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Purpose The purpose of this study is to explore the beliefs of employees who work in different positions in the hotels in Edirne, Turkey regarding unethical applications. Design/methodology/approach The survey method was used to determine the hotel personnel's unethical behaviors in the process of the service operation in hotels. The questionnaire was mainly developed from a Varinli study which was applied to the employees' job‐related ethics. Findings The findings have been evaluated and analyzed using the SPSS 11.5. The mean value and the t‐test were applied for the analysis. It was aimed to determine the beliefs of the hotel personnel's about unethical behaviors according to the 20 statements related to the topic. It was understood that the respondents significantly did not accept unethical behaviors that were scaled with 20 statements. Research limitations/implications Some statements in the questionnaire were either changed or extended, considering all the hotels in Edirne. The questionnaire was applied in 15 hotels from 9‐13 March in 2009 and excluded employees who were not on the premises during the process. After a week 160 valid questionnaires were either collected from or posted by those concerned. Practical implications The research aims to investigate the job‐related unethical beliefs of hotel employees. The housekeeping, food and beverage, and front‐office departments are mainly studied from the perspecive of the unethical applications. Nevertheless, the answers represented only the personnel's ethical beliefs. Whether they would “actually perform in such a way” in real life is difficult to verify. It is not possible to verify the employees' actual behavior compared with their answers in the questionnaire. Originality/value The paper is based on a Varinli study which was applied to the employees' job‐related ethics. In 2004 Varinli studied the hotel employees' beliefs regarding unethical applications in 3‐ and 4‐star hotels in Capadocia.
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Social Responsibility Journal
Hotel employees' beliefs on unethical behavior
Emel Gonenc Guler, Cemal Yukselen,
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Emel Gonenc Guler, Cemal Yukselen, (2010) "Hotel employees' beliefs on unethical behavior", Social Responsibility Journal, Vol. 6 Issue: 2,
pp.252-267, https://doi.org/10.1108/17471111011051757
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(1998),"Staff job-related ethics of hotel employees in Hong Kong", International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, Vol. 10
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Hotel employees’ beliefs on unethical
behavior
Emel Gonenc Guler and Cemal Yukselen
Abstract
Purpose The purpose of this study is to explore the beliefs of employees who work in different
positions in the hotels in Edirne, Turkey regarding unethical applications.
Design/methodology/approach – The survey method was used to determine the hotel personnel’s
unethical behaviors in the process of the service operation in hotels. The questionnaire was mainly
developed from a Varinli study which was applied to the employees’ job-related ethics.
Findings The findings have been evaluated and analyzed using the SPSS 11.5. The mean value and
the t-test were applied for the analysis. It was aimed to determine the beliefs of the hotel personnel’s
about unethical behaviors according to the 20 statements related to the topic. It was understood that the
respondents significantly did not accept unethical behaviors that were scaled with 20 statements.
Research limitations/implications Some statements in the questionnaire were either changed or
extended, considering all the hotels in Edirne. The questionnaire was applied in 15 hotels from 9-13
March in 2009 and excluded employees who were not on the premises during the process. After a week
160 valid questionnaires were either collected from or posted by those concerned.
Practical implications – The research aims to investigate the job-related unethical beliefs of hotel
employees. The housekeeping, food and beverage, and front-office departments are mainly studied
from the perspecive of the unethical applications. Nevertheless, the answers represented only the
personnel’s ethical beliefs. Whether they would ‘‘actually perform in such a way’’ in real life is difficult to
verify. It is not possible to verify the employees’ actual behavior compared with their answers in the
questionnaire.
Originality/value The paper is based on a Varinli study which was applied to the employees’
job-related ethics. In 2004 Varinli studied the hotel employees’ beliefs regarding unethical applications
in 3- and 4-star hotels in Capadocia.
Keywords Ethics, Hotel and catering industry, Service industries, Turkey
Paper type Research paper
1. Introduction
The hotel industry is concerned with providing accommodation, food, beverage,
entertainment and recreation for travelers away from their usual residences and normal
surroundings. The industry also naturally concerns itself with meeting the traveller’s need for
safety and supports their persons, property, transportation and even the different purpose of
their travel, if so required.
Speaking generally, those who make use of hospitality services demand achievement of a
professional level of quality consistent with the universal standards, although perhaps
regulated for local conditions. They hope that hotel will be clean, comfortable, safe and
secure. They expect to be furnished with hygienic conditions, good and sanitary food and
beverage at a reasonable price. If there are shops or facilities in the hotel, they anticipate
these outlets to reflect the same standards as the essential services. Further, they look to
host for courtesy, friendliness, respect and identification. Perhaps more important than
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VOL. 6 NO. 2 2010, pp. 252-267, QEmerald Group Publishing Limited, ISSN 1747-1117 DOI 10.1108/17471111011051757
Emel Gonenc Guler is
based at Trakya University,
Edirne, Turkey.
Cemal Yukselen is based at
Istanbul Arel University,
Istanbul, Turkey.
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anything else, they want honesty, truth and equity during their staying from the operator to
the employees (Jorgensen, 1992, p. 262).
Unethical consumer practices in hotel industry have attracted much attention from business
practitioners. Tourism sector becomes as an application of the marketing process with
specific side of tourism sector. The main focus of hospitality industry is characterized by its
intangibility not physical good, which may cause a problem in standardization and control.
