Study Paper on Managing Cultural Diversity in Hospitality Industry

Description
Cultural diversity has become a major issue in the hospitality industry of the United States. This paper focuses on analyzing the change faces and current status of the cultural diversity in the hospitality workplaces, discussing the opportunities, benefits and challenges from the culturally diverse workforce, and providing practical recommendations that might help human resource managers to successfully dear with cultural diversity issues.

UNLV Teses/Dissertations/Professional Papers/Capstones
12-2008
Managing cultural diversity in hospitality industry
Yi Gong
University of Nevada, Las Vegas
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Paper 480.
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MANAGING CULTURAL DIVERSITY IN HOSPITALITY INDUSTRY

by

Yi Gong

Bachelor of Science
China Chongqing University
1998

A professional paper submitted in partial fulfillment
of the requirements for the

Master of Science in Hotel Administration
William F. Harrah College of Hotel Administration

Graduate College
University of Nevada, Las Vegas
December 2008

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ABSTRACT
Managing Cultural Diversity in Hospitality Industry
By
Yi Gong

Gail Sammons, Committee Chair
Professor of Hotel Management
University of Nevada, Las Vegas

Cultural diversity has become a major issue in the hospitality industry of the United
States. This paper focuses on analyzing the change faces and current status of the cultural
diversity in the hospitality workplaces, discussing the opportunities, benefits and challenges from
the culturally diverse workforce, and providing practical recommendations that might help
human resource managers to successfully dear with cultural diversity issues. Based on the
analysis of cultural diversity, this paper creates a cultural diversity training module for a graduate
human resource course or a hospitality company training program that aims at facilitating
trainees to increase cultural diversity awareness and sensitivity, learn knowledge of cultural
differences, and develop skills of managing cultural diversity issues.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
ABSTRACT .................................................................................................................................... 2

TABLE OF CONTENTS ................................................................................................................ 3

PART ONE: INTRODUCTION ..................................................................................................... 5
Purpose ...................................................................................................................................... 5
Justification ............................................................................................................................... 5
Constraints ................................................................................................................................ 6
Glossary .................................................................................................................................... 7

PART TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW ......................................................................................... 7
Introduction ............................................................................................................................... 7
Current Status of the Cultural Diversity in the Workplace in Hospitality Industry.................. 9
Opportunities and Benefits of Cultural Diversity ................................................................... 12
Valuable Innovation .......................................................................................................... 13
Effective Knowledge Transfer .......................................................................................... 13
Increasing Competitiveness .............................................................................................. 14
Building Images ................................................................................................................ 16
Challenges of Cultural Diversity ............................................................................................ 16
Communication Challenges .............................................................................................. 16
Discrimination Issues ........................................................................................................ 18
Training Challenges .......................................................................................................... 19
Practical Recommendations of Managing Cultural Diversity ................................................ 20
Adopt an Employee Relationship Management System ................................................... 20
Initiate a Diversity Management Training Program ......................................................... 22
Overcome the Stereotypes and Increase Fairness ............................................................. 23
Conclusion .............................................................................................................................. 25

PART THREE: CULTURAL DIVERSITY TRAINING MODULE .......................................... 26
Introduction ............................................................................................................................. 26
Cultural Diversity Training Program ...................................................................................... 27
Needs of Initiating a Cultural Diversity Training Program .............................................. 27
Goals of Cultural Diversity Training ................................................................................ 28
Target Trainees ................................................................................................................. 29
Requirements for Training Success .................................................................................. 30
Competent trainer........................................................................................................ 30
Overcome stereotypes ................................................................................................. 30
High-level management involvement ......................................................................... 30
Monitoring and evaluation .......................................................................................... 30
Training Session Module ........................................................................................................ 31
Section One: Diverse Workforce in the Hospitality Industry ........................................... 31
Training topic .............................................................................................................. 31
Training objective ....................................................................................................... 31
Training process .......................................................................................................... 31
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Conclusion ................................................................................................................ 31
Reading materials...................................................................................................... 32
Assignments .............................................................................................................. 32
Section Two: Growing Cultural Diversity ........................................................................ 33
Training topic ............................................................................................................ 33
Training objective ..................................................................................................... 33
Training process ........................................................................................................ 33
Conclusion ................................................................................................................ 33
Reading materials...................................................................................................... 33
Assignments .............................................................................................................. 34
Section Three: Managing Cultural Diversity .................................................................... 34
Training topic ............................................................................................................ 34
Training objective ..................................................................................................... 34
Training process ........................................................................................................ 34
Conclusion ................................................................................................................ 34
Reading materials...................................................................................................... 35
Assignments .............................................................................................................. 35
Section Four: Expatriates - Bering prepared ..................................................................... 35
Training topic ............................................................................................................ 35
Training objective ..................................................................................................... 35
Training process ........................................................................................................ 36
Conclusion ................................................................................................................ 36
Reading materials...................................................................................................... 36
Assignments .............................................................................................................. 36
Conclusion .............................................................................................................................. 36

APPENDIX A ............................................................................................................................... 38
Sample Lecture of Section One: Diverse Workforce in the Hospitality Industry .................. 38

APPENDIX B ............................................................................................................................... 43
Sample Lecture of Section Two: Growing Cultural Diversity ............................................... 43

APPENDIX C ............................................................................................................................... 46
Sample Lecture of Section Three: Managing Cultural Diversity ........................................... 46

APPENDIX D ............................................................................................................................... 50
Sample Lecture of Section Four: Expatriates: Being Prepared .............................................. 50

REFERENCE ................................................................................................................................ 54

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Managing Cultural Diversity in Hospitality Industry
Part One: Introduction
People always talk about workforce diversity, such as age, religion, gender, etc. However,
inadequate attention has been paid to the cultural diversity issues, especially those that come
from labor migration (Baum, Devine & Hearns, 2007). As more and more minority groups enter
the hospitality industry of the United States, managing cultural diversity is becoming a
challenging issue in this industry, especially to HR managers (Holaday, 2007).
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to create a cultural-diversity training module for a graduate
college human resource course or a hospitality company training program that will investigate
the history and current status of the cultural diversity, analyze the opportunities and problems,
and explore solutions feasible in managing cultural-diversity issues.
Justification
Workforce diversity has long been an important issue to which the hospitality industry
has paid much attention. A lot of research has been conducted to help employers to manage
diversity issues in areas such as age, religion, gender, etc. However, limited attention has been
paid to the cultural diversity issues, especially those that come from labor migration (Baum et al,
2007). In fact, a cultural diversity workforce has long been an important reliance for hospitality
industry (Christensen-Hughes, 1992). As more and more minority groups enter the hospitality
industry of the United States, such as the group generations of African American, Hispanic
Origin, and Asian, managing cultural diversity is becoming a challenging issue in this industry,
especially to HR managers (Holaday, 2007). It is important to carry out research in this area to
help managers to realize the current problems and stereotype in managing cultural diversity and
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to explore solutions feasible in dealing with these problems. Meanwhile, related study needs to
be conducted to facilitate the industry to understand the opportunities and advantages of
successfully managing cultural diversity. It is also anticipated that the study can inspire more in-
depth research and analysis in this field.
This paper will first begin with a literature review about the cultural diversity issues. In
the literature review the paper will analyze the current status of the cultural diversity in the
workplace in hospitality industry, discuss the opportunities, benefits and challenges coming from
cultural diversity, and provide practical recommendations to help HR managers to successfully
deal with cultural diversity issues. Then this paper will provide a cultural-diversity training
module, which is designed for a human resource course to help prospective HR managers to
understand the history and current status of cultural diversity, analyze the opportunities and
problems, and explore solutions feasible in managing cultural diversity issues. Related reading
materials or podcasts will be introduced in this part.
Constraints
In this paper, the articles for the literature review are based on previous or current
existing study and research in the area of managing cultural diversity. Many data cited in this
paper is of all the workforce of the U.S, which results in a lack of statistic data specifically
related to the hospitality industry. Besides, since the training module is created by the author and
has not received any testing in the real world, there might be biases and bugs in the designing.
These limitations can be gradually reduced by regular reevaluation and revision. In addition,
recommended reading materials and videos may be dated over time and therefore needs to be
replaced when trainers apply the module for real training program. Another constraint of the
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paper is that the copyright issue limits adequate access to more professional training visual
materials such as videos or podcasts that can be applied to improve the training module.
Glossary
Cultural diversity: The term cultural diversity generally refers to the cultural differences
between people. The existing differences include language, dress, traditions, morality and
religion, societies organization, and the way they interact with the environment (United Nations
Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation, 2001).
Multicultural: Be of, relating to, reflecting, or adapted to diverse cultures that encompass
racial, cultural and ethnic diversity within the demographics of a specified place such as a school,
business, neighborhood, city or nation (Wikipedia, 2008).
Cross-cultural adjustment: The period of adapting to changes when expatriates on
placement abroad change their home base form one cultural to another (Branston, Ineson &
Lyons, 2006).
Cultural shock: An unanticipated, negative response to a new experience with different
culture (Branston et al, 2006).

