BACKROUND AND SIGNIFICANCE
This is a pilot study designed to help in the development of a
large-scale research project on the future of work in the hospitality
industry. The hospitality industry has experienced a wave of restructuring,
consolidation, and new practices to cut costs including lean staffing
and greater performance demands on the workforce. The study will
explore the impact of these and related changes on the health
and quality of life the largest occupational group within the
hospitality industry, room cleaners. Jobs in housekeeping (and
food and beverage) operations of the hospitality industry represent
the future of work in this growing service sector with jobs characterized
by increasing repetitive physical workloads, low income, low skill
utilization, low job control, and virtually no prospects for training
and career advancement. There is compelling evidence that this
kind of low-income jobs result in a disproportionate high burden
of illness, injury, and disability. Unlike other services, businesses
in the hospitality industry, cannot be moved across the borders
but will remain a fast growing sector in industrialized countries,
creating increasing societal costs including disproportionate
workers' compensation and health care utilization costs. Working
conditions in the hospitality industry are representative for
a growing number of workers of color, working women, and former
welfare recipients. The hospitality industry has become a major
target for welfare-to-work and job training programs in cities
throughout the country. An aging workforce is faced with increasing
job demands in a competitive industry constantly upgrading services.
Few studies have been done on this growing workforce and little
is known about their specific working conditions and health risks
and how they could be addressed.
This study will take a broad view at physical and psychosocial
job factors, health, including general self-rated health, musculoskeletal
disorders, work-related injury, and health-related quality of
life. Further, this study will investigate which innovative organizational
strategies can help to reduce the burden of illness and disability
in the service sector by comparing hotels in different market
segments, different degrees of unionization, and hotels with innovative
joint labor management health and safety programs, negotiated
child care/elder care benefits, and a multi-employer worker training
project.
San Francisco is expected to provide several union and non-union
cases for comparison to similar cases in low union density markets
and to a selected number of additional cases in other high union
density markets that highlight organizational innovations (such
as training and career laddering in Las Vegas or work redesign
in New York to avoid sub-contracting). The pilot study focuses
on housekeeping since it is the largest occupational category
in the industry and is the central focus of a larger study including
hotels in other cities. The study combines qualitative and quantitative
research methods and is participatory in design and implementation
thereby laying the groundwork for sustainable efforts in understanding
and improving health and safety of service workers.
COOPERATIVE SETTING
The pilot study is administered by the director of the Labor and
Occupational Health Program (LOHP) at UC Berkeley Robin Baker,
in collaboration with Niklas Krause, physician epidemiologist
from the School of Public Health at UC Berkeley. Funding is provided
by the United Way of the Bay Area and Local 2 of the Hotel Employees
and Restaurant Employees International Union (HERE).
The level of union density in San Francisco is among the highest
in the country. The largest union is HERE Local 2 which represents
8,000 workers or around 70 % of the industry's non-supervisory
workforce. In San Francisco the multi-employer bargaining agreement
with about 50 hotels in the city has taken wages and benefits
out of competition. The starting wage for non-tipped jobs is $11
per hour plus comprehensive portable benefits. San Francisco presents
a special opportunity for comparisons of work conditions in the
industry and for future workplace interventions because of a unique
partnership with twelve first class hotels that is designed to
improve customer service and job quality in the industry. The
San Francisco Hotels Partnership Project has implemented a core-training
program throughout much of the industry, and developed pilot projects
to resolve conflicts at the lowest possible level within an organization.
The parties have also worked to establish joint decision making
processes for redesigning work in the food and beverages and housekeeping
operations.
OBJECTIVES
The objectives of the proposed study are:
1. To identify key changes in technology and organization in the
hospitality industry that affects the future of work for room
cleaners.
2. To explore the impact of industry changes on the health, injury
rates, and well being of room cleaners.
3. To develop potential strategies for enhancing the future health
and well being of room cleaners.
4. To demonstrate the utility of a participatory research methodology
that actively involves room cleaners in every aspect of the study,
and that results in the ability of participants to effectively
advocate for health-promoting changes in their work.
5. To explore the relevance of the findings to similar low wage
populations, particularly in the service sector.
6. To widely disseminate study findings and recommendations to
encourage further study and action by academic researchers, labor,
management, policy makers, and advocacy groups.
The pilot consists of establishing an advisory group of participants,
focus groups with room cleaners, the development and administration
of a survey instrument, analysis and discussion of results with
participants, and dissemination of results in a final report.
Although designed for comparisons with other cities, the pilot
will allow for comparisons between high quality and low quality
(in terms of labor relations and customer service) hotels in San
Francisco. In addition, the use of some standardized instruments
will enable comparisons of working conditions of housecleaners
with jobs in different industries. Finally, future studies are
planned to investigate the effects of changes in work conditions
and labor-management collaboration on injury incidence, health
and functional/quality of life outcomes.