Performing tourism service is limited by time and place that makes the sector perishable.
Traveling consists of many different products; as transport, accommodations, food and
beverage, attractions that not all presented by the same company. The tourism industry is so
volatile that can easily affected by world events, health, economic crises and so on. Another
important thing about tourism sector is consuming the tourist product at the same time and
place (Wheeler, 1995, p. 41). It can be seen that, the intangibility, inseparability, perishability
and variability are the main characteristics of hotel industry. Because of this, involving a high
degree of contact and coordination between employees and the guests is so responsive that
they may cause a negative impression on the hotel guests and it is possible to meet
unethical behavior of the personnel to the guests.
Concerning all these, in the process of the service production, every personnel in the hotel
should work as a serviceman and as a marketer of the hotel. Especially the front office,
housekeeping, and food and beverage department employees represent as a personnel
sale department.
Service quality and ethics are two complementary factors in hotel industry. These two crucial
elements also provide competitive advantage in hospitality sector (Fox, 2000, p. 71). As in all
service sectors, in hotel sector, employees are the main elements in sustaining the service
and customer satisfaction (Singapakdi et al., 1996, p. 636).
Ethics is now becoming more important than before in attracting customers besides superior
service, quality products and competitive pricing (Dreyfack, 1990, p. 25). So it is very
important for these department employees who have so close relations with the guests to
behave ethical for the hotel and the guests every time.
2. Ethics
Ethics as a philosophy discipline has a 2,500-year-history. Ethics theories started at the age
of Socrates, Platon and Aristoteles, turned into a serial of human administration principles
developed as time passed (Kozak and Gu
¨c¸lu
¨, 2006, p. 21).
Ethics means styles of behaviors and rules that individuals and groups should obey in a
society in a span of time. On the other hand, ethics as a science of morality means moral
principles values and system of standards searching concepts such as good, bad, right and
determining which of the individual or group behaviors are right or wrong (Yalc¸ın, 2000, p.
44).
It is possible to find lots of definitions about ethics. According to Turkish Language
Foundation, ethics means ‘‘moral, related to morality’’.
Concept of ethics states that there is a difference between good and bad, and right or
wrong. Moreover, it states that it is necessary to do our best and the right one every time by
differentiating these differences (Aslan and Kozak, 2006, p. 50).
Ethics is also defined as ‘‘inquiry into the nature and grounds of morality where the term
morality is taken to mean moral judgments, standards, and rules of conduct’’ (Singapakdi
and Vitell, 1990, p. 4).
On the other hand, Vallen and Casado (2000) suggested 12 ethical principles as follows:
1. Accountability. People are morally accountable for their actions and treatment of others,
particularly in connection with the specific professional position that they hold. Morally
responsible hospitality managers should be accountable for the welfare of the
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employees they supervise given that, in most cases, the workers’ livelihood depends on
them.
2. Commitment to excellence. Commitment to excellence determines the necessity to
deliver the best service possible for the price obtained. Hospitality managers who
deviate from this principle would chat their guests of their right to have their money’s
worth for service received.
3. Concern for others. At minimum, the golden rule (‘‘do unto others as you would have
them do to you’’) applies in having a human concern for the needs of others. Thie
principle is hard to observe from the lofty position of managers vis-a
`-vis hourly workers
performing menial jobs.
4. Fairness. A basic policy is to deal with people evenhandedly for equal performance. In
violation of this principle managers tend to deal more harshly with minorities such as
women, people of color, the old and undocumented aliens.
5. Honesty. Being able and willing to state the truth (no matter how painful) is ethically
essential. This is true not only because deceiving or misleading others often results in
costly lawsuits and in some cases, jail sentences.
6. Integrity. While soundness of moral principle and character may be qualities of an
individual’s moral code, managers and employees may feel conflicting pulls of moral
conscience and self-interest. The hospitality industry offers many examples of situations
that can damage individual integrity and responsibility. One instance would be a
manager’s willingness to continue daily operations and preserve his job even as the
resort is polluting the local environment.
7. Law-abiding. An action’s legality does not guarantee that the action is morally right.
While laws codify customs and mores, they can reflect political compromise and, thus,
are not sufficient to establish the moral standards that should guide individuals or
professions. As a result, hospitality managers can follow the letter of the law while still
acting against their values. An example might be taking advantage of bankruptcy laws
to avoid having to pay creditors.
8. Leadership. A example of ethical leadership in the hospitality industry would be to
refuse to employ illegal aliens at below-market rates even competitors are doing so.
9. Loyalty. Faithfulness to engagements and obligations toward laws, companies, guests
and employees should be part of the moral behavior of all professionals. This faithful
adherence may be difficult if one’s own benefit or social comfort is at stake. A hospitality
manager might, for instance, find it difficult to abide by legal or company principles if his
or her quarterly bonus for improving the bottom line is in jeopardy.
10. Promise keeping. Some time ago, a business deal made orally with another person
carried all the necessary assurance that the expectations would be fulfilled. Today, most
deals must be closed in the presence of attorneys lest one of the parties involved breaks
the original promise. Hospitality mangers intending to make use of another person as a
means to an end would be acting untrustworthily. An example of this would be signing a
promissory note while knowing that the company is going into bankruptcy proceedings.
11. Reputation. The community’s and guests’ estimations of a company is important for
conducting business. Attempts by hotel manager to resist employees’ organizing could
cast an unfavorable shadow on the company’s ethical values.