Part Two: Literature Review
Introduction
Diversity is defined as the differences among people. The primary dimensions of
diversity include issues such as gender, race, and age (Lim & Noriega, 2007). The workforce
diversity that people always talk about is mainly related to these core issues. However,
inadequate attention has been paid to the secondary dimensions of diversity, which include issues
such as communication style, religious beliefs, ethnic customs, relationship status, and general
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appearance. These differences can generally be described as cultural diversity (Reece & Brandt,
1996).
A cultural diverse workforce has long been an important reliance for hospitality industry
(Christensen-Hughes, 1992). As globalization has become a driving force behind corporate
strategic planning of most international hospitality companies (Hudson, 2008), and as more and
more migrant labors and minority employees enter the hospitality industry of the United States,
today’s hospitality industry is facing a multicultural challenge. Both management and employees
have various national and cultural backgrounds. With this situation, companies have encountered
some serious questions. 1. How to increase fairness for all employees regardless of their different
cultural backgrounds? 2. How to maximize the contribution of every member in a diverse team?
3. How to make the diverse workforce to harmoniously work together to achieve common goals?
To answer these problems, companies must make efficient efforts to address the
diversity issue no matter whether the multicultural character comes up from the mobile
workforce in the international locations in various countries or from the mixed backgrounds of a
workforce in a single location in the United States (Day, 2007). Therefore, successfully
managing cultural diversity is becoming a challenging issue in the hospitality industry (Holaday,
2007). Line managers who supervise multicultural background workers directly face this
challenge. Expatriate managers also need to deal with cross-cultural adjustment problems.
Moreover, HR professionals who manage the whole workforce must realize the importance of
managing cultural diversity and design effective programs to help the company to rise to the
challenge.
The following literature review focuses on analyzing the current status of the cultural
diversity in the workplace in hospitality industry; exploring the opportunities and benefits of
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cultural diversity such as knowledge transfer, innovation and competitiveness; discussing the
challenges from cultural diversity like communication problems and training difficulties; and
providing practical recommendations that might help managers to successfully deal with cultural
diversity issues in both global and domestic markets.
Current Status of the Cultural Diversity in the Workplace in Hospitality Industry
With the growth of globalization, more and more corporations have realized that they are
not merely competing for domestic market but also for the global market. Today, more than half
of the world’s assets are controlled by multinational corporations (Lim & Noriega, 2007).
Globalization is as well a trend in the hospitality industry. The expansion of international
hospitality companies has never been stopped (Lim & Noriega, 2007). For instance, with the
rapid economic development, the Asia-pacific area has become one of the dynamic markets for
hospitality and tourism industry. Macao, Hong Kong, Mainland China, etc. have turned out to be
ideal places to open new properties for brand international companies like Hilton and Marriott.
It is reported that in order to chase Marriott and cash in on the boom in business and leisure
travel in India and China, Hilton Hotels Corp. has decided to add 300 hotels to the 47 it already
operates in Asia over the next decade (Stanley, 2008). Due to the coming 2008 Beijing Olympic
Games, almost every brand international hotel company has opened new property in Mainland
China. In addition, many brand casinos famous in Las Vegas have rushed into Macao to open
properties to compete rivals and increase their market share in the gaming market there. What
these companies have to compete for now are the best talents in the hospitality market, especially
those competent and eligible global managers who can successfully cooperate with people from
different cultures (Doherty, Klenert & Manfredi, 2007). Thus, it is important and necessary for
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the international hospitality companies to efficiently manage multiculturalism and help
expatriates to overcome cultural barriers.
Along with the continued globalization of hospitality industry, in the domestic market of
the United States, more immigrant labors and minority employees get into the workforce. The
percentage of minorities in the U.S. labor force is expected to increase to 29% in the first decade
of the new millennium (Elmuti, 2001). According to the Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor
Statistics, Asian and other labor force increase most rapidly, and the Hispanic labor force is
projected to be larger than the black labor force by 2010. In race and ethnic groups, the number
of Asian and other employees (Pacific Islanders, American Indians, and Alaskan Natives are
included) will increase 44.1% by 2010 in the U.S. workforce, while Hispanic employees will
increase 36.3% and African American 20.7%. By 2010, women will make up 48% of the
workforce and the growth rate of women in the labor force will still increase at a faster rate than
that of men. (Fullerton & Toossi, 2001). In addition, minority groups are projected to comprise
almost half of the nation’s population by 2050 (Frabotta, 2001). Currently, the structure of four
group generations in labor’s ranks is as: Caucasian, African American, Hispanic Origin, and
Asian and Pacific Islanders (Frabotta, 2001). The U.S. Census Bureau has estimated that
Hispanics will soon expand over African Americans as the nation’s largest minority group, with
a percentage increase of Hispanic origin in the workforce from 10.9% in 2000 to 13.3% by 2010
and a percentage decrease of African America from 11.8% to 12.7% (Fullerton & Toossi, 2001).
With the percentage increase of minority employees and the structure change of labor’s ranks,
the work environment becomes full of cultural and social challenges (Frabotta, 2001). In order to
meet the needs of growing minority, ethnic and other segments of society, important shifts in
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marketing and product development activities in the U.S. industry will also be expected (Elmuti,
2001).
Due to the rapid growth rate of globalization and the labor structure change in the
workforce of domestic organizations, it is obvious that managing cultural diversity is becoming a
big issue to most of the twenty-first century employers of the United States. Undoubtedly, the
hospitality industry must take actions to follow the trends and cope with the challenge. As a
result of multicultural workforces, companies will have to become more sophisticated in
managing cultural differences, such as providing language training to overcome communication
barriers (Elmuti, 2001). Many companies in the hospitality industry have applied specific
strategies to adapt to the trend of workforce diversity. For instance, since MGM Mirage adopted
a corporate diversity program in 2001, it has increased its percentage of minority employees
from 50.48% in 2001 to 54.38% in 2005, with a 4% increase in minority vendors and contractor
pool (Holtmann, 2005). Hilton launched a recruiting and training program named as Elevator
General Manager Program in 1998 to develop a group of talented, internationally mobile people
to General Management positions in its international market. Candidates must be bilingual, and
better have various cultural backgrounds. And this program is continued and improved now
(Hilton Elevator, 2008).
However, many companies in the hospitality industry still encounter difficulties of
effectively managing cultural differences. Discrimination and stereotypes coming from
insufficient assumption of other culture still exist in the workplace, even among some
management level mangers. For example, regardless of the increased portion of minority
employment, most of the minority employees are still at the entry or low-skilled level of the
workforce. It is reported that in the restaurant industry, “minorities account for 30 percent to
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almost half of all foodservice employees at the hourly level, but minorities’ percentages decline
at the management level (Berta, 2006, pg. 49)”. Many employers in this industry continue
thinking that the minority workers were low skilled and tend to offer positions mainly in back-
of-house in departments such as the kitchen and housekeeping. Many migrant workers may
therefore be under-used in the labor market (Baum et al, 2007). In addition, merely providing
language training can no longer meet the requirements of dealing with diverse workforce,
especially for international companies in the global market. The majority of all expatriate failures
happen only because of cultural difference problems (Caudron, 1991). Evidently, in order to
increase employees’ awareness and sensitivities of cultural differences and effectively manage
cultural diversity to maximize corporation productivity, specific cultural diversity management
training needs to be carefully designed and seriously conducted in the hospitality companies.
Opportunities and Benefits of Cultural Diversity
Cultural differences can have both positive and negative impacts on organizations.
However, undoubtedly, these differences would not be considered as hazards but rather
opportunities and benefits if they can be managed well (Day, 2007). The opportunities and
benefits include, but not only include, innovation, competitiveness and knowledge transfer;
increased attraction to minority customers (Baum et al, 2007); better talent recruitment and
retention; and labor cost reduction. Successfully managing cultural diversity can also help
companies to diversify supply base by developing business partnership with minority-owned
vendors to drive quality up and cut cost down (Ruggless, 2003), and help companies to enhance
corporate images in neighbor communities as well (Fernandez, 2006). Take the Hispanics for
instance. Since it is estimated that Hispanics will soon exceed African American as the nation’s
major minority group (Fullerton & Toossi, 2001), managers should concentrate on hiring and
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educating Hispanics to use their input and ideas, which will help the companies to develop
marketing and product strategies to target this increasing demographic in the United States. The
benefits of targeting this growing Hispanic culture within the U.S. can aid the companies to
increase market share and profitability (Elmuti, 2001).
Generally, among the benefits of cultural diversity, four are frequently mentioned in the
literatures as the main reasons why companies in the hospitality industry endeavor to be diverse.
The benefits include valuable innovation, effective knowledge transfer, increasing
competitiveness and building image.
Valuable Innovation
First of all, diversity often stimulates new business innovations (Johansson, 2007).
Employees with multicultural backgrounds and experience can bring in the industry more
improved innovation by providing new ideas from their different viewpoints. If employers can
understand and appreciate their different kinds of values and different ways of viewing the world,
the companies can greatly take advantage of the benefits that differences bring in. Many surveys
reveal that if a team or a general workforce includes individuals with different cultures
backgrounds, more effective resolutions can be presented for the business problems. When
compared to homogeneous employee groups, diversified employee groups show outstanding
performance in the long run and efficiently take responsibility to their duties. This difference is
partially caused by the increased creativity and novelty in multicultural teams that come from the
diverse perspectives, views and experiences of their team members (Seymen, 2006).
Effective Knowledge Transfer
Cultural diversity can be helpful in knowledge transfer. Although human beings come in
different colors, shapes and forms, they do not seek to be different from others. Rather, people
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prefer to be with their own kind (Denton, 1997). Most people agree with that when two strangers
come together, it is much easier for them to break ice if the two have some common backgrounds
or experience. In the workplaces, obviously, it is much easier to communicate and transfer
information and knowledge if some of the employees speak the same language, have the same
cultural background, and think or behave in similar ways. Efficiency increases simply because
that misunderstanding can be greatly reduced by eliminating communication barriers from
cultural differences. For example, it would be more efficient for a training manager with
Hispanic cultural background to give training courses to employees with Hispanic origin. This
easier knowledge transfer greatly enhances the working efficiency and productivity.
Increasing Competitiveness
Effectively managing cultural diversity increases companies’ competitiveness. The
hospitality industry is an extremely competitive one. To survive in the competition, companies in
this industry will have to control labor costs and increase customer count. In order to achieve
these goals, companies must learn how to motivate employees, decrease turnover, and attract
more customers. Successful diversity management will definitely do help (Belfry & Schmidt,
1989).
In today’s dynamic markets, companies have to serve various customer groups with
different characteristics. Hence, cultural diversity in the workforce can help companies to
develop their capability of understanding customers’ needs and keeping long-term business
relations with them. Take Maybelline as an example. By employing African American, Spanish
and Asian workers, Maybelline has improved strategies for products and marketing towards a
new line of ethnic cosmetic market. This change brings Maybelline 41% market share of the
ethnic cosmetic market (Seymen, 2006). Clearly, diversity creates net-added value to
15
organization process (Cox and Blake, 1991). As some catering providers in the service industry
whose success highly depends on customers’ satisfaction, companies of hospitality industry can
greatly benefit from managing cultural diversity to increase customer service quality and
therefore attract more customers. Related research shows that a cultural diversified environment
with reasonable portion of minority employees can attract more minority customers (Baum et al,
2007), especially for companies in the foodservices industry (Berta, 2006), which therefore helps
the companies to increase the market share and customer loyalty.
Meanwhile, companies with fair standards in hiring can gain an advantage over their
competitors with better talent recruitment and retention, given the gradually tightening labor pool
(Berta, 2006). Moreover, companies in hospitality industry can even enhance competitiveness by
diversifying supply base, for example, by developing business partnership with minority-owned
vendors to drive quality up and cut cost down (Ruggless, 2003).
In global businesses, the most important reasons why managers need to increase
awareness of cultural diversity and to manage it effectively can be reflected in the following
statement by O. A. Symen (2006):
Providing for richness, perspective and a spectrum of alternative ways of thinking,
creativity and innovation; settling organizational flexibility; enriching the potential of human
resource; recognizing the needs of different markets better; stimulating job satisfaction;
stimulating learning through doing; providing the basis for specialization which is imperative in
today’s complex business scenarios and diminishing costs by reducing workforce turnover rate
(p. 302).
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Undoubtedly, just as stated by Belfry and Schmidt, having a company environment that is
sensitive to individual differences and their diverse cultural backgrounds can provide the
company competitive advantage (1989).
Building Images
Cultural diversity can help to enhance corporation images. The hospitality industry has
been somewhat passive about building a positive industry image for the public (Fernandez, 2006).
It should take some actions to build an image that this industry is willing to recruit more valuable
minority employees from diverse cultures. This kind of message can attract more young people
to take hospitality as a possible career option. In addition, diverse cultural workforce can make a
company look and feel more like the neighbor communities that it serves. This kind of images
can help the companies in the hospitality industry to be better recognized and accepted by
diverse communities.
Challenges of Cultural Diversity
Aside from the benefits, hospitality industry still faces challenges of cultural diversity
(Baum el al, 2007).
Communication Challenges
Different languages and various cultural backgrounds increase the difficulty of
communication between employees in the workplaces. Language is always viewed as a crucial
one among all the cultural features that make up cultural identity (Ganen, 1999). As Geert
Hofstede, the famous writer of Culture’s Consequence, an influential book published since 1980,
said in an interview, “I would say that understanding of other languages is almost a necessary,
albeit insufficient, condition for the understanding of the phenomenon of culture (Powell, 2006,
p.13)”. Language differences often result in miscommunication.
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The second factor that causes communication gap is the cultural background differences.
Rather than coming naturally, communication competence is a learned process like some other
skills, which therefore increases the difficulty employees with different backgrounds to
understand each other quickly and correctly. In addition, an intercultural communication may
encounter more specific problems than a communication with one culture does. With different
knowledge or experience, people in an intercultural communication have more difficulty to
interpret others’ behavior, which increases their uncertainty of how other persons will respond to
the communication (Baum et al, 2007). Employees of a company with diversity environment are
therefore often poorly prepared to manage the high uncertainty experienced in intercultural
communication. For example, an immigrant worker from Asia might be lack of knowledge or
experience in dealing with a local American employee who was born and brought up in the
United States. Different cultural backgrounds often engender misunderstanding when
communication becomes unsuccessful or inefficient (Baum el al, 2007). Not only the workers, to
effectively manage team members with diverse cultural backgrounds, line managers also need to
be sensitive to the cultural differences that may affect the working relationship of employees.
The ability to work effectively with people who have diverse backgrounds is one of the essential
skills that hospitality managers require but may often lack (Baum, et al), which increases the
possibility of miscommunication in the workplaces.
Particularly, when individuals fail to conduct an effective cultural communication, they
may feel themselves excluded. At the same time, some feelings may be provoked such as
suspicion, lack of confidence, and even hostility. In many oversea properties of the international
hospitality companies, problems causes by communication difficulty seem more prominent. Take
the expatriate mangers for instance, communication difficulties can negatively influent their
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everyday life, which makes them unhappy with their current situation and prevents them from
successfully adjusting to the host country and its culture. Obviously, proper cross-cultural
training can help employees to cope with intercultural communication obstacle. For expartiate
managers, effective communication helps them to become more efficient in the workplace,
reduce their emotional stress, and ultimately aid them to complete the cultural adjustment
successfully (Seymen, 2006).
Discrimination Issues
As a visually oriented species, people tend to notice differences and seek to be with their
own kind. In the history of human beings, most of the bloody battles have been between social or
cultural groups. It seems that people are inclined to choose enemies based on cultural differences.
One of the reasons is that culture, once developed, refuses changes. It helps people to identify
and strengthen their sense of community. China, with its culture, may be the best historical
example. As a cultural identity, China has existed for over 2,500 years. But the Chinese cultural
identity was almost intact after such a long time no matter the countless invasions and changes in
different ages. Just because people with different cultural backgrounds always tend to protect
their own culture, sometime conflicts easily occurs in multicultural workplaces (Denton, 1997).
Today, it cannot be ignored that cultural differences increase the possibility of discrimination
issues among workers. Direct and indirect discrimination among workers have continually
reported in companies with cultural diversity workforce (Baum et al, 2007). In fact,
discrimination does not only happen among employees. Sometime employers can also easily
involve in discrimination issue. For example, there are indications that some employers only
focus on recruiting minority but do not provide career progression for them (Baum el al, 2007).
Due to some stereotypes, minority employees get jobs in lower-skill level and might encounter
19
difficulty to be promoted to management level. Cultural differences cause communication
difficulties, and communication difficulties continually cause misunderstanding, which
stimulates more cases of discrimination. Discrimination issues result in the increase of lawsuit
and claims, and these discrimination-related lawsuits and claims would directly increase the
company’s costs and lower the retention rate as well. Working productivity may also be
influenced negatively. One of the new human resource tasks is that managers must realize the
changing faces in the workforce of the hospitality industry and recognize it as a newly
multicultural one. Most importantly, companies will not benefit from diversity if they do not
have related policy with respect to equal opportunities and devoted to diminish discrimination.
Programs of action to increase general awareness of cultural diversity should be created to
support the company policy (Baum et al, 2007).
Training Challenges
Diversity training aims at building up respect and increasing sensitivity for all of the
differences among employees and customers. In order to develop a diverse workforce, it is
essential to reduce cultural ethnocentrism and shortsightedness in employees (Lim & Noriega,
2007). Multicultural training will play a key role to increase the awareness of cultural diversity in
employees and build up a culturally enriched environment in a company (Baum et al, 2007).
Training needs to be conducted to employees to help them to understand the requirements
and benefits of the cultural diversity. They should also be given training to increase their
knowledge and skills of dealing with people having different cultural backgrounds (Baum el al,
2007). Language training and cross-culture-gap training are necessary and helpful to minority
employees, especially to immigrant employees and expatriate managers. However, no single
course can sufficiently prepare trainees for interaction with every culture in the world. Besides,
20
how to conduct the training and meantime control the training costs are also challenges to the
current hospitality companies who devote to develop cultural diversity.
Moreover, survey shows that although some companies do have diversity-training
programs in place, most of these programs simply have a goal to increase employees’ awareness
of diversity and no high-level managers in charge of diversity efforts. The only way that
diversity-training programs will be able to be successful in the hospitality industry is with the
support of upper-level management (Lim & Noriega, 2007).
Practical Recommendations of Managing Cultural Diversity
Although challenges exist, some approaches can effectively help contemporary
hospitality companies to manage cultural diversity.
Adopt an Employee Relationship Management System
In the 21
st
century, leadership styles may differ from those in the past (Clarke, 2007). It is
vital for managers to be sensitive to cultural differences so they can review their own perceptions
and behaviors and manage the diverse employees more accurately, otherwise these cultural
barriers may cause discomfort and stress for the judged individual (Baum et al, 2007). Although
it is well known that multicultural workforce in a companies is very helpful to performance and
profitability, the culturally diversified workforce can be difficult to effectively manage. To
successfully manage the multicultural workforce, managers should first realize that majority and
minority cultures do not always share experiences. The following strategies can also help
managers to break cultural barriers and reap advantages from cultural diversity. The strategies
includes such as creating programs that increase awareness of cultural diversity, improving
positive attitudes toward differences among diverse groups, realizing the same view points and
21
relations among different ethnic groups, being flexible in communication, and expressing
personal concerns and confusions when facing cultural obstacles (Elmuti, 2001).
In addition to these strategies, another important and effective approach to mange cultural
diversity in the workforce is to adopt an employee relationship management system. To integrate
minority workers into the workplaces, managers should accept the cultural differences by all the
employees and create good relationship with them. Some programs can help to build up the
relationship, which include: teaching other language to local employees, celebrating different
religious or traditional holidays of minority employees in the workplace, involving minority
employees’ families into some company activities, and emphasizing the importance of minority
workers to the companies (Baum et al, 2007). It has been proved that creating such a family
atmosphere can successfully help keeping retention (Frabotta, 2001). Unfortunately, many
managers tried to create such an atmosphere through some programs but finally failed. It is
mostly because that they had not tried to know the personalities and backgrounds of their people.
Managers should make an effort to build one-on-one relationship with employees,
understanding where they came from by having conversations with them during the down time
or some social events. Most of minority employees of the hospitality industry are young and
independent. They prefer being listened to and respected. And many of them traversed oceans to
the United States without any support network. Therefore, increasing communication with those
minority employees and providing environment of understanding and appreciating these
employees can effectively obtain their trust and loyalty. Once they become self-motivated, their
productivity would also be enhanced accordingly (Frabotta, 2001).

