Tourism and the labor marke

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Tourism and the Labor Market
Introduction
This paper is a research paper and talked about the human resources in the hospitality
industry. Also, the paper provided summaries and analysis for two empirical studies which are
Gendered Identities in the Work of Overseas Tour Reps, the Global City and the Labor Market in
London and two trade articles which are the influence of tourism on the woodcarving trade
around Cape Town and implications for forest resources in southern Africa, Cultural Tourism:
Marketing Challenges and Opportunities for German Cultural Heritage. From these articles I
have found that tourism industry is very important to develop the country’s economy by focusing
on the labor market, heritage sites, cultural products, and other natural sources to success in the
tourism industry.
Empirical articles
Summary Article 1: Gendered Identities in the Work of Overseas Tour Reps
The work of the author is entrenched in the investigation of how work in the tourism
industry is gendered. Yvonne and her fellow had their interest in the investigation of tourism
employment trends concerning gender identities in the oversea countries. Though the
overarching aim of the study is on the gender identity in the tourism work, a lot more important
subjects are also revealed in the work. These include feminism and masculinity in the field of
tourism, behavior disparities portrayed by the different workers in the industry and general male
and female relationships in the developing nations. The explanation of the work identities in the
tourism industry yields much significant information on how different people in the society have

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different perception on the tour opportunities. According to the study, it’s a field which is
dominated by men, however, the work that they do is viewed as women’s job. They further
disclose the effects of feminization of the work with its effect on behavior changes for both men
and women. The writer shows that feminizing of the work categories makes certain groups to be
vulnerable to some behaviors risks. Females are thus seen to be at risk of sexual harassment due
to feminized works of arranging for guests rests, entertainments and being friendly to them.
(Guerrier and Adib, 2007)
Critical analysis
During the end of the mid of the 19 century, there has been numerous changes which has
taken place all over. The developed and developing nations saw a revolution on the division of
labor and work. Due to the efforts to root out the notion of men’s masculinity nature, this has
brought about jargon in the work specialty. With women empowerment and the conception of
women’s liberty to work equally like men, this has obliterated the traditions of the past
generation. In this particular case, feminism and masculinity on job related matters can be
viewed on the basis of personal benefits or group interest. However, like any other business, the
recruitment process of workers perhaps is the main source of the feminism issues. Moreover, we
cannot deny of the reality that there are certain areas where men are best suited than women, and
the vice versa is equally true that women will always perform better on specific jobs than men.
Thus, human resources in tourism industry have to select the suitable transport means that leads
to business improvement. For instance, men can be viewed as most suited in the control of rowdy
crowds, but under the authority control, both men and women would perform equally the same.
The view that women work are feminized making them vulnerable to work harassment, each

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kind of work has its own risks. We therefore believe that the management and the control
measure taken are the most important in reducing the risk vulnerability.
Summary Article2: Tourism, the Global City and the Labor Market in London
The work content in this paper deals with the labor market in the London. It’s a city with
extensive tourism activities. The author Church and his colleague Martin were interested in
establishing the conditions of the labor market in UK. The pertinent goal in revealed in the article
was to establish the influence of a global city in the labor market in connection to the tourism
industry. Church and Martin developed several explanations on labor flow as the main goal of
global city in the labor market. Further, they also related the flow of the labor force to other
factors of production and the society. In this particular area, it was overt that they explored the
working conditions and terms including remunerations, job security and other benefits or
disadvantages the employees may experienced in working in global city. According to their
study, tourism industry gets its labor from both local and foreigners, who are hired as either full-
time or part-time employees. Their argument shows that the foreigners, who are mostly student
from the poor countries, form the largest proportion of the part-time employees. Apart from this,
working conditions are not favorable for the working migrant, which means the international
labor transfer has influence on the local employment. (Church and Frost, 2008)
Critical analysis
The tourism industry in major metropolitan places like in the City of London has large
market source of labor force. Although the industry draws workers from the local community, a
considerable proportion of the labor comes from foreigner students and immigrants in the
country. Despite the fact that tourism is a major contributor to the growth of the country’s

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economy, the working conditions and standards in the industry are alleged as being unfavorable.
Furthermore, there is inequality in the industry remunerations between the foreign immigrants
and those from the local communities, which is likely to affect the tourism in the area. The low
payments being offered to workers discourage in their work environment. Low salary and wage
payments make workers feel unmotivated, which leads to poor service delivery. As result, there
is lack of customer satisfaction leading to shifting into other countries.
Trade articles
Summary Article 1: The influence of tourism on the woodcarving trade around Cape Town and
implications for forest resources in southern Africa
The subject matter on this paper was to highlight to contribution of the informal sectors in
the tourism industry. The authors were interested on getting an insight understanding of South
Africa, where woodcarving is believed to contribute a great part of trade. Depending on their
work, the alleviated trade in South Africa wood products results from the neighboring nations
including Zimbabwe and other far countries like Kenya. Several advantages have been identified
as related to increasing production of woodcarving in the country. While the South Africa is
becoming a metropolitan place, it’s also being recognized as tourists centre. This has contributed
to its attraction of new market from other countries like Kenya and Zimbabwe. In addition, the
opening of woodcarving in South Africa has opened new job opportunities for the local
communities settled in the Western Cape. (Mikolo and Paxie, 2009)
Critical Analysis
The growth of South Africa’s Western Cape Town as major tourists’ destination is
attributed to its geographical strategic location. Its establishment has brought many benefits to