12. Respect for others. One of the Kant’s principles states that everyone should be treated
as an end, not merely as means to an end. Every human being deserves to be treated
with respect, as an independent moral agent. The example of hearing illegal immigrants
at low wages also violates this principle of respecting other human beings (Vallen and
Casado, 2000, pp. 45-46).
Vallen and Casado (2000) surveyed these ethical principles to find out the hotel industry
personnel and the managers ethical behavior. The respondents were given a list of the
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ethical principles and they ranked the concepts according to their importance to profitable
hotel operation and then again according to how frequently each principle was breached.
Leadership, accountability, commitment to excellence and integrity were the four most
important ethical principles for successful operation in the hotel. The three
most-often-breached principles (in the managers’ view) were accountability, commitment
to excellence, and respect for others. A survey of 45 GMs of the largest hotels in several US
states found a strong perception that hotel-industry workers and managers do not always
behave ethically. Anecdotal comments comprised scathing observations of unethical
behavior. Like so many people, the respondents considered themselves more ethical than
others in the industry and also believed that the industry itself had a distance to go in relation
to other businesses.
3. Ethics literature and ethics in hotel industry
One of every 16 working personnel is employed in tourism sector, especially hotel industry
such as accommodation, food-beverage, animation, transformation, entertainment
department. About 1 billion people traveled and $900 million of tourist income all over the
world was obtained in 2008 (World Tourism Organization, 2009). In developed countries,
people spend as much for travel and tourism as they do for clothing or health care (Hall,
1992, p. 2).
This huge and important sector is mainly dealing with the guests and employees
relationship. That is why most of the problems arise and are solved by the ‘‘people-customer
or employees’’ during performing the service in tourism sector.
The first step of ethics in tourism was developed in Istanbul-Turkey during the Congress of
World Tourism Organization in 1997. ‘‘Global Code of Ethics for Tourism’’ was confirmed in
the following year in Chile. Most of the ten codes are dealing with ethical principles while
performing the service (U
¨lger, 2004, p. 85).
Hotel industry, which is one of the world’s greatest industries, is also a social phenomenon
with a great tendency to expand and develop gradually every year. The ethical components
of the tourism and hotel industry are important due to the industry’s great international
importance. Even if the main goal of the hoteliers is to maximize their profits, ethical
principles and standards should be respected at first. Hospitable acts, expressions of
kindness, treating of others as we would like to be treated are the most affective activities in
service marketing promotion. Business ethics increases the reputation, market
competitiveness and market share of a hotel more than the other marketing activities.
In developing countries, tourism is generally the first sector to generate revenues,
employment and gives hope in otherwise economic crises impact and touches the lives of so
many people it also experiences the whole entire of concerns and opinions about the
rightness and wrongness behavior.
The hotel industry is the same as other sectors continuously feel the stress of the economic
condition and marketplace. When a tourism company like the others focuses on just profit, it
may easily neglect and ignore the importance of employees, customers, society,
government, environment and social responsibility. Yet, negligence of all these
contributors to the success of the business may cause irreparable damage to society and
the environment. If the firm profit becomes more important than the employees, the firm can
not enrich its workforce to be more ethical and responsible (Malar, 2008, p. 137).
As a matter of fact, there may be a conflict between a hotel’s need to sell rooms and facilities
and practice of overbooking which guarantees a room or a service that does not exist at the
same time of the guarantee. Certainly overbooking is a financial issue in that revenue from
unsold services is lost forever, but it is also an ethical issue if the availability of a room or
service is misrepresented to the disservice of the guests (Hall, 1992, p. 2).
Overall the employees of the hotel play a crucial role on the hotel marketing. It is really
difficult to make decisions about especially ethical behaviors, without having a commonly
accepted following set of facts about hotel industry employees:
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1. The hotel industry is faced with high-level turnover not only of the employees but also the
management staff.
2. Most of the employees are not educated in tourism and are from the lower socioeconomic
classes.
3. Some service personnel are rarely encouraged to consider themselves as professional.
4. The hotel industry tries to keep the wages and benefits low, because of small profit
margins and the high employees’ costs.
5. Nearly 50 percent of the tourism graduates do not work or leave the hotel industry within
five years (Nusbaum, 1992, p. 34).
All these facts, economic crises, working long hours, low payment, high level of turnover of
hospitality employees and managers, may be related to the lack of ethical behaviors. All
these characteristics of the hotel industry draw the hoteliers and the employees to act more
carefully.
The most important task of a hospitality business is to develop the service side of the
business, specifically, a strong service culture. The service culture focuses on serving and
satisfying the customer. The service culture has to start with top management and flow
down. A service culture empowers employees to solve customer problems. It is supported
by a reward system based on customer satisfaction (Kotler et al., 1999, p. 43).
The unique characteristics of the hotel and tourism industry are to have a closer link with
ethical issues than any other industries. It is argued that (Stevens and Fleckenstein, 1999, p.
72) the ethical uncertainty mostly arises from the fact that employees and the customers are
from different backgrounds, which implies that people under these social contexts can carry
diverse expectation and ethical standards.
The hotel Industry is running with the power of the guests and employees. It is very important
for the hotel recruitment and public relations policy (Nusbaum, 1992, p. 34).
As one of the important service sectors, hotel industry considers of the ethical standards and
behaviors of the direct service personnel in the process of the business transaction in the
hotel (Wong, 1998, p. 107).