22
Initiate a Diversity Management Training Program
Another factor ensuring effective management of cultural diversity is training program.
To meet the cultural diversity challenges, companies in the hospitality industry must have
sensitivity to differences (Clarke, 2007). Diversity training and education are necessary and
essential to help companies in the industry to become competitive and successful (Christensen,
1993). The increased globalization of hospitality industry has made it necessary for international
companies in the industry to work effectively in foreign environments. Diversity management
training program such as cross-cultural training can help oversea mangers to learn knowledge
about different cultures and help them to develop skills of managing cultural diversity issues,
which can therefore significantly reduce the potential costly failure caused by cultural difference
problems (Caudron, 1991). For international hospitality companies, preparing current managers
and future expatriate mangers with cross-cultural sensibilities is important. To diminish cultural
barriers that managers of international hospitality companies may encounter in foreign countries,
they will have to aware their own ethnocentric viewpoints and have the willingness to go beyond
them and learn about a different cultural environment (Canen, 1999). The cross-cultural training
section should be added into the training program to direct and help the trainees to understand
the cultural expectations and their additional nonverbal behavioral manifestations.
Diversity management training and multicultural education teach employees about
various cultures. These training programs help to diminish stereotypes and allow trainees to see
the cultural differences and the truth about other cultures. By the training, employees will show
more respect to other people with different cultural backgrounds, and achieve more
understanding of others’ beliefs and their traditions (Fernandez, Kleiner & Sturz, 2005). Many
companies in the lodging industry have initiated diversity management training program
23
(DMTIs). Study of those lodging companies who initiated the DMTIs as practices shows that
employees’ perception of the importance of the training program increases once they become
involved in. The training program emphasizes communication and educational training, which
has positive impact to both minority and non-minority employees (Weaver & Wilborn, 2002).
Since multicultural workforce includes every job position from the top management
down to low-level employees (Elmuti, 2001), diversity management training should be
conducted in all levels in the hospitality industry but not only in the entry-level or low-skilled
level (Weaver & Wilborn, 2002). Say, specific training programs aiming at managing cultural
diversity should be carefully designed, continually enforced, and gradually improved. Moreover,
it cannot be ignored that for any training program that has the chance of long-term success, upper
level management must be involved to ensure the implementation of diversity practices (Ahmed,
2006).
Overcome the Stereotypes and Increase Fairness
How much culture of others should be allowed to express has been the topic of many
heated debates in political fields. The Civil Rights movement has answered this kind of questions.
Now culture becomes hot in industry and business too. But as people agree with that it is all
behind them, cases of ethnocentrism, discrimination and cultural stereotyping can still be seen
nowadays. This kind of issues even happen on persons who have been acculturated into the
American culture. “Stereotypes are defined as a conventional, formulaic, and oversimplified
conception, opinion, or image (Fernandez, et al., 2005, p. 58)”. For example, Asian employees
may be thought as good learners with academic gifts, while many Middle Eastern employees
might be labeled as terrorists because of stereotypes of their culture. Stereotypes can easily result
in discrimination to minority employees with cultural differences. And the discrimination may
24
cause minority employees to feel ashamed of their culture and therefore lack the willingness to
cooperate with others (Fernandez, et al., 2005). Ethnocentrism is the belief that one’s culture is
superior over others’. Stereotype, ethnocentrism or discrimination can take place in parts of the
employees, or even among some managers. This negatively affects the whole company, which
might result in further isolation of minorities (Fernandez, et al., 2005). Companies devote to
diversity must first be aware of the stereotypes, ethnocentrism, and prejudice, and then create
and adopt effective strategies to overcome biases.
In the hospitality industry, improving fairness and equal employment opportunities are
also very important. “In today’s labor market, managers might need to be more of a talent scout
than a resume screener (Frabotta, 2001, pg. 46)”. Employers should recognize the talents of
minority workers, developing management opportunities to those qualified minority candidates
(Ruggless, 2003). They should first overcome negative stereotypes such as the assumption that
minority workers only tend to be capable of foodservice work like washing dishes. It is necessary
to use some success stories to attract more minority talents into this industry, which could help
more minority talent workers to view the hospitality industry as a viable career option
(Fernandez, 2006). In addition, hospitality industry needs to improve fairness in pre-employment
hiring screening. Job descriptions need to be more rational. New standards like structured
interviews or culturally sensitive tests should be added into the screening system (Berta, 2006).
HR departments must regularly review and reevaluate their current measures and mechanism for
hiring and evaluation to ensure that these systems are fair to applicants or employees with
different cultural backgrounds. Make sure that the screening tools are culturally sensitive and the
testing is cultural unbiased (Berta, 2006).
25
Fair treatment is completely essential, but for a company who wants to meet the
multicultural challenge it is not enough. Completely evaluating diversity means treating people
as individuals. Do not see other people as cultures or as “pieces in some kind of multi-racial
mosaic (Day, 2007, p. 216)”. In an efficient diversity management system, companies should pay
attention to the contributions that the diverse workforce and unique individuals can make to the
companies. When dealing with cultural differences, a developmental method will help to
increase fairness, diminish stereotypes, and make the diversity a reality (Day, 2007).
Conclusion
The increasingly competitive world economy, gradual globalization of international
companies, and rapid changes in demographic trends and labor structure are posing great
challenges to management in the hospitality industry. Understanding and managing diversity has
thus become important to the contemporary hospitality industry.
Cultural diversity brings great opportunities and benefits to the companies in the
hospitality industry. But at the same time, these companies are still facing a big challenge as how
to effectively managing the multicultural workplaces. Many cultural barriers such as
communication obstacle, discrimination and stereotypes still need to be overcome. To increase
the awareness and sensitivities of cultural diversity management, related training program should
be designed and conducted in the industry.
Although the hospitality industry’s interest in the outcome of cultural diversity is
increasing, it seems that in the academic field few educators have been concerned with the
implications of adding cultural diversity management into hospitality curriculum. Much of the
burden of multicultural education as a result has been on industry training (Lim & Noriega,
2007). As the future managers who will enter the workplace and deal with the cultural diversity
26
issues directly, hospitality graduate students need to be educated with multicultural management
knowledge and skills. There is necessity that cultural diversity management training is
incorporated into college curriculums, such as in a human resource course. Companies of the
hospitality industry, especially the HR departments of these companies, should also create and
conduct effective training programs for employees, providing diversity management training to
employees to increase their awareness and sensitivities to cultural diversity. Current managers
and future mangers should be given additional multicultural management training to polish their
management skills in dealing with cultural diversity issues. Cross-cultural training should be
given to those individuals that will be entering the global marketplace of hospitality management
field (Lim & Noriega, 2007). Hence, designing some training programs is necessary for the
hospitality industry. In the following fart of this paper, a cultural diversity management training
module will be presented as a practical example for the hospitality industry.

