Research Statement
The research will be conducted to find out how staff members are recruited and selected in casinos, in Las Vegas. The research will look into criteria used and qualifications required for one to be recruited to work in casinos.
Rationale and Research Questions
Working in a casino, in Las Vegas, is quite appealing because there are many casinos. However, getting a job is quite difficult in Las Vegas. Many people have confessed that it is exceedingly hard for an individual to secure a job in Las Vegas despite many openings available (Shaffer and Hall, 2006).
This has raised questions regarding the criteria used by employers to recruit staff. In fact, gambling and hospitality business is doing uncommonly well in Las Vegas, and this is the reason why there are many casinos. There are many people working in these casinos, and at the same time, there are a number of others who are jobless.
Casino workers need to be truly effective and keen to ensure that they monitor activities inside the casinos. For instance, gambling must be observed to ensure that gamblers remain calm despite having several instances of conflicting arguments. Therefore, these employees need to be there to intervene and ensure that game rules are followed.
In addition, those working in the hospitality section of casinos need to be very thorough to ensure that their customers appreciate their efforts and services (Michand, 2001). This study is useful to the entire society because people will be able to understand what they need to apply for jobs in Casinos. In addition, the research will be able to outline several aspects considered when recruiting and selecting staff for these casinos.
This is extremely beneficial since managers of the casinos may be given the report to read about recommendations made by researchers. The research will be able to shed light on the reason why people struggle to get jobs while there are many casinos in Las Vegas (Derek and Douglas, 2001). The secret behind this can only be unveiled by carrying out researches regarding recruitment of staff for casinos. Therefore, the research question for this study will be: Is recruitment and selection of casinos staff in Las Vegas discriminatory?
Literature Review
Working in casinos is not the best thing for anybody considering the type of activities that takes place inside those premises. In fact, the job involves gambling where people place bets and rely on luck to get win or lose. Therefore, employees are exposed to psychological issues and when recruiting staff managers should come up with a way of ensuring that they select people with sober minds (Long, Clard and Liston, 2004).
This happens because as employees work with people from different cultural backgrounds, they keep close contacts with them and can be affected by some of their problems. For instance, dealing with problem gamblers can be quite tasking hence discouraging workers. The casino job is risky as employees may be involved with conflicts leading to fights hence affecting their health or physical looks.
In a case where a gambler feels that the employee is colluding with their opponent against them, may be disastrous as the gambler may become violent demanding their rights to fair game. This means that casino workers need to be psychologically fit in order to contain such gamblers hence enjoying their job (Lam, Zhang and Baum, 2001).
Casinos employees may be exposed to deviant work place behaviors, and this poses a serious challenge whenever managers are recruiting and selecting their staff. This results from the fact that casino employees keep close contacts with gamblers some of which are criminals.
In addition, gamblers express their feelings towards casino employees not only in terms of customer satisfaction but also their emotions. This means that drunken customers may harass employees, and to some extent they involve them in physical confrontations (Lam, Zhang and Baum, 2001).
As a result, these employees may turn to use of drugs in search for solace because they have to retain their jobs for survival. Therefore, casinos’ human resource personnel have to find people of strong morals who can handle any customer without losing their morale and the will to work. In some cases, casino workers get sexually harassed or even assaulted by angry gamblers and this calls for management to come up with adequate rules to safe guard their staff.
Employees are also required to work extra hard to meet demand of all customers effectively. This is due to high turnover in casinos as customers flock to gamble and have their favorite drinks during their leisure time (Ladouceur, 2002). When recruiting employees, the human resource department should develop a way of knowing how applicants can handle high numbers of employees.
In addition, employees need to be highly reliable in order to keep everything running in casinos. This is critical because customers have to be treated in a given manner and both staff and customer security must be enhanced. When recruiting staff, human resource personnel should make sure that they select candidates who show reliability traits.
