An Exploration of Situational Leadership Support and Impact on Ghanaian SME Hotels

The Ghanaian hotel industry which is categorised under the tertiary sector and dominated by small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) accounts for over half of tourist accommodation and contributes more to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of Ghana than the other industries. Ghanaian SME hotels are however acknowledged to lack professional and multidisciplinary competent staff, who are characterised with high power distance, high uncertainty avoidance and affected by collectivist societal factors. Scholarly debate on the mechanisms through which leadership supports SME employee’s competence development, for effective service delivery in the hotel industry is therefore inconclusive. The aim of this research is to explore situational leadership support and impact on employee’s competence development and identify contextual factors, that need to be considered alongside employee readiness levels when deciding on a situational leadership theory (SLT) leadership style to support employee’s competence development in the various quadrants of situational leadership model. Ghanaian SME hotel managers who often double as owner-leaders tend to exhibit the use of less structured leadership styles to support their employees competence development. Interventions within Ghanaian SME hotels are therefore likely to be affected by their behaviour, culture, beliefs, and form of business ownership due to their proximity to employees. Limited research has showcased the different situational leadership styles used by Ghanaian SME hotel leaders to support the competence development of their employees who are characterized as being first-time employees, senior high school (SHS) or vocational school leavers with no or limited competence and are also ii placed in an industry characterised by high levels of emotional exhaustion, occupational stress, long working hours, and mood swings. This research is underpinned by an interpretivist philosophy using a case study strategy to create new, deeper understanding and interpretations of social worlds and contexts using semi-structured interviews and hotel records from ten Ghanaian SME hotels to provide in-depth information to achieve the research aim and objectives. The data analysis process was implemented alongside data collection. The researcher adopted the use of thematic analysis supported by CAQDAT (NVivo) to analyse data and adopted the Gioia approach to presenting the results. Findings revealed on-the-job training, use of the scrum system, face-to-face discussions, aligning staff passion to job roles, allowing staff initiative-taking, task assignment and social and financial support as the leadership practices Ghanaian SME hotel managers apply to support their employees competence development, which are align with the four situational leadership styles. On-the-job training, which aligns with the directing and coaching styles within situational leadership model is used as a major managerial employee competence development practice by Ghanaian SME hotel managers. This is due to Ghanaian SME hotels liability of smallness, their rarely receipt of job applications from qualified staff, the lack of professionally trained key employees like receptionists, specific to the hotel industry, its associated cost-effectiveness and being focused on employee’s training needs. The research builds on current understanding of situational leadership support on employee’s competence development, and develops a novel model recognising culture, family ties and religious factors as key contextual factors in the leadership process that need to be considered alongside employee readiness level at the various development levels. It also aligned Ghanaian SME hotel managers iii leadership practices with situational leadership directive and supportive leader behaviours, to provide guidance on how managers or leaders can support the development of their employee’s competence for effective service delivery to achieve organisational objectives.