Part Three: Cultural Diversity Training Module
Introduction
The literature review in part two of this paper implies that diversity training, especially
cultural diversity training, should be incorporated into graduate curriculum to educate hospitality
students that will enter the marketplace of hospitality management; and should be implemented
in hospitality companies to help employees to increase awareness and sensitivities of different
kind of diversities, which ensures the companies to be competitive and successful in the industry.
Hence, it is necessary and essential to create an effective module to guide this kind of training.
As the last part of the paper, the training module first defines the needs, goals and requirements
of the cultural diversity training program; and then creates some practical training sessions as a
model that can be applied in the graduate human resource course or used by HR managers of the
27
hospitality industry. In each training session, a formal training project is designed that includes
the contents of training topic, training objective, and training process. PowerPoint document for
each session is created and shown as appendix. Related reading materials and videos are
introduced for each section as well. Future research can focus on the assessment of the
effectiveness of cultural diversity training or exploring the challenges that trainers may face in
implementing the cultural diversity training.
Cultural Diversity Training Program
Needs of Initiating a Cultural Diversity Training Program
Along with the continued internationalization and the increasing diversity of the
workforce, a lack of skills of managing diversity has been viewed as a main contributor to high
turnover and lower productivity in hospitality industry. As the workplace is full of people with
different cultural backgrounds, the standards of good leadership have accordingly changed over
time. Having multilingual employees is no longer enough to handle increasing diversity issues
for hospitality companies. To remain competitive in the marketplace, managers in these
companies must have greater awareness and sensitivity of cultural differences in their employees,
stakeholders, and customers.
Since these leadership skills do not come naturally, to meet the needs of the industry,
cultural diversity training program should be designed in hospitality companies to educate
individuals who are managing and supervising, or will manage or supervise, a diverse workforce
within the global market (Lim and Noriega, 2007). Educational institutions also need to
incorporate the training program into curriculum to educate graduate students who prepare
themselves for upper management or senior administrative positions.
28
Diversity training is defined as “a means of establishing respect and developing a
sensitivity for all of the differences among employees and customers (Lim and Noriega, 2007,
p.67)”. Cultural diversity training can provide trainees a forum for discussion. A greater
willingness to talk directly about differences helps employees to build trust, make effective
decision and even open a door of compromise. This kind of training has seemed more necessary
when skills of dealing with difficult situations and communicating effectively in multicultural
workplace are required (Day, 2007).
Goals of Cultural Diversity Training
Generally, there are three goals of implementing cultural diversity training. The first
training goal is to help trainees who learn to handle cultural differences to increase awareness of
cultural diversity. People learn from each other. By learning in a multicultural workshop, trainees
can build an awareness of how people are culturally different and how others view them from the
point of view of impressions, perceptions, and stereotypes. It is the starting point for proper
cross-cultural sensitivity (Day, 2007).
Besides of increasing trainees’ awareness of diversity, the cultural diversity training
program has a goal to help trainees to obtain knowledge of possible differences between cultures.
By participating the training, trainees get to know where these differences come from and what
forms they might take. For example, how relationships are established in other cultures, what
expectations an employee with different cultural background might have; or how the
communication styles are different in various cultures. Recognizing and understanding these
differences can help people build trust, communicate more efficiently, avoid misunderstanding,
and enhance harmony in the workplace.
29
The training program of handling cultural differences includes a third goal: to develop
skills of managing cultural diversity. With the increased awareness and knowledge of cultural
differences, trainees need to develop more skills to manage, communicate, or negotiate in a
cultural diverse environment (Day, 2007). The diversity training program can prepare trainees
these know-how skills.
In a sentence, the goal of the cultural diversity training can be simply described as to
prepare individuals to become competent intercultural communicators with cultural awareness
and sensitivity (Baum et al., 2007).
Target Trainees
Cultural diversity can create barriers in the hospitality industry. Employees must be
prepared to deal with business in the increasingly diverse marketplace, or prepared for wider
international responsibilities. Eligible trainees of the training grogram normally have three
characters such as (1) being willing to recognize that cultural differences do exist across cultures,
(2) trying to understand such differences, and (3) desiring to value the differences of others
(Tung, 1993). In hospitality companies, the training mainly target at team leaders, supervisors
and mangers, especially expatriate managers. The diversity training session that aims at
increasing awareness should be given to all employees to help them to interact with customers
and each other more successfully. In academic area, cultural diversity training can be given to
graduate students in human resource courses. As future managers of the industy, hospitality
graduate students should have sensitivities about cultural diversity. They need guidance to
develop skills of dealing with cultural diverse situations, improve intercultural communication
skills, and overcome discrimination and stereotyping.
30
Requirements for Training Success
Competent trainer. Trainers who prepare students or trainees for management positions
must foresee the future needs of the industry. Before giving training, trainers themselves must
receive educational training in cultural diversity management. They need to identify what
activities of diversity are presently the most important, and therefore incorporate the important
diversities into the training. Trainers should better have cultural diversity backgrounds or
experience, and should be given access to required resources to develop research and deliver
such training (Baum et al, 2007).
Overcome stereotypes. For the training program to be successful, stereotyping and other
biases that trainees bring to the classroom or workshop must be discussed. The training sessions
must be designed to first increase trainees’ awareness of differences. Trainees have to understand
that there are differences across cultures and it is necessary to develop skills through training to
manage these differences. Trainees must be educated that with the influence of cultural diversity
certain behaviors may not work in all situations (Lim & Noriega, 2007).
High-level management involvement. Without the support of upper management, the
diversity training program may face great difficulty to be successful in the hospitality industry.
Top management must be involved to ensure the training to have chance of achieving long-term
success (Ahmed, 2006). High-level management involvement is helpful in creating a corporation
environment that appreciates innovation, creativity, different opinions and diverse talents.
Without such an environment, cultural diversity training may not be conducted continuously or
not have any developing future in that company (Lim & Noriega, 2007).
Monitoring and evaluation.Like any other training program, the cultural diversity training
should be continuously monitored and evaluated. It has to be reinforced to guarantee that there is
31
a positive attitude toward the program. Feedbacks of the program need to be evaluated for future
improvement (Lim and Noriega, 2007).
Training Session Module
The following training session module is designed as a model sample that colleges and
hospitality companies can apply in their cultural diversity training program. Each section is
designed as a one-hour session. And the number of trainees is assumed to be around twenty.
Section One: Diverse Workforce in the Hospitality Industry
Training topic. The first section of the training module is about the diverse workforce in
the hospitality industry. In this section, trainers can start the training by introducing the definition
of diversity and the current status of diverse workforce. Two categories of dimensions of
diversity will be explained. The primary dimensions include the core issues such as race and
gender, and the secondary dimensions can also been seen as cultural differences. As the core
issues of the primary dimensions, race, gender, age and disabilities will be discussed in details
respectively, each about ten minutes in the training section.
Training objective. This training session aims at giving trainees a background
introduction of the diversity in the hospitality industry. By introducing the basic information, the
training session tries to increase trainees’ awareness and sensitivities of diversity in the industry,
and help them to overcome discrimination and stereotyping.
Training process. A practicable training process sample is designed for reference. See
Appendix A: Sample Lecture of Section One.
Conclusion. After taking this training session, trainees should realize that (1) there are
differences between people; (2) diverse workforce benefits the companies; and (3) they need to
32
respect others’ differences. At the end of the training session, trainers need to emphasize these
expectations to trainees.
Reading materials. Some reading articles are suggested in this section to help trainees to
get more information about the diversity in the hospitality industry. Reading article 1: Just do it:
The time to improve gender, race diversity is now. This article is about the topic of the lack of
black women holding executive positions in the U.S. foodservice industry, which is discussed at
the 2007 Women’s Foodservice Forum in Orlando, Florida (Kizart-Hampton, 2007). It is an
article that helps trainees to insight into the diversity issues about both race and gender. Reading
article 2: Don’t waste this pool of experience. This article is about the issue of age, claiming that
older employees with experience are important to the hospitality industry (Coburn, 2007).
Reading article 3: Parkert: People with disabilities an overlooked resource. This is an interview
with Joanne Packert, in which the supported employment manager at Chesapeake Service
Systems presented her thoughts that operators should consider hiring people with disabilities to
affect their bottom line (Berta, 2007)
Assignments. Some assignments are designed to help trainees to digest what they have
learned in this training section and ensure that trainees are prepared for the next training session.
Assignment 1: Read the assigned reading materials to get an in-depth understanding of the
diversity workforce in the hospitality industry. Assignment 2: To prepare for the discussion in
training section two, trainers are required to prepare a one or two minutes example or story that
they experienced in person or they have thought as cultural differences. Trainees are encouraged
to use the Internet to find more interesting information about cultural diversity.

