EMPLOYEE ENGAGEMENT PRACTICES AND PERFORMANCE OF STAR RATED HOTELS IN KENYA

Abstract

Employees are the backbone of any organization; thus, they can make or break an organization. Therefore, successful organizations are cognizant of ways to engage employees. Employee engagement is a human resource concept that describes the level of enthusiasm and dedication employees feel towards their job. Engaged employees care about their work and about the performance of the organization, and feel that their efforts make a difference. The main objective of this study was to explore the influence of employee engagement practices and performance of star-rated hotels in Kenya. The specific objectives were: say, stay and strive, the moderating variable was working conditions, while the dependent variable was performance of star-rated hotels in Kenya. The theories used to support the study variables were Aon Hewitt Engagement model, Herzberg’s two-factor theory. The study used a descriptive research design; the target population was 180 star-rated hotels, and a sample of 116 star-rated hotels was selected from each hotel region using stratified random sampling. A structured questionnaire was used to collect primary data. Collected data was analyzed using a statistical package for social science version 23.  Descriptive and Inferential statistics, correlation and linear regression were used to measure the relationship between dependent and independent variables. Multiple regression analysis was used to determine the moderating effect of working conditions on the independent variable employee engagement and dependent variable performance of star-rated hotels. The study results show that employee engagement had a significant and positive relation with the performance of star-rated hotels in Kenya.  The correlation results indicated that employee engagement and performance had and strong positive correlation. The inferential statistics indicated that with the introduction of working conditions as the moderating variable between employee engagement and the performance of star-rated hotels in Kenya, Employee engagement also showed a positive significant influence on performance of star rated hotels similarly showing a positive significant influence on performance. Multiple regression presents two regression models analyzing the relationship between employee engagement and performance of star-rated hotels, with a moderating effect of working conditions. The results indicate, the interaction effect enhances the relationship strength It also shows R² increased which also improves the model fit significantly. Employees who are engaged at their workplace feel connected to the organization thus help the organization to perform well. The study findings on employee engagement the results showed that engaged employees speak positively about the hotel, work effortlessly and they are more likely to stay.