PROGRESS
A 30-member advisory group of room cleaners participated in the
planning and implementation of this pilot study.
Ten focus groups have been conducted with about 20-25 housecleaners
at each meeting recruited from different San Francisco hotels.
A survey instrument has been developed and tested in a focus group
of 25 roomcleaners. The revised survey has been translated into
Spanish and Chinese languages. The survey includes standard instruments
such as Karasek's Job Content Questionnaire, Siegrist's effort/reward
balance scales including measures of intrinsic and extrinsic effort,
SF36 health-related quality of life/functioning, general health
status, and specifically developed questions to measure physical
workload, musculoskeletal symptoms, work injury, and demographic
variables. Depending on reading and language skills it takes 30
to 75 minutes for workers to complete the survey with assistance
available from researchers and translators.
139 out of 397 roomcleaners from 4 selected hotels completed the
survey during the first wave of data gathering in December 1998.
In summary, specific aims 1 through 15 have been completed (see
attached list).
PLAN
A second wave of data gathering among 258 non-responders is planned
for February. Intensive efforts of personal recruitment at the
workplace and telephone follow-up is planned for a random 50%
sample of 130 non-responders.
Data management and basic analyses limited to descriptive statistics
and comparisons between four hotels are planned for March and
April. A draft report will be prepared for the union by May 15
and will be available for joint labor management focus groups
preparing for upcoming bargaining of five-year contracts. Further
analyses including comparisons with national survey data, discussions
with participants, and a final report will be completed by December
1999. Publications in peer reviewed scientific journals may be
prepared simultaneously or thereafter but no funds have been allocated
yet for this purpose.
SPECIFIC AIMS
(0) Establish cooperative relationships between researchers and
stakeholders
(1) Select 2-6 hotels (with a total of about 400 employees) representing
"good" and "bad" overall work conditions as
perceived by union representatives and key senior employees
(2) Conduct a series of focus groups with room cleaners from different
hotels which are not selected into the pilot survey, to (a) gain
a detailed understanding of their job tasks, workload, working
conditions, and work-related health problems, (b) to discuss the
scope and goals of the research project, and (c) to invite further
participation in design and execution of the study (e.g. development
and administration of survey instrument, organization of meetings
with roomcleaners at participating hotels)
(3) Develop draft survey instrument
(4) Discuss draft survey instrument with union representatives
and other key informants
(5) Pre-test survey instrument in focus group with 25 roomcleaners
(6) Revise survey instrument
(7) Translate survey instrument into Spanish and Chinese languages
(8) Obtain names and addresses of current employees at selected
hotels
(9) Invite employees of selected hotels by mail to fill out the
survey in off-site meetings
(10) Conduct first wave of survey under supervision of University
researchers and with assistance of translators at different times
and locations in San Francisco
(11) Create database for data entry using Microsoft Access software
(12) Enter data from questionnaires and check for completeness
(13) Follow-up of workers with incomplete responses by telephone
in their first language
(14) Update list of employees and draw random 50% sample from
survey non-responders
(15) Obtain contact information including telephone numbers for
non-responders
(14) Invite all non-responders by mail to fill out the survey
in off-site meetings
(15) Invite 50% random sample of non-responders by telephone and/or
personal contact to fill out the survey in off-site meetings
(16) Conduct second wave of survey
(17) Provide follow-up meetings with research team for workers
willing to participate but unable to attend the pre-scheduled
survey meetings
(18) Enter data into database
(19) Check data for missing information and inconsistencies
(20) Prepare final data set with variable labels for all data
fields and create scales for work conditions based on theoretical
and/or empirical approaches
(21) Analyze survey data and (a) prepare frequency tables for
all questionnaire answers and scales stratified by hotels, (b)
compare responses of first wave responders with second wave of
responders in 50% sample intensively followed up, (c) compare
responses between "good" and "bad" hotels,
(d) compare work conditions with reports from studies in other
industries, (e) investigate the association between work conditions
and self-reported general health, musculoskeletal symptoms, quality
of life, and work injury
(22) Gather OSHA 200 logs in selected hotels for 1998 and enter
in separate database
(23) Replace employee names by ID code in injury data set and
merge with survey data
(24) Analyze merged injury (OSHA 200 log) and survey data, and,
specifically (a) compare frequency of self-reported and formally
reported work injuries, (b) examine self-reported reasons for
not reporting a work-related injury, (c) investigate associations
between working conditions and both self-reported and OSHA 200
log based injury frequency
(25) Prepare draft report by May 15, 1999
(26) Present report to stakeholders in joint labor management
meetings
(27) Prepare final report by December 1999
(28) Prepare peer-reviewed journal article(s)
(29) Integrate results of pilot study into proposed larger study
comparing working conditions and health outcomes across different
US cities representing different organizational settings and labor
markets in the hotel industry