33
Section Two: Growing Cultural Diversity
Training topic. After introducing the big picture of the diversity in the workforce, the
training can be narrowed down to the secondary dimensions of diversity, say, the cultural
diversity. The training session can cover the contents such as the definitions of cultural and
cultural diversity, the theory behind the cultural diversity, the current status, and the benefits and
challenges of cultural diversity.
Training objective. This training session is designed to orient and familiarize students and
trainees with the status quo of growing cultural diversity in the hospitality industry. It tries to
increase trainees’ consciousness and awareness of differences in values, attitudes, patterns of
behavior and communication styles that may exist across cultures (Baum et al, 2007)
Training process. A practicable training process sample is designed for reference. See
Appendix B: Sample Lecture of Section Two.
Conclusion. After the training, trainees should have the awareness of understanding and
respecting others’ cultural differences, recognize the benefits from cultural diversity and learn to
deal with cultural differences in some situations. With this training, the trainees, most of whom
might be current or future managers, should realize the fact that people with different cultural
backgrounds, because of their upbringing, may support different values or assumptions that can
influent the way they collaborate, communicate, compete, organize and make decision (Baum et
al, 2007).
Reading materials. Reading article: Operators outline programs, initiatives to guarantee
diversity among workforce. This article highlights the meeting of the Multicultural Foodservice
and Hospitality Alliance's conference in Dallas, Texas. Many cultural diversity topics discussed
at the meeting are reported in this article (Ruggless, 2003).
34
Assignments. Assignment 1: Trainees are required to read the assigned article to get in-
depth understanding of the growing cultural diversity in the hospitality industry. Assignments 2:
Trainees are required to prepare a scenario for discussion in next training session based on their
previous experience that how a manger failed to manage cultural diversity, why they think so,
and if there are any alternative solutions. Students in college can be required to complete this as a
writing paper.
Section Three: Managing Cultural Diversity
Training topic. This training session will lead trainees to discuss the topic of stereotyping
and discrimination to cultural differences in hospitality industry, and encourage trainees to
explore efficient solutions of managing cultural diversity. This training session is more like a
workshop that trainers and trainees participate together.
Training objective. The objective of this training session is to help students or trainees to
overcome their stereotyping and discrimination to cultural differences, and to facilitate them to
develop leadership and efficient cultural diversity management skills in the multicultural
workplace.
Training process. A practicable training process sample is designed for reference. See
Appendix C: Sample Lecture of Section Three.
Conclusion. After the training, students or trainees should have managed the skills of
how to successfully create an efficient and friendly manager-employee relationship in the
multicultural workplace. Management skills do not come naturally. People learn from each other.
A dynamic workshop can encourage trainees to participate the discussion. And it is well known
that for adult learner, more participation can increase the efficiency and success of the training.
35
Reading materials. Reading article: Cultural diversity: Making staff differences work.
This article discusses the advantages of cultural diversity program to businesses, which can help
trainees to understand the reason why managing cultural diversity is important in running a
business (Leitner, 2008).
Assignments. Assignment 1: Trainees are required to read the assigned article to get in-
depth understanding of different approaches of managing cultural diversity and relate them to the
hospitality industry. Assignment 2: To prepare for the class discussion in section IV, every
trainee is required to choose a foreign country as an assumed expatriate location. The trainee
needs to find out at least three cultural differences that they might encounter if they would go to
that country as an expatriate.
Section Four: Expatriates - Bering prepared
Training topic. This training session is specifically designed to target the expatriate issue.
To follow the internationalization trend in the hospitality industry, more cross-cultural training
should be designed and implemented to prepare expatriates before they enter foreign workplaces.
This training session will teach trainees knowledge about how various cultures differ from others
and how expatriates can successfully complete cross-cultural adjustment.
Training objective. Lack of preparation can hinder expatriates to complete cross-cultural
adjustment successfully (Branston et al, 2006). Managers working with international workers
should be specially educated and prepared for the difficulties of building cultural working
relationships. This section is designed to help current managers in oversea properties or future
expatriate managers who are going to enter international workplaces to gain knowledge and
skills of breaking cultural barriers.
36
Training process. A practicable training process sample is designed for reference. See
Appendix D: Sample Lecture of Section Four.
Conclusion. After this training session, trainees should have built up confidents to
develop new skills and competencies in managing cross-culture difficulties in foreign
workplaces. These skills may include communication competency, proficiency in other
languages and negotiation skills (Baum et al, 2007). By taking the training, students or trainees
should become aware of opportunities for additional and more precise information about specific
cultures (Lim & Noriega, 2007).
Reading materials. Reading article: Cross-cultural impact and learning needs for
expatriate hotel employees in Taiwan lodging industry. This article provides information of why
and how important that expatriates in hospitality industry need cross-cultural training to help
them complete the adjustment. It also provides some examples of the cultural differences
between Asian and Western countries, which helps the trainees to insight into the multicultural
management field (Hu, Lynda & Yeh, 2002).
Assignments. Assignment 1: Trainees are required to read the assigned article to
recognize the cultural challenges they might encounter in international workplaces. Assignment
2: Every trainee is required to complete a five-to-eight-page individual paper. In this paper,
trainees are required to write about what they have learned from the training sessions and what
they want to learn if they will have chance to participate similar training in the future. This
assignment can help trainers to evaluate and reinforce the cultural diversity training program.
Conclusion
Cultural diversity training is an approach that helps trainees to understand cultures and
provides them an overall perspective in cultural diversity. However, no one course can cover all
37
the cultural differences. An individual can still experience great difficulty when he or she applies
the skills and knowledge learned from the training in real situations (Baum et al, 2007). Training
for competencies towards managing diversity is by no means the most efficient method to help
the industry to manage cultural diversity. Creating an intercultural working environment is more
important (Baum et al, 2007).
Since the training module is created by the author and has not received any testing in the
real world, there might be biases and bugs in the designing. These limitations can be gradually
reduced by regular reevaluation and revision. Recommended reading materials and videos might
be dated over time, which needs to be replaced when trainers apply the module for real training
program. Another constraint of the paper is that the copyright issue limits adequate access to
more professional training visual materials such as videos or podcasts that can be applied to
improve the training module.
Future research can focus on the assessment system of the evaluating the effectiveness of
the cultural diversity training or exploring the challenges that trainers may face in implementing
the cultural diversity training to prepare graduate students or hospitality mangers for a
multicultural workforce.