However, the physical assets and the material property of the hotel are well-designed, the
consumers are not satisfied in this way, but the satisfaction depends much more on how they
perceive they are treated by the hotel employees. Most of the hotels are perfectly decorated
and have the same facilities as SPA center, sport center, popular cuisine and well designed
room equipment that seems slight different at first sight. On the other side, good relations,
ethical behaviors, morality treatments and customer relations management differentiate and
make the hotel preferable and memorable among the others.
According to Lynch (1992), a quality and ethics can transform total quality management into
total care management. He pointed out that ethical behavior should include six values;
legality, equity, social legitimacy, justification, confidentiality, and sincerity.
The chain hotel groups Marriot and Ritz Carlton practice total quality management with their
motto, which is ‘‘we are ladies and gentlemen who serve ladies and gentlemen’’ and this
causes no doubt that the ethical beliefs of the service employees in hotels can influence a
customer’s final satisfaction (Wong, 1998, p. 107).
Generally hospitality and especially hotel industry present many occasions for unethical
behaviors (Reynolds, 2000, p. 95). As the hospitality industry grows, so do concerns for
related ethical issues. These concerns are evidenced by a small but growing body of
research developed over the past decade. There are many studies about ethics in hotel
industry but most of them are dealing with the managers’ ethical behaviors (Varinli, 2004, p.
46).
There are also some studies about tourism and restoration students, but studies about the
hotel employees are limited.
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Damitio and Schmidgall (1993, p. 43) studied the ethical problems of the professionals (club
managers, hotel managers and hotel accounting controllers) in hotel industry in order to
determine whether their various ethical behaviors are acceptable or not. There was no
difference among the three groups’ ideas on ethical affairs.
According to a study conducted by loss prevention specialists (1999), restaurant employees
perceived themselves as follows:
Bdishonest, 13 percent will attempt theft regardless;
Bbasically honest, 21 percent will never steal; and
B66 percent will steal if others do so without reservations (Somerson, 1999).
Unethical acts by restaurant industry employees are manifested in several areas and such
acts are committed by both managers and employees. One of these areas is internal theft.
The average annual theft per employee is $ 218 according to the Fourth Annual Survey of
Restaurant and Fast Food Employees (National Restaurant Association, 1999).
Another survey by Yeung (2004, p. 254), pointed out the importance level of ethics among
the hospitality personnel. In this study, theft from the hotel and sexual harassment appeared
to be two important matters.
Other unethical behaviors committed by restaurant employees are:
Bcharging guests for food or drinks not served them;
Bsabotaging products served to guests by contaminating them with bodily fluids;
Bhiding service charges applied to guest checks so that the server may receive two
gratuities;
Bdrinking alcohol while working;
Busing or selling drugs in the workplace;
Bnot charging for products served to guests;
Bstealing products from the restaurant such as food and alcohol (stealing tips from other
employees);
Baccepting bribes from purveyors to ‘‘push’’ their products;
Bchanging credit card charges after the guest has signed the voucher; and
Bintentionally destroying restaurant property to sabotage management (Kincaid et al.,
2008, p. 471).
Varinli (2004) studied the hotel employees’ beliefs on unethical applications in 3- and 4-star
hotels in Capadocia-Turkey. In this study, the unethical behaviors generally are not accepted
by the respondents and the evaluation was different as for the different positions in the hotel.
The other result of the study was the employees’ flexibility on the unethical applications.
Regarding most of the academic studies about ethics, the ethical behaviors of the
employees bring success and profit to the company but vice versa will increase the cost and
result in failure. In a study applied to the big hotel managers and employees by Vallen and
Casado (2000, p. 45), unethical behavior increases the costs and causes almost $102,000
which is really very important figure for the company. Concerning with the dimensions of the
service quality and the cost affects of deviation ethical behaviors in the hotel industry, will be
very useful to make this search for both sides in determining the employees’ beliefs on
unethical behaviors and applications (Varinli, 2004, p. 47).
4. Research methodology and findings
4.1 Edirne City
This study presents quite importance in the process of branding Edirne destination. Edirne is
one of the branding 15 cities in Turkey as a multicultural destination (Republic of Turkey,
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Ministry of Culture and Tourism (2007). Edirne is not only famed for its many mosques, the
elegant domes and minarets but also magnificent churches, synagogues and Bahaian
houses, which symbolize the tolerance among different cultures in the province.
Edirne is a border city in the European part of Turkey, the first stopover for newcomers
from Europe, situated between the Greek, Bulgarian borders. The city is located at the
junction among the rivers Tundja, Maritsa and Ardas, and is only 7km from the border to
Greece, 18 km from the border to Bulgaria and 210 km to one of the world biggest
metropolitan-Istanbul city. Edirne is an important border city with two European countries
over 3 million people crossing through five important borders every year. Kapıkule border
is especially crucial gate for the people coming from Europe (mostly Germany) as
workers.
Selimiye Mosque the biggest in Balkans is submitted on the tentative list of ‘‘The World
Heritage’’ by UNESCO (Turkey-World Heritage Centre, 2000).
Edirne has been applied more than 40 cross-border projects that are mostly about
contributing the cultural, social and tourist activities between Bulgaria and Turkey since
2005. Edirne is also about taking a place in Euroregion (INTERREG III-A) projects with
Greece and Bulgaria (Edirne I
˙l Yıllıg
˘ı, 2005, p. 109).
