Diversity !

The definition of diversity is the state of being diverse, variety or a range of different things. I believe diversity is a very important aspect in the business world because without it companies would not stand out or have competition. It is the window to improvement and motivation. Diversity is the key for change and keeps things alive and interesting.

Every employee should have a strong code of conduct and ethics because these are also two important aspects that defines a person in their careers. Code of conduct are rules on how employees should act and code of ethics are rules on how companies can act. If an employee does not follow a code of conduct, they have potential to lose their job, go on probation, get demoted, or even blackballed, which is when someone is socially ostracized. If a company does not follow their own code of ethics, they can be fined, lose their license to operate, or be completely shut down. As for an employee disobeying ethics, they can lose their job, face criminal charges, and also be blackballed.

Ethics, to me, are extremely important and define who you are as a person. It can be the defining factor on if you are a trustworthy employee or a disloyal one. It shows in a person’s life with their families and relationships. Having good ethics can go a long way. Every employer looks for people who have good ethics and can be a deciding factor on whether to hire a person or not.

I watched the movie October Baby about a young girl, Hannah, who finds out she was adopted and was a product of a failed abortion. Upon finding this out after having repeated medical issues, she became very angry and confused and goes on a road trip with some friends to find herself. She searched for her unknown mother and is very disappointed to learn her mother has a new life and family and was ashamed of her. She was very hurt, but with the help of an old friend, Jason, who she develops feelings for, she learns that every life is beautiful.

The outcome of this movie was very unexpected for me, but had a strong message that I really enjoyed. It triggered my emotions and showed me how abortion can potentially affect a person’s life. After watching this, my views on abortion changed from pro-choice to pro-life because it truly showed me a different view on things.

Teamwork!

We have come to the end of week 12 of our RHM 303 class. This week we emphasized  the importance of teamwork. One of my all time favorite quotes is, “there is no ‘I’ in team.” I also like the analogy that “T “stands for together, “E” stands for everyone, “A” stands for achieves, and “M” stands for More.  These two quotes are very popular and known quotes about teamwork; I will always refer back to them. I am a strong believer in teamwork and strive for everyone to work together to achieve a common goal. I have found by utilizing teamwork, a larger amount is achieved in a shorter amount of time. I can relate to this in several ways. One way would be with sports. I was a swimmer and a cross country runner in high school, which are both individual sports. This may cause one to wonder why this relates back to teamwork. This is because I know without the support of my teammates, I would not have been able to finish my races or get through tough practices.

Now pertaining to the business world, teamwork is always an important aspect, especially in the hospitality industry. I had my own experience with this interning for a big event planner in Alabama, Scot Wedgeworth. We were putting together a charity event, Rock the Runway, in a very short period of time. In order to make the event a success and pull it off we all had to work together. The day of the event had finally arrived and we had a lot to get done. We were nervous we would not have it ready in time, but with enough hard work and working as a team, we were able to pull off a very successful charity event. Teamwork has several great elements that I believe everyone should take advantage of.

Personality Test !

In week 11, we were privileged enough to take an animal related personality test. This test matches your personality with either an otter, golden retriever, a lion, or a beaver. My results showed that I match up with the traits of an otter. This was exciting news to me, being that an otter proved to be one of the best. Its strengths included: Outgoing, responsive, warm, friendly, talkative, enthusiastic, and compassionate.

I can contest that I am all of these things and it is crazy how this test proved to be so accurate. If you ask any of my close family or friends, they will not be shy to tell you that I consist of all of these traits. As far as weaknesses it listed: Undisciplined, unproductive, exaggerates, egocentric, and unstable. I actually do not feel like I fit with some of these weaknesses. This is because I am always productive, barely ever exaggerate, and I feel that I am a stable person. If I, myself, could describe my personality I would say that I am all of the strengths listed above along with dependable, reliable, hard working, organized, energetic, and always positive. I have a good outlook on life and strive for the best.

Perspective Paper: Leadership Series

Recently I attended the Leadership Series at the University of Alabama where we had a guest speaker give us advice and share his story of success. The guest speaker was Bob Green, the Vice President of Association Business Development at Marriott International.  I remember him stressing to us to gain as much experience working in different fields within the hospitality industry. He said by doing this we will gain valuable knowledge and will have an advantage when applying for jobs with having previous work experience. Another key element of advice he shared was to make sure we have mentors throughout  life.