38
Appendix A
Sample Lecture of Section One: Diverse Workforce in the Hospitality Industry
Trainer: Good morning everyone. My name is Li Wang. I came from China and received
my undergraduate degree of Education there. I got my master’s degree and PhD. in UNLV,
major in human resource management. This training session is about cultural diversity
management. With my international backgrounds and experience, I believe I can give you some
help to insight into the field of cultural diversity. Before we start our training, I would like
everyone to do a simple personal introduction. Tell us your name, where did you came from, and
if you have any international experience.
Students/Trainees: (Giving personal introductions)
Trainer: Good. We see many of you have international backgrounds or experience. You
must have some thoughts of cultural diversity. Before we get into the topic of culture differences,
let’s first look at the diversity itself. What do you think about diversity? Can you give me any
HR example of diversity?
Students/Trainees: (Giving example about diversity)
Trainer: Great. As you said, diversity is defined as the differences between people, such
as gender, race, appearance, etc. In fact, there are two categories of the dimensions of diversity,
the primary dimensions and the secondary dimensions. (Show the PowerPoint slide to students/
trainees). We can find out that the core issues such as gender, race, and age you mentioned
before are the primary dimensions of diversity, and the secondary dimensions include issues such
as education, communication style, religious beliefs, ethnic customs and so on. The secondary
dimensions can also be viewed as cultural differences that mostly do not come naturally but are
39
formed due to individuals’ various backgrounds or experience. Both the primary and secondary
dimensions of diversity make people uniquely different (Lim and Noriega, 2007).
Trainer: The workforce is becoming more diverse in the U.S. Let’s see how it changes.
(Show the PowerPoint slide to students/ trainees) According to the Department of Labor’s
Bureau of Labor Statistics, Asian and other labor force increase most rapidly, and the Hispanic
labor force is projected to be larger than the black labor force by 2010. In race and ethnic groups,
the number of Asian and other employees (Pacific Islanders, American Indians, and Alaskan
Natives are included) will increase 44.1% by 2010 in the U.S. workforce, while Hispanic
employees will increase 36.3% and African American 20.7%. By 2010, women will make up
48% of the workforce and the growth rate of women in the labor force will still increase at a
faster rate than that of men. The number of workers 55 or older will increase 50% by 2012
(Fullerton & Toossi, 2001). Employees with disabilities and immigrants from developing
countries are also continuing entering the workforce.
Trainer: As we mentioned before, race, gender, age and physical/mental abilities are
some of the core issues of the primary dimensions of diversity. Now let’s look at these issues one
by one. Let us first watch a video about gender diversity in the workforce. (Open the hyperlink
of video in the PowerPoint slides)
Students/Trainees: (Watch the video)
Trainer: What do you think of the gender diversity in today’s workforce after you
watched the video? (Encourage students/trainees to participate the discussion)
Students/Trainees: (Participate the discussion)
Trainer: We must agree with that men and women are different. This is a report about
gender research (Show the table in the PowerPoint slides). Men and women show different
40
characters in business. In spite of these differences, employers should value and take advantage
of the differences by enhancing business performance with gender diversity. At the same time,
employers must ensure equal work with equal pay no matter whether the worker is male or
female. However, although women’s share in the labor force is increasing, there is still an 18%
pay gap between male and female. Women continue to be kept from getting upper level positions.
There is still gender bias such as female managers do not or cannot measure up to male
(Wheelwright, 2006). If the stereotypes continue to exist, the goal of gender diversity cannot be
achieved.
Trainer: Let’s watch the next video about race. (Open the hyperlink of video in the
PowerPoint slides)
Students/Trainees: (Watch the video)
Trainer: What do you think of the race diversity in today’s workforce after you watched
the video? (Encourage students/trainees to participate the discussion)
Students/Trainees: (Participate the discussion)
Trainer: The study of race in the U.S. has mostly been limited to the examination of
African-American and their relations with whites (Segura, 2006). Generally, the percentage of
black and minority ethnic workers in the hospitality industry is high, but still much lower in
senior level. Most of them work with low-level jobs such as housekeeping and kitchen work.
Discriminations still happen. So, again, overcoming stereotyping is necessary.
Trainer: The next video is about age. In China, there is an adage “An old person is a
fortune to a family.” Are old persons also fortune to corporations? Let’s watch the video. (Open
the hyperlink of video in the PowerPoint slides)
Students/Trainees: (Watch the video)
41
Trainer: What do you think of the issue of employing old persons after you watched the
video? (Encourage students/trainees to participate the discussion)
Students/Trainees: (Participate the discussion)
Trainer: Obviously, older employees are fortune to our business. Employers can apply
these experienced employees into training positions to make use of their years of experience
(“Equality and diversity in the hospitality workplace”, 2008).
Trainer: The last video is about employees with disabilities. (Open the hyperlink of video
in the PowerPoint slides)
Students/Trainees: (Watch the video)
Trainer: Any one wants to share his or her opinion with this issue? (Encourage
students/trainees to participate the discussion)
Students/Trainees: (Participate the discussion)
Trainer: Today, there are more than 56 million people with disabilities in the U.S., almost
one out of every five. In this pool, there must be talents with some disabilities want to and could
work in some areas (“Equality and diversity in the hospitality workplace”, 2008). Employers
should give equal opportunities to these people to crease a diverse and valuable environment.
Trainer: As a conclusion, we should realize that (1) there are differences between people;
(2) diverse workforce benefits the companies; and (3) we must overcome stereotyping and
respect others’ differences.
Trainer: Two assignments to you after today’s training. First, please, read the assigned
reading materials to get in-depth understanding of the diversity workforce in the hospitality
industry. Second, our next training session is about the growing cultural diversity in the
workplace. We will have some discussions about this topic. Please prepare a one or two minutes
42
example or story that you experienced in person or you have thought as cultural differences. You
can use the Internet to find more interesting information about this topic and bring it to the next
training class. Thanks everyone, and see you next class.