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the country. First, it has opened market for the locally produced goods and services. The Western
Cape acts also as an international market for the neighboring countries like Zimbabwe, Kenya,
and Congo among others. This is integrated with the opening of new opportunities to the local
communities. Although the Western Cape seems to offer unprecedented advantages, the
operations of the tourism industry is posing great threat to the affiliated surrounding nations.
Whereas South Africa is among the developed nation in the continent of African, it’s developing
its economy under the pride of its affiliated developing country by squeezing their chance
expanding their markets and opening opportunities for their local communities.
Summary Article2: Cultural Tourism: Marketing Challenges and Opportunities for German
Cultural Heritage
This is an article which explores the tourism in German based on the specificity on
cultural tourism. The author of the paper focuses on the cultural tourism as potential sources of
income in the country which can bolster the economy of the state but it’s under-exploited due to
low funding by the federal, state and the communities. He studies certain tourism related
institution of great importance in enabling the growth and development of tourism in the country
as the world as whole. He in particular pin point heritage institution as a major player in
advancing tourism a German. As elucidated on the paper, the main tourism activities in the
region has been affected in the recent times due to institutions cutting down of expenditure on
personnel required to support tourism. According to the writer’s canon, music and artistic
institution have been greatly affected. Consequently, cultural tourism which is considered as
mega part of the tourism industry has been destabilized. (Hausmann, 2009)

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Beside the exploration on crucial factor of low funding on the industry, there are
numerous other factors which are revealed concerning the development of sustainable market in
the state. Generally, there is need of integrating both cultural sites with other cultural offerings
which are in demand for tourists’ attraction. The integration of the two aids in the successful
positioning of the tourism industry. That is, tourism is bolstered through the partnering between
cultural and the non-cultural markets, hence marketing of the tourism industry would also
increase the market for other local products. (Hausmann, 2009)
Critical analysis
German tourism industry is well grounded on cultural tourism. The most important
contribution of tourism in the country is based on the development of different cultural products.
This mostly comprise of artistic work such as music and other artwork. In addition, heritage sites
play important part in developing the tourism in the country. Home tourism contributes the larger
part than the foreign tourism. Hence, heritage site though important in the overall development
of the industry has got low impact on the industry development without other supportive means.
Lack of cooperation of the German institutions is thus view to affect the industry in the recent
past. However, the claims are thus involving the diminished funding on the institutions of
paramount importance in producing both the needed services and products in the endeavor of
marketing tourism in the country. The industry should however consider the recent effects of
financial crisis as major affecting the industry and others in the general economic growth which
has lead to the low funding. This implies that the human resource as the main sources of the
management team should be held accountable of the low funding absorption of the incompetent
labor force, which is devoid of the ability to come up with sound strategies and decisions.

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Conclusion
Tourism industry is very important in the development of the economy of many countries.
It involves the proper management of the available resources which comprise of both natural and
many factors. Heritage sites, cultural products and services general contribute to the successful
productivity in the industry. However, the integration of the various institutions is a major
determining factor in the growth of the industry.
Self-Appraisal
At the beginning of this course, the professor assigned us to choose an area between 8
areas that are functional areas. When I first saw the human resources s one of these areas, I
picked it because I like this subject and it is express me. Before I came in U.S., I was working in
Hilton Jeddah in Saudi Arabia as an assistant human resource manger and teaching assistant in
Prince Sultan College for Tourism and Hospitality. Therefore, I am very interested in this subject
and I want to explore more about it.
The human resource area was in the week eight and as a group of three; we start to work
on this project in previous week. We start to search materials and articles that may help us to do
our presentation and functional paper. My group was very helpful, they send me many article
that I was not aware of it. Three of us, start to brainstorm what we can do in the presentation,
however, in the human resource area, there is no differences in its function regard the hospitality
industry. As a result, we decide to talk about the human resource functions in general and pick
some of the issues that impact the hospitality industry. In our project, I have faced difficulties
when we search for articles especially for the functional paper. In other hand, the presentation
was the easiest part in this project.

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I have found that I need more skills to improve myself in order to enhance my career with
is the hospitality industry. I need to improve my language skills, learning skills, and critical
analysis. To make these improvements, I have just started my plan which is continuing my
education in one of the best schools in my field; actually I am very lucky that I have the
opportunity to learn something from one of the best professors in our industry, Dr. Caroline
Cooper. If I had to do this project over again, I would like to work with other group who work
more and more committed and willing to do better work.

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Bibliography
Church, A. and Frost, M. (2008).Tourism, the Global City and the Labor Market in London:
Tourism Geographies
Guerrier Y. and Adib A. (2007) Gendered Identities in the Work of Overseas Tour Reps:
Blackwell publishing.
Hausmann, A. (2009). Cultural Tourism: Marketing Challenges and Opportunities for German
Cultural Heritage: journal International Journal of Heritage Studies
Mikolo Y. and Paxie W. (2009). The influence of tourism on the woodcarving trade around Cape
Town and implications for forest resources in southern Africa: Development Southern
Africa,