Workplace design and well-being: aesthetic perceptions of hotel employees

ABSTRACT

The study recognizes the lack of a clear theoretical and empirical link between employees’ sense of well-being and hotel design aesthetics, although beautiful environments are associated with optimal human functioning. Drawing on conceptual insights from organizational aesthetics and theory of subjective well-being, this quantitative study explored relationships between workplace design aesthetics, hotel employee subjective well-being and the role of contrast of back- vs. front-of-the-house. Based on cross-sectional data collected from 525 operations-level hotel employees in USA, the study found that backstage employees experience less aesthetic pleasure and report lower levels of well-being than frontstage employees. Design characteristics Unity and Variety positively affect the sense of well-being, while Typicality exhibits a U-type relationship with well-being. The effect of Variety is weaker for back-of-the-house employees. This study is the first attempt to empirically and explicitly connect organizational aesthetics to well-being and identifies a novel way to enhance the well-being of the hospitality workforce.

KEYWORDS:

• Hotel design
• employee well-being
• aesthetics
• beauty
• workplace design
• back-of-the-house
• aesthetic pleasure
• variety

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This study was funded by the School of Hotel and Tourism Management, Hong Kong Polytechnic University [grant number #1-ZE5Y].