43
Appendix B
Sample Lecture of Section Two: Growing Cultural Diversity
Trainer: Before we begin our class, let us watch a video first. (Open the hyperlink of
video in the PowerPoint slides named as cultural diversity.)
Students/Trainees: (Watch the video)
Trainer: We know today’s training topic is about cultural diversity. Then, what is culture?
What is cultural diversity? Do you have any thoughts after you watched the video? At the end of
last training session, I asked everyone to prepare a small example or story that you experienced
in person or you have thought as cultural differences. Anyone want to share that with us?
(Encourage students to join in the discussion.)
Students/Trainees: (Join in the discussion)
Trainer: Thanks for everyone’s participation. You did very well. What’s the definition of
culture? According to the Webster, culture has the main meanings as (1): the integrated pattern
of human knowledge, belief, and behavior that depends upon the capacity for learning and
transmitting knowledge to succeeding generations (2) “the customary beliefs, social forms, and
material traits of a racial, religious, or social group; and also the characteristic features of
everyday existence (as diversions or a way of life) shared by people in a place or time; (3) the set
of shared attitudes, values, goals, and practices that characterizes an institution or organization
(4) the set of values, conventions, or social practices associated with a particular field, activity,
or societal characteristic (Merriam-Webster, 2008). (Show the PowerPoint slides)
Trainer: Every cultural identity has its own characters, which can be seen as cultural
differences. Fro example, Uganda has legislation against mini-skirts and Iranian revolutionaries
have women back in the veils (Denton, 1997). Asian people keep closer relationship to big
44
family while western people are more independent. These differences make cultures extremely
diverse. According to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation, the
term cultural-diversity generally refers to the cultural differences between people. The existing
differences include language, dress, traditions, morality and religion, societies organization, and
the way they interact with the environment (UNESCO, 2001). (Show the PowerPoint slides)
Trainer: Once culture developed, it resists change. It is difficult for people to easily
accept cultural differences of others’. Why this happens? The theory behinds the phenomenon is
that we are visually oriented species and tend to notice differences. We seek to be with our own
kind (Denton, 1997). (Show the PowerPoint slides) Then, how can we deal with the cultural
diversity, especially in the workplaces? Let’s watch a video first. (Open the hyperlink of video in
the PowerPoint slides named as cultural diversity in the work place.)
Students/Trainees: (Watch the video)
Trainer: What do you think of the advantages of cultural diversity in the workplace?
(Encourage the students/trainees to participate the discussion.)
Students/Trainees: (Join in the discussion)
Trainer: Very good. Just as you said, cultural diversity really benefits the corporations.
The advantages include such as innovation, competitiveness and knowledge transfer; increased
attraction to minority customers (Baum et al, 2007); better talent recruitment and retention;
cutting labor cost; diversifying supply base by developing business partnership with minority-
owned vendors to drive quality up and cut cost down (Ruggless, 2003); and enhancing corporate
images in neighbor communities as well. (Show the PowerPoint slides)
Trainer: How about the challenges of cultural diversity? (Encourage the students/trainees
to participate the discussion.)
45
Students/Trainees: (Join in the discussion)
Trainer: Yes, there are still challenges of cultural diversity that the hospitality industry
needs to cope with, for example the language barriers, communication difficulties, stereotyping
and discriminations, training difficulties, and cultural barriers for expatriates.
Trainer: Is these challenges manageable? Yes. We can manage the cultural diversity if we
know more about the differences. In the following training secessions, we will discuss how to
manage these challenges. To prepare for the next training session, I would like everyone to
prepare a scenario for discussion in next class. The scenario should be based on your previous
experience about how a manger failed to manage cultural diversity. It should be a true story.
Please don’t create one. If you don’t have such kind of experience, you can go online to find one.
Then turn it as a two or three page paper. Also include why you think it is bad management. Are
there any alternative solutions? What would you do if you were that manager?
Trainer: In addition, please also read the article assigned to this training session. It will
help you to insight into the cultural diversity in the hospitality industry. Thanks everyone and see
you next class.

