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The hotel business is a hard business, even harder it gets by saving costs in the wrong place:the employees! The imposition of fines on luxury hotels in Munich for breaching minimum wage provisions and the Zimmermädchenaffäre in Hamburg are only examples that give reason to believe that the hotel business cannot show off with an extraordinarily high level of employee contentedness. In spite of the recent shortage of skilled workers and specialists, who time and again talk about the relevance of an employee-oriented HR- Management (HRM), it seems as if the branch has not yet realized the necessity of its employees contentedness. The thesis starts with academic approaches on satisfaction and theoretical conceptions for the evaluation of outstanding HRM. Subsequently it reveals special characteristics of the hotel industry and shows how they influence the establishments as such and their HR- activities. Having defined the term Best Practise it contains an analysis of the HR- activities of three hotel businesses that have received awards of different kinds for their exemplary HRM. As a final result the thesis elaborates a comprehensive model for Best Practise- HRM in the industry.

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Annette Eisenbeis, 1984, A-levels, State- certified Hotel Management Assistant (HBFS). Work experience in several hotels in UK and Spain. BA in International Tourism- Management (HTW Saarbrücken). Currently enrolled in the Master s programme in International Management and acting as student assistant at the Zentrum für Angewandte Sprachen (HTW).

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