The health museum (Sultan Bayezid II Complex/Health Care Museum) one of the most
important health centers of its period, fifteenth century, where patients were treated with the
sound of water, music, scents, various occupations, as well as medical knowledge and
medicine awarded by European Council as European Museum in 2004 (Trakya University,
2004).
Edirne city is a member of ‘‘Union of Historical Cities’’ and the founder and the head of
‘‘Strandzha Municipalities Union’’ which aims mainly the cultural, tourist, social, agricultural
and economic activities among ten municipalities from Turkey and Bulgaria (Edirne
Municipality, 2006).
Edirne signed ‘‘Sister City’’ agreement with Haskovo (2004), Yambol (2005) Bulgaria and
Aleksandrapolis (2007) Greece cities in order to improve the partnership between two
cities (Edirne Municipality, EU and International Relations Office, 2004).
Kırkpınar-oil wrestling – the oldest living historical sport in the world has been held for 648
times including many entertaining activities in Edirne. Kırkpınar festival was awarded under
the title of European Tourist Destination of Excellence in Intangible Heritage in 2008
(European Commission, 2008).
Edirne is used to be an important point on historical ‘‘The Silk Road’’, hosting many
caravanserais which are still popular as hotels.
Edirne, with a population more than 100,000 and 20,000 university students, tries to be a
touristic, education city more than a heavy industrial city causing air pollution. The touristic,
cultural, natural and social potential of Edirne points to one of a strong brand destination. All
these international relations direct tourism and touristic products including the hotel and
personnel to be sustainable and qualified.
Considering all these opportunities for Edirne gradually has a high tourist potential as not
only the citizens but also the foreigners from the year 2000. As it can be seen from Table I,
while the foreigner tourist number in 2000 was 6,561, this number reached to 24,247 in 2008
which means the foreigner tourist number increased four times. Most of the foreigners were
from Germany, Romania, Greece, Bulgaria, Poland, Holland tourists in 2008. On the other
hand, the citizens also realized about three folder of arrivals from about 79,000 to 209,000
visitors in last nine years in 20 hotels with 1,500 beds in Edirne.
The museums especially after getting international awards become very popular and
152,588 tourists visited them in 2008 (Republic of Turkey, Ministry of Culture and Tourism,
2009).
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4.2 The research methodology
The main aim of this study is to state the hotel employees’ beliefs on unethical behaviors and
practices. Besides, it was aimed to find out if there is a meaningful difference between the
behaviors and practices considering the employees’ different characteristics and hotels
classes.
Top level and middle managers are one of the important role model sources for ethical
learning. The employees learn the firm organization’s values and the standards following
their managers. That is why the personnel notice what the managers do and how the
managers behave in the business. Taking this into consideration, the managers should be
able to show the acceptable and unacceptable applications during the operations (Stevens
and Brownell, 2000, p. 43).
The hypotheses of the research are determined as the following:
H1. There is a meaningful difference in accepting level to the unethical behaviors of the
personnel by different hotel categories.
H2. There is a meaningful difference in accepting level to the unethical behaviors
between the middle managers and the staff.
H3. There is a meaningful difference in accepting level to the unethical behaviors of the
personnel between who have direct communication with the guests and indirect
communication with the guests.
H4. There is a meaningful difference in accepting level to the unethical behaviors
between the personnel graduated from tourism school and others.
H5. There is a meaningful difference in accepting level to the unethical behaviors
considering the age of the personnel.
In this study, survey method was used to determine the hotel personnel’s unethical behaviors
in the process of the service operation in Edirne. The questionnaire was mainly developed
from a Varinli (2004, p. 49) study which was applied to the employees’ job-related ethics.
Some questions in the questionnaire had been changed or added considering all the hotels
in Edirne.
For the reliability analysis of the scale dealing with the job-related ethics the Cronbach Alpha
statistics is found 0.883, which means high reliability of the scale (Norusis, 1993, p. 147). The
questionnaire was prepared in two sections. The first was about the demographic
characteristics and the second was about 20 statements on unethical behaviors. The
respondents were asked to reply the statements according to the Likert scale of:
5¼strongly accept that is wrong; 4 ¼accept that is wrong; 3 ¼no comment; 2 ¼accept
that is not wrong; and 1 ¼strongly accept that is not wrong.
The population of the study is the employees who work in Edirne Hotels. There are 20 hotels
in Edirne, such as: three of which are 3-star hotels, ten of which are 2-star hotels, two of
Table I Arrivals in Edirne (2000-2008)
Year Foreigner Citizen Total
2000 6,561 79,009 85,570
2001 11,143 74,521 85,664
2002 9,528 75,439 84,967
2003 7,523 74,244 81,767
2004 7,618 92,079 99,697
2005 8,726 98,378 107,104
2006 5,633 97,925 103,558
2007 10,134 176,540 186,674
2008 24,247 208,916 233,163
Source: Republic of Turkey, Ministry of Culture and Tourism (2009)
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which are 1-star hotels, three of which are Boutique hotels, and two of which are motels
(Table II). The questionnaire could not apply in five hotels; four of them are resort hotels on
the beaches and closed during the winter and the other hotel refused to reply the
questionnaire. There are about 200 employees working in Edirne hotels according to the
opinions of authorized managers. Therefore we can assume that respondent rate is 80
percent in this research. In the view of that, the result of the study cannot be applicable in
other cities. Because of this, the results of study are just valid for Edirne sample and can not
be generalized at all.