He had a few mentors himself who helped him along the way and ultimately got him to where he is today. He also mentioned he had worked for many large hotel companies but was becoming burned out and needed to take a break. He did this by going to a smaller hotel where he always continued to shine through with his work ethic, impressing many. It did not matter if he worked for a large convention hotel or a small motel. Mr. Greene was working hard to provide good service for the guests staying at his properties. He would try to solve any problem he could himself first before seeking help. This refers back to the story he told about a mound that had been formed from a previous swimming pool that used to be on the property that was no longer there. He tried to fix it himself but ended up ruining one of his nice suits. By showing that he was a hard worker and a good problem solver he was moved up in positions very quickly. Then shortly after this he was offered a position with Marriott.

He was very surprised, but because of his mentors, previous work experience, and work ethic Mr.Greene got the job working for Marriott. Without those key elements Mr.Greene would not be where he is today. These are valuable lessons and advice that I will try to implement while working my way towards finding a career.

Online Footprint

Social media is something that has vastly grown within the recent years and it highly used among my generation. It is very hard to find someone that does not have a Facebook. The only problem with it is that Facebook could come back to haunt you when it is time to find a job. This is because it is all public and out there for anyone to see. Knowing this, we need to be careful and rethink what we want on our Facebook profiles. I know I am friends with my family and would not want them seeing anything inappropriate or anything they would not approve of. Saying this, I am not ashamed of anything I have on my Facebook and believe it is appropriate for employers to view.

Twitter and Instagram are also other aspects of social media that should be appropriate at all times since these are open to the public and potential employers as well. This is something that can be a deciding factor on whether you get a job or not. Most employers refer to your social networking sites before ever interviewing you and will have a pre-determined impression that could be hard to change. Some employers will not even tell you that they have viewed your Facebook and you could have a flawless interview, but may not get hired because of what is on your Facebook and you will never know that was the reason why you did not get hired. In my opinion, it is not worth not getting your dream job because you wanted to look cool doing something illegal or inappropriate online.

So next time you go to update your status, make a tweet, post an inappropriate picture, re-think and ask yourself, is this worth wasting my degree and education by not getting my dream job. It has a huge impact on the path of your life and your future and that should always be in mind whenever using social media.

Good examples of social media that could be beneficial for you and gaining a career are Linkin and blogs. If you were to search for me, my Linkin site and blogs would show up which all contain very useful information about me that would be beneficial in an interview or for a potential employer to view to get a good perspective of what type of employee I would be. I believe it is good to have a positive online presence.

Speaker at Libraby

As week nine has come to an end, we were instructed to visit the library for a guest speaker. Our guest speaker was Brittany Rhea Deputy, assistant professor who gave us very useful information. She gave us a virtual tour of the university’s library website. Among this website was a very helpful search engine that contained valuable and reliable data, along with information for the students to utilize for things such as research papers. One of these search engines we were shown was Scout. We were able to practice finding different articles concerning the hospitality industry.Within Scout, there is an option for an advanced search as well. You can also tell if the articles have been peer reviewed, which is a component that I really like and think it helpful when deciding if it is reliable information to use. The library’s website contains e-books, databases,  useful search engines, digital collections, and many other useful elements for students. Before this guest speaker, I was unaware that this was offered for us to use and I will now take advantage of its accessibility. Another tool I found very helpful on this website was a citation machine that will cite your resources for you and keep record of them. There seems to be many hidden secrets unknown by students that are out there to aid us. I am very glad I was able to reveal one of them and am excited to continue revealing others along my career at the University of Alabama.

Executive Summary: Malcomb Baldridge Award

The Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award is known for recognizing business, health care, education, and non-profit organizations for its performance. This award is the only one that formally recognizes public and private businesses. Up to 18 different awards are given each year. The importance of this award is that it shows awareness of performance excellence and creates a competitive environment. This can also bring successful businesses to share its strategies and what makes them work so well. In order to be a recipient of this award the organization must include a role-model organization management system that makes sure its continuously improving. The seven categories that make up its criteria are, leadership, strategic planning, customer and market focus, measurement analysis and knowledge management, human  resources focus, process management and business results.

