyalty towards their companies, and their attitudes and behaviours are conducive to providing quality services, maintaining a positive and long-term rapport with customers (Heskett et al., 1994; Van Looy et al., 2003). Such behaviours enhance effectiveness of gaining competitive advantage by implementing the differentiation strategy.The increasing role and significance of human capital in contemporary enterprises as well as the indisputable link between internal service quality and organisational productivity and performance justifies the analysis of working conditions in the tourism industry. Sector attractiveness affects the ability to compete for labour resources and to create sustainable competitive advantage in the contemporary market (Bednarska and Olszewski, 2011). Enhancing working conditions for tourism staff is considered to be one of important ways in which tourism could contribute to improving quality of life in general (Benckendorff et al., 2009). The objective of the paper is to identify job and organisation characteristics determining the quality of work life in tourism in the context of gaining competitive advantage of the tourism industry. In the paper, the results of European Working Condition Survey run by European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions are analysed. Special attention is paid to attributes that may considerably influence the capacity to compete for human capital resources and, as a result, constitute key determinants of achieving competitive advantage and tourism industry development. The first section of the paper is devoted to human capital and its ability to provide sustainable competitive advantage. The second section gives insight to the concept and dimensions of the quality of work life. …