Most of the hotels are 2-star and 98 of 160 personnel (Table III) work in the hotels in Edirne.
The questionnaire was applied in 15 hotels in the week of 9-13 March in 2009 and excluded
employees who were not on the premises during the process. After a week, 160 employees
valid questionnaire were either collected or posted by the concerned ones. The findings
have been evaluated and analyzed using the SPSS 11.5. The mean and the t-test have been
used for the statistics analysis.
Moreover, the statements in the study cover the behaviors and applications dealing with the
front-office, food-beverage and housekeeping departments which have face to face
communication with the guests. The other hotel departments, human resources, accounting,
cost- control, are not included in the evaluation. Since the most of the problems exist in the
departments that require direct communication with the customer in service industry, the
most three important departments in the hotel have been taken into consideration in this
study.
4.2 The research findings
The first part of the questionnaire was about the demographic characteristics of employees
such as: sex, education level, the school field, age, position level, and department in the
hotel. The results are presented in Table III.
The Kruskal-Wallis test was used to determine whether there are meaningful differences by
sex of the respondents in evaluation of the statements on the questionnaire for unethical
behavior. But the results showed that there aren’t any meaningful differences in evaluation of
the statements by sex of the respondents.
As can be seen in Table III, the 37 percent of the respondents are female and most of the
employees’ age was 36 and over. The employees only have primary-secondary education
(nearly 80 percent), which is quite below the required degree for tourism training. Another
interesting result of the study is that 86.9 percent of the employees had not graduated from
tourism training school. Since, five of these hotels have restaurant facilities, most of the
respondents work in the front office department, which are open 24-hours and needs three
different personnel a day.
In this study, it is aimed to determine the beliefs of the hotel personnel’s about unethical
behaviors according to the 20 statements relating the topic. The one-sample t-test, the null
hypothesis represent the mean (from a single sample) is equal to an expected mean (it is 3:
no comment) of the population with specific level of significance.
Table II The population of the study
Classification of the hotel Hotel % Employees %
3-star hotel 3 15.00 30 18.75
2-star hotel 10 50.00 98 61.25
Boutique hotel 3 15.00 24 15.00
Special hotel 4 20.00 8 5.00
Total 20 100.00 160 100.00
Source: Republic of Turkey, Ministry of Culture and Tourism (2009)
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The statements displayed in Table IV that represent the ethical principles determined by
Vallen and Casado (2000) are evaluated appropriate to the principles by the respondents.
The items used in the research are the statements of the ethical principles such as respect,
promise keeping, honesty, fairness, concern for others, commitment and accountability.
According to the results of analysis the respondents accept the statements as unethical but
only except for statment ‘‘picking up magazines left behind by the guest without reporting to
lost and found’’.
Table V shows the central tendency measures of each statement. The measures can be
interpreted as that all the employees accept the statements as unethical. The measures are
too close to 5 which means ‘‘strongly accept that is wrong’’. For testing H1, the respondents
are grouped into the hotel categories. The analysis covers the 3-star, 2-star and boutique
hotels in Edirne.
According to the results showed in Table VI there are meaningful differences among the
employees grouped by the hotel categories. By this result the source of the difference was
also tested. According to the results showed in Table VII, the 3-star hotel personnel’s
acceptation level to the unethical statements was stated as higher than the personnel work in
other hotels. So, H1 hypothesis has been accepted.
Table III The respondents’ profile
n%
Sex
Female 60 37.5
Male 100 62.5
Total 160 100.0
Age
,20 2 1.3
20-27 41 25.6
28-35 43 26.9
.36 74 46.3
Total 160 100.0
Education level
Primary 70 43.8
Secondary 57 35.6
Vocational institute 22 13.8
University 10 6.3
Postgraduate 1 0.6
Total 160 100.0
The school field
Related to tourism 21 13.1
Not related to tourism 139 86.9
Total 160 100.0
Position level
General staff 135 84.4
Middle manager 19 11.9
Others 6 3.8
Total 160 100.0
Hotel department
Housekeeping 38 23.8
Front office 44 27.5
F&B service 23 14.4
Accounting 4 2.5
Personnel and training 25 15.6
Kitchen 11 6.9
Others 15 9.4
Total 160 100.0
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Table V meant that all the hotels’ employees accept the statements as unethical. Table VII
emphasizes the level of acceptance. As a matter of this fact the analysis points out that the
level of acceptance of the employees oh 3-star hotels is higher than the other employees of
two groups. This results means the employees of 3-star hotel are more conscious and
sensitive in interpretation and implementation of ethical principles.
The respondents were also grouped into the management level of the employees as the
general staff and middle level managers to test H2. But the results of the analysis showed
that there is no meaningful difference in accepting level to the unethical behaviors between
the middle level managers and the staff, so H2 has been rejected.
The employees are grouped as the front office, food and beverages and housekeeping
department personnel (group 1) who have direct communication and the other personnel
(group 2) who have indirect communication with the guests. It has been tested if there is any
meaningful difference in the acceptation on unethical behaviors between two groups.
According to the results of the compare of two sample means test there is no meaningful
difference (t ¼20:581,
a
¼0:562) and the H3 has been rejected. That is the entire frontage
and backstage employees accept the statements an unethical at the same importance level.
