Reward Management and Job Satisfaction among Frontline Employees in Hotel Industry in Malaysia

Reward system is comprised of financial rewards and non financial rewards. Selecting the right rewards for the employees has always been an issue in the human resource management. Many organizations in the hotel industry are unable to identify the types of rewards which are best used to foster employees’ job satisfaction. This study was conducted to investigate the relationship between rewards and job satisfaction as well as to examine the types of rewards that will affect employees’ job satisfaction. Base salary raises (financial reward) and recognition (non-financial reward) have been discussed in this research. Frontline employees working as Front Desk Assistants in four-star and five-star hotels in Klang Valley, Malaysia were taken as sample for this study. 150 questionnaires were distributed and 132 were collected for analysis. Four hypotheses were assumed and had been tested in this research. The data was analyzed using correlation and multiple regression analysis. The results revealed that rewards are positively and significantly associated with job satisfaction; financial reward (r=0.819**) while non-financial rewards (r=0.740**). Thus, hypothesis 1 and hypothesis 2 were supported. In addition, the regression result has indicated that financial reward (β = 0.597) has a stronger impact on job satisfaction as compared to non-financial reward (β = 0.438). Hence, hypothesis 3: financial rewards affect job satisfaction was accepted while hypothesis 4: non-financial rewards affect job satisfaction was rejected in the present study. Further discussions of the results and recommendations for future research are presented in the study.