Working in casinos requires one to be trustworthy to ensure that the rules of gambling are observed to provide fair deals to all involved parties. This means that honest people should be given a chance whenever selection is being done. This is because customers love gambling in casinos where they accredit their win or loss.
This means that customers are not expected to question actions of employees as far as gambling is concerned (Kaplan, 2005). Casinos where workers collude to give some parties unfair deals are always faced by issues such as fighting which may turn to be fatal. Therefore, selection of employees must be done with care to ensure that casinos get qualified candidates to promote peace and stability.
Furthermore, casino employees should be willing to learn as they may be required to understand how gambling is done. In fact, it has been found that many casino workers end up being gamblers in their lives. This means that they have to learn rules of gambling hence attaining experience on how to solve some disputes between gamblers (Hsieh, Liang and Hsieh, 2004). During recruitment and selection of casino staff, human resource personnel should consider people who are ready to learn.
In many cases, casinos require people with basic experience in military training because security is vital. Therefore, the staff selection panel should make sure that they consider people with past experience in the military or in private security firms in order to have workers who have adequate skills in handling security cases (Kaplan, 2005).
In addition, casino workers are required to have high skills in public relations. This can enable them to approach any gambler and convince them to reason without causing violence in case there is any dispute. Public relation skills are tremendously significant because it portrays how well hospitality staff can work and achieve their set operational goals.
Staff at casinos must be able to use their common sense in serving customers within their work place. This can be vital in averting instances of assault or harassment. For example, they can compromise in order to solve upcoming conflicts (Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, 2001).
The selection panel should be particularly keen to select these employees because loyalty to the company is essential for company prosperity. They should use their selection skills and knowledge to ensure that they identify candidates who can be loyal to the company and recruit them.
Methodology
An overall introduction
The study will involve data collection aimed at gathering adequate information that will help researchers to come up with an inclusive report. This study will be based on some assumptions which have to be proved by the researchers. For example, it is assumed that employers select people according to their looks. This has to be proved after the research hence calling for adoption of the most effective methods of collecting data.
Researchers need to be positive about carrying out the research since this will be the only way to get answers to their question. This is important because they will get to the bottom of the matter regardless of the process that may be involved. It is necessary for researchers to identify the most convenient data collection method to use in order to attain adequate and reliable information from the target population (Harrahs Entertainment, 2004).
Methods
Researchers will use questionnaires to collect data from casino workers. This method is effective because it allows respondents to take their time in responding to research questions. For instance, casino mangers who are busy may find it difficult to get time for having interviews with researchers.
Therefore, researchers can leave a questionnaire in the office so that the manager can pick it and fill in either from their offices or their homes and return it to the office for collection (Cathy, 2001). Questionnaires are advantageous because they can reach all target respondents regardless of their schedules.
In addition, researchers will make use of interviews to collect data from casino workers. This is where data collectors will be visiting casino workers to find out information about their recruitment and selection. This is a remarkably effective method of data collection because oral dialogues are involved (Harper, 1999).
This gives data collectors opportunities to ask all relevant questions and seeks clarifications where possible. Interviews end up giving data collectors the most collect information for research. Interviews may be expensive to conduct because people will be required to travel from one place to another trying to reach as many respondents as possible hence making the whole process expensive. Finally, data can be collected using observation method.
This is where researchers record what they know about casinos from their own experience. This method is vital because it gives room to data verification procedures since the data researchers can be asked to shed more light on their observations (Garry, Harold and Tim, 2003). In fact, observation gives firsthand information because some of the researchers might have been involved in recruitment and selection of casino staff. This may put them at a position to give useful information for research.
Sampling
The sample of the population for this study will include workers at the casino. These will include selected employees who will be required to respond to questions concerning their work place. Human resource personnel will be involved in the study, as well. This is because they are best positioned to give information regarding requirements set for one to be selected (Gupta and Derevensky, 2000). Finally, casino managers will be required to answer some questions regarding the quality of employees they consider for their businesses.