The Ritz Carlton is a prime example of this award. They are two time winners in both the years, 1992 and 1999. This is because they really focus and zero in on their training programs for their employees. They are also leaders in the hotel world and offer classes, on-site presentations, advisory services, and testimonials for anyone to attend. This is in order for other businesses to learn about what makes them so successful, which makes them an excellent example of an organization that is willing to share its strategies. By them using the seven different criteria mentioned above, the Ritz saw an improved change in employee and customer satisfaction, increased productivity, market share, and most importantly profitability.

The Baldrige Performance Excellence Program relates back to the Malcolm Baldrige Award, because they are responsible for providing it and creating its criteria. It is a program that is dedicated to performance excellence. The program’s mission is, “To improve the competitiveness and performance of U.S. organizations.” Its vision is, “ To be the partner of choice for excellence in every sector of the economy.”

Power vs. Empowerment

The definition of power is the ability to do something or act in a particular way, especially as a faculty or quality. Some words that come to mind when I think of power are, might, force, strength, potency, authority, energy, actuate, and operate. Having power is something that is very important because without it, it will be hard for those around you to take you seriously. People will end up walking all over you and not have any respect for you. It is the basis for building respect and a sense of authority. It is crucial for an employer to have power over their employees in order to establish a sense of hierarchy.

Empowerment is defined as the process of increasing the capacity of individuals or groups to make choices and to transform those choices into desired actions and outcomes. As an employer I would make sure I had power, but also give my employees empowerment. I think it is important that employees have a voice in order to create a greater good for the group. I also believe with empowerment comes motivation and chances to improve.

Power and empowerment are two aspects in the business world that are greatly prevalent and has a large impact on how efficient a company can be. They work together; I believe you cannot have one without the other. They both support each other and are the building blocks for success.

IMPROVEMENT !

We have come to an end in week 6, we focused on different types of improvement, continuous, incremental, and breakthrough. Continuous improvement explains itself in the fact that it is always improving and changing with time. It strives to make things faster, better, and less expensive. I like this type of improvement because it is up to date and is always on the move. Incremental improvement is a type of improvement that takes time and needs a team to make the change. An example of this would be PANAM. Lastly, breakthrough improvement is a redesign of the processes in a business or work to create new speed, quality, and overall savings. An example of this would be the Ritz- Carlton. I feel breakthrough and continuous improvement are similar in that they both strive to always improve and become better than they already are.

The one that mostly resonates with me would be breakthrough. This is what my group did our presentation on and how the Ritz- Carlton is the leading hotel in the market because of their intense training programs. They even won the Malcolm Baldridge Award for quality in service, which is a really difficult award to win. To me this really says a lot and is extremely impressive. Improvement is very important and without it the world would be a boring, non-initiative place.

Quality

Edward Deming, the man with a plan. A.K.A the hero of management improvement, product quality, testing, and sales.

He was able to achieve these things through various methods, namely applying statistical methods as a math major graduate. He had the largest role among the Japanese manufacturing and business and was becoming well- known in the U.S. around the time of his death.

In order to make such an impact and change for businesses, Deming had come up with fourteen key points, which were first introduced in his book, Out of The Crisis. I believe these points are all very effective and have been proven to work in the business industry. I feel without them or Deming, the business industry and management would not be where it was today or not nearly as powerful. He set a guideline and a sense of direction for them to use.

(LIST INSTEAD)His key points include: creating improvement of a product or service, adopting the new philosophy, ceasing dependence on inspection to achieve quality, ending the practice of awarding business on the basis of a price tag, improving constant and forever the system of production and service, institute leadership, drive out fear, break down barriers between departments, eliminate slogans, exhortations, and targets for the work force asking for new levels of productivity, eliminate work quotas on the factory floor, remove barriers that rob the hourly worker of his right to pride of workmanship, institute a vigorous program of education and self improvement, and lastly put everyone in the company to work to accomplish transformation.

All of the above principles are key to success in a business. One can run and operate without them but won’t be successful. It is important to always be improving, renovating, keeping up with the times, and making sure teamwork is established. I feel the one principle that is most important of all is the last one: put everybody in the company to work to accomplish the transformation. I believe this because it is everyone’s job and without everyone being on the same page and willing to make a change, it will not be effective.