46
Appendix C
Sample Lecture of Section Three: Managing Cultural Diversity
Trainer: Good morning everyone. In the last class, we talked about cultural diversity. We
know the diversity in growing in the workplace of the hospitality industry. And we also know
there are benefits and challenges for a cultural diverse workforce. The most important point we
have get is although there are challenges, they are manageable. So today, we will talk about how
to manage cultural diversity.
Trainer: Last class, I asked everyone to prepare a scenario based on your own experience
about how a manger failed to manage cultural diversity. Now, can someone share his or her story
with us? When someone talks about his or her story, I’d like others to think about the following
questions for that case. Is it bad management? Why do you think it is bad? How can the manager
improve the management? (Show the PowerPoint slides and encourage students/trainees to
participate the discussion.)
Students/Trainees: (Participate the discussion.)
Trainer: Thanks for everyone’s participation. That is good discussion. Now we can see,
there are no exact rules or model for managing cultural diversity. But have you noticed that? One
of the most often mentioned word in our discussion is “communication”. If you don’t understand
others’ cultures or if you have different opinions with others, go to ask and talk with them.
Communication, communication and communication, this is the most important point in dealing
with cultural diversity issues. There are some practical recommendations for managing cultural
diversity. (Show the PowerPoint slides)
Trainer: The first is adopting an employee relationship management system, which
means that managers accept the cultural differences of all the employees and create good
47
relationship with them. Some programs can help to build up the relationship, such as teaching
other languages to local employees, celebrating different religious or traditional holidays of
minority employees in the workplace, or involving minority employees’ families into some
company activities (Baum et al, 2007). It has been proved that creating such a family atmosphere
can successfully help keeping retention (Frabotta, 2001). Sometime, very simple action can make
things different. Fro example, Holiday Inn Express has lot of Latinos working for housekeeping
job who do not have enough English to effectively respond to requests. The company developed
a flyer with English/Spanish translation for the basics, like towel, sheet, etc., along with a
phonetic explanation about how they sound. And they found that their staff did a better job
(Gleason, 2004). So, make an effort to build one-on-one relationship with employees,
understanding where they came from and what they need. Once the employees become self-
motivated, their productivity would also be enhanced accordingly (Frabotta, 2001).
Trainer: The second is to overcome stereotyping and discrimination. Please do not always
relate Middle Eastern employees to terrorists. Learn to respect the differences of others. It is also
necessary to improve fairness and equal employment opportunities to employees with different
cultural backgrounds. Performance evaluation or appraisal can be helpful to manage this kind of
issues.
Trainer: The last one is training. That is what we are doing now. Use training to increase
employees’ awareness and sensitivities of the cultural diversity. But the main goal of the training
is to build an environment in the companies that accepts and appreciates those differences.
Trainer: Next, we will create a workshop. Let first watch a video. It is about race, but
please pay attention to the cultural hints. (Open the hyperlink of video in the PowerPoint slides
named as Diversity Day in the Office.)
48
Students/Trainees: (Watch the video.)
Trainer: Any comments to this video? Is there stereotyping or questionable
communication in the video? (Encourage students to participate discussion.)
Students/Trainees: (Participate the discussion.)
Trainer: Good points. Now we’ll do the same game. But there is a little difference. Take
the name card with you and go communicating with others. You don’t need to guess the culture
you are assigned only if you want to make more fun. Try to collect at least five different
comments to your culture. Remember the five should be different. Also count how many persons
give you the same comments. For example, like the video, probable 8 persons think eating rice is
a main culture of Asian countries. Then eating rice is the first comment on your list. And please
also record the number 8. Once you collect the five different comments, please write them down
on the board. (Hand out the name cards to students/trainees.)
Students/Trainees: (Participate the workshop.)
Trainer: (Write down the name of each culture on the boar to let students/trainees list
their collections of comments accordingly.)
Students/Trainees: (List their collections of comments on the board.)
Trainer: Do you like the game? I found some of you really enjoying it. It’s a good
practice for you to find topics for an intercultural communication. Now let’s see what you have
got. What does the number after each comment mean? Could it also mean some kind of
stereotyping? (Lead the students to discuss the information on the board.)
Students/Trainees: (Participate the discussion.)
49
Trainer: Good. After the workshop, I believe that everyone must have had some ideas of
how to effectively manage cultural diversity. Please read the recommended article for this
training section after the class. You can get more insights of this topic.
Trainer: We will talk about how to overcome cultural barriers for expatriates in our next
class. Before that class, I’d like everyone to choose a foreign country as an assumed expatriate
location. Please try to find out at least three cultural differences that you might encounter if you
would be assigned to that country as an expatriate. Thanks everyone and see you next class.

50
Appendix D
Sample Lecture of Section Four: Expatriates: Being Prepared
Trainer: Welcome to the last training session of the cultural diversity training program.
We talked about the management of cultural diverse workforce in domestic market in previous
classes. Today, we will talk about cross-cultural adjustment for expatriates. Globalization of the
hospitality industry has caused continuously increasing number of expatriates. But many
expatriates who did well in the U.S. fail to complete their missions in other countries. Cultural
shock is the main reason. Let’s watch a video first. (Open the hyperlink of video in the
PowerPoint slides named as Culture Shock.)
Students/Trainees: (Watch the video.)
Trainer: (Give a pause to the video at 5’28’’; just after the section about foreign food is
played.)
Trainer: It’s funny, isn’t it? But to experience such cultural shock without any preparation
is definitely not that funny. Cultural shock is defined as “an unanticipated, negative response to a
new experience (Branston et al, 2006, p. 356)” when people change location to a new culture.
Different language, customs, and foods can all cause expatriates to feel uncomfortable. So, being
prepared for the cultural differences becomes important and necessary for expatriates. Let’s
finish the video. (Resume the playing of the video.)
Students/Trainees: (Continue watching the video)
Trainer: Obviously, Pepsi is playing a card named culture. So, again, if you can manage
culture, you will really benefit from it. Let’s come back to our topic. At the beginning of the
video, we saw a new visitor to New York. He was happy, excited, and curious. Everything
seemed new and interesting to him. This kind of feeling is called cultural surprise, which is
51
defined as “a feeling of well-being and comfort experienced by those who come into contact
with new cultures (Branston et al, 2006, p. 358)”. Another term you need to know is cross-
cultural adjustment. When expatriates in international locations change their home base from one
culture to another, the adaptation period associated with this changes is defined as cross-cultural
adjustment (Branston et al, 2006). (Show the PowerPoint slides.)
Trainer: Then, how to be a prepared expatriate? To effectively break the cultural barriers
and successfully complete cross-cultural adjustment, expatriates should first understand the
cultural differences. (Show the PowerPoint slides.)
Trainer: The first difference between cultures is how they deal with their relationship
with other people. There are five ways that people relate to each other (Kippenberger, 2000).
First, rules versus relationships. A universalist whose culture is rule-based tends to operate in the
abstract. For example, within the Western world, legal contracts are readily drawn up and focus
on rules rather than on relationship. A Germany will frown at behaviors against rules such as
crossing the street when the light is red. On the contrary, a particulist with relationship-based
culture background make judgments on the relative importance of other people. Asian and South
American belong to this culture base.
Trainer: The second is Me versus Us. Individualist societies such as Canada and the U.S.
more believe in individual freedom. While in a communitarian culture such as Mexico, Japan,
China or France, people tend to orientate mainly towards common goals even though that
obstructs their individual freedom and values. The third is the neutral culture versus the affective
culture. People within a neutral culture will keep their feelings under control carefully, such as
the Japanese, while people within an affective culture prefer showing their emotions. For
example, people of Latin countries are within this culture.
52
Trainer: Anyone has any idea about specific culture and diffuse culture? (Encourage
students to participate discussion.)
Students/Trainees: (Participate the discussion.)
Trainer: In a specific culture, people separate out the work from the play, but in a diffuse
society, all aspects of life and every level of personality overlap with all others (Kippenberger,
2000, p. 30). China is a good example of a country with diffuse culture. Most of Chinese people
like to deal with business around a dining table. But you do not want to waste your time wining
and dining someone who has specific cultural backgrounds. The last way that different cultures
deal with people relationship is the status being culture versus status doing culture. For a status
doing culture, one’s achieved status is based on his or her achievement. But for a status being
culture, one’s status is given by virtue of age, gender, family, or education. The status being
culture countries include such as Arabia, Thailand and India, while the status doing culture
countries include such the U.S., UK, Finland, Denmark and Norway (Kippenberger, 2000).
Trainer: These are the five ways people within different cultures relate themselves to
others. Another cultural difference is time management. (Show PowerPoint slides.) Different
cultures have different understanding towards part, present and future. For example, the British
have strong link with the past; Belgian view all of the three as equally important; and the
American pay more attention to future. In addition, when managing time, a sequential culture
deals with one thing at a time, adhering strictly to plan or schedule. A synchronic culture will
take care of several things at the same time, and pay attention to relationship rather than
schedules.
Trainer: The last big difference is inner-directed culture versus outer-directed culture.
The former tries to impose its will on natural environment. They believe the adage ‘win some,
53
lose some’. The later believe that man is part of nature and must go along with it. They therefore
say ‘win together, lose apart’. This cultural difference can explain why employees of North
America need to be trained to take care of customers but it comes naturally in Japan and
Singapore (Kippenberger, 2000).
Trainer: Now, let’s do more discussion. In last class, I asked everyone to choose a
country as your destination. Now, I’d like you to discuss your case in groups. Every four or five
persons can form a group. Share your ideas with others and give your suggests to others. (Direct
the students/trainees to form groups.)
Students/Trainees: (Participate group discussion.)
Trainer: Good discussion. I’ve heard many good points when I walk around. Today’s
training is almost done. As a conclusion, expatriates need to understand these differences to
prepare themselves to potential cultural barriers they might encounter in foreign countries.
(Show PowerPoint slides) The main point is to reconcile the differences by increasing awareness
and respect to the cultural diversity. Think about situations in your own life. Put yourself in
others’ shoes. This can help you to understand others (Kippenberger, 2000). In addition, no any
training course can cover all the cultural differences. Expatriates have to learn cultures while
experiencing the differences. Put simply, being prepared, then you can successfully conquer the
cultural barriers.
Trainer: After the class, please read the assigned article to recognize the cultural
challenges expatriates might encounter in international workplaces. And please write a five-to-
eight-page individual paper. In this paper, please include what your have learned from the
cultural diversity training program and what you want to learn if you will have any chance to
54
participate similar training in the future. The four-section training is completed. Thank you for
your participation.

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