Technical
Ethical problems
The research will be conducted in accordance with rules governing researchers. These should include adherence to set rules and laws aimed at ensuring that respondents’ rights are protected. This means that any information voluntarily given by respondents during the study remains confidential. This helps in curbing situations where workers are intimidated for giving information concerning their workplaces or their bosses to researchers (Gomez-Mejia, Balkin and Cardy, 2001).
In cases where names of respondents have to be included in report writing, real names should never be used, but instead researchers should come up with other names. They should put a note within the report to show that names used in the report are not the real names of respondents.
Finally, researchers should observe the code of conduct set by laws that guide the researchers on people to involve in research. For instance, it is illegal to use children to respond to research questions regarding some aspects of social life. In fact, even when one is carrying out a study among children of a given age, permission from their parents or teachers has to be granted. This protects the rights of children as they may be tricked into exposing information without their parents’ consent.
Vulnerable groups among the society should also be handled with care by researchers. This means that they should never be involved in researches, and if it is necessary proper procedures should be followed to ensure that information gathered is for their good (Bennett and Robinson, 2000). In addition, data collectors should use formal approaches when collecting data. This means that data collectors should be able to cooperate with their respondents in terms of timings (Griffin, O’Leary-Kelly and Collins, 2000).
References
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Cathy, A. E. (2001). What Keeps You Up at Night? Key Issues of Concern for Lodging Managers, Hotel and Motel Management, 42(2), 38-45.
Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (2001). Labour Turnover, retrieved from web.
Derek, B. & Douglas, F. (2001). The Sure Hand of Surveillance, Security Management, September, 87.
Garry, S., Harold, W., & Tim, H. (2003). Examining Police Records to Assess Gambling Impacts: A Study of Gambling-Related Crime in the City of Edmonton, The Alberta Gaming Research Institute.
Gomez-Mejia, L. R., Balkin, D. B., & Cardy, R. L. (2001). Managing Human Resources, 3rd ed., New Jersey: Prentice Hall.
Griffin, R. W., O’Leary-Kelly, A., & Collins, J. (2000). Dysfunctional Work Behaviors in Organizations, Trends in Organizational Behavior, 5, 65-82.
Gupta, R. & Derevensky, L. J. (2000). Adolescents with Gambling Problems from Research to / 30 / Treatment, Journal of Gambling Studies, 16(2/3). 315-342.
Harper, D. (1999). Spotlight abuse—Save profits, Industrial Distribution, 79: 47-51.
Harrahs Entertainment (2004). Know When to Stop before You Start, retrieved from web.
Hsieh, A. T., Liang, S. C., & Hsieh, T. H. (2004). Workplace Deviant Behavior and Its Demographic Relationship among Taiwan’s Flight Attendants, Journal of Human Resources in Hospitality & Tourism, 3(1), 19-32.
Kaplan, H. B. (2005). Self-attitudes and Deviant Behavior, Pacific Palisades, CA: Goodyear.
Ladouceur, R. (2002). Understanding Gambling and Problem Gambling: a Step in the Right Direction, AGA Responsible Gaming Lecture Series, 1(1), 1-10.
Lam, T., Zhang, H. Q., & Baum, T. (2001). An Investigation of Employees’ Job Satisfaction: the Case of Hotels in Hong Kong, Tourism Management, 22. 157-165.
Long, P. T., Clard, J., & Liston, D. (2004). Win, Lose, or Draw: Gambling with America’s Small Towns. Washington DC: Rural Economic Policy Program, The Aspen Institute.
Michand, L. (2001). Turning the Tables on Employee Turnover, RSI: Roofing Siding, Insulation 78, 15-16.
Shaffer, H. J., & Hall, M. N. (2006). Estimating the Prevalence of Adolescent Gambling Disorders: A Quantitative Synthesis and Guide toward Standard Gambling Nomenclature, Journal of Gambling Studies, 12, 193-214.