It is also tested whether there is a meaningful difference by the graduate of the employees.
The results of the test which shows the difference in the level of the involvement in unethical
behaviors between the tourism school graduates and others are as follows: the average of
Table IV The results of the one sample t-test of the mean of respondents’ acceptance level
of the items
Unethical behaviors t SD
a
Picking up magazines left behind by the guest
without reporting to lost and found 21.586 159 0.115
Offering free coffee or tea to friends in the
restaurant without issuing a captain’s order 2.838 159 0.005
Realizing there is a mistake with the guest bill and
waiting for the guest to come back 6.983 159 0.000
Releasing guest information to friends 7.388 159 0.000
Accessing information about a guest through
computer out of curiosity 12.365 159 0.000
Eating an extra meal in the staff canteen without a
valid coupon 16.225 159 0.000
Eating left-over food from the buffet at the back of
the house 19.862 159 0.000
Accepting tips to arrange room change for a
guest 20.985 159 0.000
Not dropping cash tips to the central pool and
keeping them personally 25.615 159 0.000
Visiting a doctor and receiving a sick report not to
go to work 29.133 159 0.000
Consuming drink in the bar before the bar is in
operation 32.025 159 0.000
Collecting left-over fruit from guest rooms for
self-consumption 32.025 159 0.000
Using the toilet in a guest’s room 32.486 159 0.000
Making telephone call in a guest’s room 37.466 159 0.000
Breaking a glass or plate but blaming it on a
guest’s carelessness 37.852 159 0.000
Listening to the radio in the guest’s room 37.931 159 0.000
Charging private telephone calls as a guest’s or
marking as business calls 38.499 159 0.000
Not changing the bed sheets in the guest’s room
due to excessive workload 43.967 159 0.000
Watching TV in a guest’s room 44.624 159 0.000
Consuming minibar beverages and charging
them to a guest’s account 51.775 159 0.000
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Table V The results of central tendency measures of unethical behaviors
Mean Standard deviation
Unethical behaviors 3-Star hotel 2-Star hotel Boutique hotel Full sample 3-Star hotel 2-Star hotel Boutique hotel Full sample
Not changing the bed sheets in the guest’s room
due to busy workload 4.93 4.67 4.63 4.73 0.254 0.552 0.495 0.498
Listening to the radio in the guest’s room 4.90 4.59 4.21 4.61 0.305 0.514 0.658 0.538
Accessing information about a guest through
computer out of curiosity 4.87 4.02 3.83 4.20 0.434 1.385 1.007 1.228
Accepting tips to arrange room change for a
guest 4.90 4.28 4.33 4.44 0.305 0.982 0.702 0.866
Picking up magazines left behind by the guest
without reporting to lost and found 3.50 2.55 3.00 2.87 1.167 .863 .885 1.047
Making telephone calls in a guest’s room 4.90 4.67 4.42 4.69 0.305 0.588 0.717 0.572
Eating an extra meal in the staff canteen without a
valid coupon 4.83 4.13 3.96 4.24 0.531 1.032 0.806 0.970
Releasing guest information to friends 4.77 3.35 4.08 3.81 0.774 1.465 0.830 1.380
Watching TV in a guest’s room 4.93 4.67 4.46 4.71 0.254 0.513 0.509 0.484
Eating left-over food from the buffet at the back of
the house 4.70 4.28 4.50 4.40 0.794 0.972 0.511 0.892
Consuming drink in the bar before the bar is in
operation 4.93 4.55 4.42 4.63 0.254 0.720 0.584 0.642
Breaking a glass or plate but blaming it on a
guest’s carelessness 4.90 4.60 4.54 4.67 0.305 0.622 0.509 0.558
Not dropping cash tips to the central pool and
keeping them personally 4.93 4.49 4.38 4.58 0.254 0.852 0.875 0.781
Consuming minibar beverages and charging
them to a guest’s account 4.97 4.74 4.58 4.78 0.183 0.461 0.504 0.434
Collecting left-over fruit from guest’s rooms for
self-consumption 4.80 4.56 4.54 4.63 0.761 0.643 0.509 0.642
Offering free coffee or tea to friends in the
restaurant without issuing a captain’s order 4.27 2.90 3.50 3.31 0.868 1.410 1.216 1.393
Using the toilet in a guest’s room 4.83 4.56 4.38 4.61 0.461 0.675 0.576 0.625
Realizing there is a mistake with the guest’s bill
and waiting for the guest to come back 4.63 3.51 3.83 3.83 1.033 1.613 1.308 1.506
Charging private telephone calls as a guest’s or
marking as business calls 4.97 4.70 4.46 4.73 0.183 0.596 0.721 0.569
Visiting a doctor and receiving a sick report not to
go to work 4.90 4.50 4.38 4.58 0.305 0.750 0.711 0.687
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the tourism schools graduates not getting involved in unethical behaviors 4.1476, and the
others’ is 4.3827. The difference between the means of two groups is meaningful at the level
of
a
¼0:039 and H4 has been accepted. But the results are not appropriate of our
expectations. We expect that the employees graduated in tourism should be more
conscious and sensitive than the other others. But reverse results are found.
