THE IMPACT OF ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS: THE EMPLOYEES' PERSPECTIVE - CASE STUDY OF AN INTERNATIONAL HOTEL IN HONG KONG

Research into Environmental Management System (EMS) started appearing in the late 1990s with most of these studies focusing on its driving forces, costs and benefits and EMS itself. In the hotel and tourism field, very little research has been done about EMS except for a few studies on environmental management, such as environmental protection practices and environmental performances of hotels. Recognising this, this research aims to explore and evaluate the application of EMS in the hotel context and the impact of EMS on hotel employees whose working attitude directly affects services to guests. An extensive review of the literature on environmental management and environmental management systems identified various approaches to EMS. To develop a richer and deeper understanding of the application of the six core EMS elements identified in the hotel context and its impact on hotel employees, a qualitative case study was employed in which data was collected from an international hotel, from three levels of employees: executive, supervisory and general. A series of in-depth, semi-structured interviews was conducted and relevant documents were collected for analysis, with the company's consent. From the hotel case, it was found that the motivation to EMS was different from that of other industries. Pressure from customers and legislation - the common reasons for EMS - was absent for hotel. Instead, it was more influenced by internal forces. The six EMS elements identified in the literature play important roles in developing and implementing EMS in a hotel context. In addition, four influential factors were identified in the formation stage: (1) Corporate governance, (2) Piloting activities, (3) Initial gap analysis and (4) Partnership with external consultancy. The findings on the impact of EMS on hotel employees indicated both positive and negative impact. The positive and negative influences of EMS on hotel employees were triggered by several human resources factors and the organisational motivations to adopt EMS and its outcome. Although EMS could help promote a bottom-up approach to change even within a predominantly top-down culture, a top-down approach to implement EMS was found more suitable for a hotel with a predominantly Chinese workforce due to cultural issues. Low involvement of employees in the planning stage did not seem to affect employees' commitment to EMS as long as correct organisational motivation to EMS was communicated to them. This study identified ten suggestions which developed the body of knowledge in mainstream environmental management research, especially related to EMS