The mean differences have been tested by the variance analysis in order to see the
difference among the age groups. The personnel divided into three age groups. Group 1 is
less than 28 years with 43 employees, group 2 is between 29 years and 35 years with 43
employees, and group 3 is older than 36 years with 86 employees or. According to the result
of the variance analysis, it was found F ¼0:080 and
a
¼0:923. This means there is no
meaningful difference among the groups and the H5 has been rejected. The age of the
employees is not a meaningful factor in evaluation the statements which reflects the ethical
principles.
Conclusion
Unethical behavior in tourism business is a significant problem for all people in the society.
Ethical practices and ethical behaviors of the personnel within the hotel organizations are
rather serious concern to practitioners and researchers. Generally the hotel industry
presents many opportunities for unethical behaviors. This is not only an unpleasant situation
for the hotel guests but also runs up the costs of the hoteliers.
This research aims to investigate the job-related unethical beliefs of hotel employees in
Edirne. The housekeeping, food and beverage, and front-office departments are mainly
studied on the unethical applications. Unfortunately, the employees who work in different
departments of the hotel face many ethical challenges and temptations every time. The
guests sometimes themselves attempt to induce employees to behave in an unethical
manner, e.g. a guest may ask a hotel room to upgrade or may seek to bribe an employee to
ignore the theft of the hotel property.
Hotel employees must therefore make instant decisions about what to do, often without
direct supervision. Nevertheless, the answers represented only the personnel’s unethical
beliefs only whether they would ‘‘actually perform in such away’’ in real life is difficult to verify.
It is not easy to watch over, e.g. a housekeeper, while she is performing her job. It is not
possible to control the employees’ actual behavior compared to what they answered in the
questionnaire.
Table VI ANOVA results of the test of differences by the hotel categories
Sum of squares Df Mean square F
a
Between groups 4.023 2 2.011 8.709 0.001
Within groups 13.164 57 0.231
Total 17.186 59
Table VII The sources of differences between groups (Tamhane statistics)
Classification of hotels Classification of hotels Mean difference t
a
3-star hotel 2-star hotel 0.55200* 0.16141 0.006
Boutique hotel 0.54650* 0.11960 0.000
2-star hotel 3-star hotel 20.55200* 0.16141 0.006
Boutique hotel 20.00550 0.17007 1.000
Boutique hotel 3-star hotel 20.54650* 0.11960 0.000
2-star hotel 0.00550 0.17007 1.000
Note: *The difference is meaningful at the level of 1 percent
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The hotelier’s heavy workloads, stressful environment, limited time for servicing, high level of
employees’ turnover, low pay, individual sense of right and wrong make impossible to
separate personal from business ethics and theory from practice.
Despite these inevitable limitations, this study was very effective in remembering the ethical
behaviors for Edirne hotels. It is also important not just for the managers and the personnel
but also for the hoteliers.
Managers are faced with a responsibility to the hotel organizations and the stakeholders to
engage in business practices that will generate a profit for the company. In order to achieve
this goal, managers and other employees may feel a need to compromise the ethical
standards of the organization. Hotel industry plays a very crucial role in advertising Edirne,
but the lack of the good management may cause bad reflections in the branding process.
This study reflects the ethics attitudes of the hotel employees in Edirne city, Turkey. It can be
applied in other cities in branding process in Turkey and other countries to identify any
cultural differences between the countries. It can be also an interesting district to examine
the validity of this study to other cultures as well as the oriental cultures. It may be more
suitable to develop representative and universal dimensions of job related ethical beliefs.
Since this study is dealing with the employees and the customers, it can also be applied to
the customers. How do the customers perceive the employees’ unethical applications and
attitudes? This is very important in training the employees in developing and applying the
ethics codes.
In the end, this study performed the aim of finding out more about hotel employees’ beliefs
on unethical behaviors in Edirne. Hotel managers should be able to have an understanding
in how to ensure a standard of quality service in hotel industry that is highly demanding in
Edirne.
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Appendix
Corresponding author
Emel Gonenc Guler can be contacted at: emelgguler@yahoo.com
Figure A1 The hotel employees’ belief on unethical behaviors: a survey in the hotels in
Edirne
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The main purpose of this study is to explain the concept of business ethics in human resources management and the components that make up business ethics. In addition, behaviors that do not comply with business ethics in human resources management are explained. In this study, the document analysis method was used. In this method only written and visual materials are used, if direct observation and interview are not possible in the research. In other words, examining and analyzing documents is also used as a method in this research. The moral institution is one of the most important institutions that ensure the integrity of society and keep it alive. Business ethics is essentially an integral part of social ethics. For this reason, business ethics should be established together while establishing social ethics. Business ethics generally consists of three basic elements. These are work ethics, professional ethics, and business administration ethics. As in the "compound containers principle" in chemistry, these three elements support each other. These three elements decrease together in societies where business ethics principles are ignored. This decrease leads to an increase in unethical behaviors. In a society where the principles of business ethics are not followed; Social diseases such as discrimination, favoritism, corruption, bribery, embezzlement, conflict, use of affection and intimacy, violence, sexual harassment, dogmatic behavior, arrogance, and superiority are increasing. To prevent these social diseases, it is necessary to establish social ethics and business ethics. The concept of business ethics is explained to understand better the behaviors that do not comply with business ethics. Then, the definition of business ethics is made and the three sub-components of business ethics (elements of business ethics) are explained. In the continuation, human resources management and behaviors that do not comply with business ethics are explained under ten sub-titles. Keywords: HRM, Ethics, Business Ethics, Unethical Behaviors
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