Whether one is speaking of hotels, conference centres, catering
businesses or indeed any other enterprise where hospitality is involved,
business is undoubtedly tough. Competition may be fierce and ensuring
staff undertake hotel management courses might just enable you to
improve your service quality and gain competitive advantage as a result.
More than pleasantries
Providing hospitality is more than simply making available a number of exemplary facilities. It is about packaging those facilities into a human presentation and delivery environment that is efficient and friendly at the same time.
Although it is true that there are occasionally cultural differences that might affect your service proposition, there are certain general features that are universally accepted as being mandatory if hospitality is to achieve world-class status. This is not just a question of being cheerful-looking and professional when responding to customers; it is about enhancing their experience of the facilities on offer and dealing with any issues that arise. Just a sample of some of the skills that can be learned on hotel management courses can include:
As the above brief overview illustrates, simply putting untrained individuals into such a role and somehow hoping that they will "cope" might be, at best, a recipe for average performance and potentially at worst, a recipe for disaster. Whilst it is true that some individuals may be naturally more gifted than others in areas such as communication and empathy, it is also true that many of the above skills are unlikely to be innate. That is why hotel management courses could prove critically important in helping your organisation improve the quality of service it provides.Valuable techniques can be taught and existing skills enhanced or on-developed.
If you believe that your organisation already has first-rate skills in this area that are not capable of being improved, you may wish to put them to the test regularly through approaches such as mystery shoppers. This is hard-end testing and may occasionally show up gaps in your performance management. Remember that in a highly competitive marketplace, it might only take a single demonstration of poor inter-personal skills or a lack of service-orientation to irreparably damage your reputation with an individual client or potentially group of clients. That is something that might prove to be extremely expensive and which would put the cost of putting staff through hotel management courses into context.
More than pleasantries
Providing hospitality is more than simply making available a number of exemplary facilities. It is about packaging those facilities into a human presentation and delivery environment that is efficient and friendly at the same time.
Although it is true that there are occasionally cultural differences that might affect your service proposition, there are certain general features that are universally accepted as being mandatory if hospitality is to achieve world-class status. This is not just a question of being cheerful-looking and professional when responding to customers; it is about enhancing their experience of the facilities on offer and dealing with any issues that arise. Just a sample of some of the skills that can be learned on hotel management courses can include:
- formal welcoming of new arrivals;
- explaining available facilities and, where appropriate, what is required of visitors/customers;
- understanding customers' requirements and explaining to them how the facilities on offer may enable them to obtain more benefit overall;
- helping to manage the relationships between an individual or groups of customers (e.g. dealing with contention for resources etc.);
- problem resolution;
- conflict management (e.g. difficult customers or customer complaints);
- the communication of corporate values;
- helping to maximize the customer experience and to increase the reputational benefits accrued by the facility providers.
As the above brief overview illustrates, simply putting untrained individuals into such a role and somehow hoping that they will "cope" might be, at best, a recipe for average performance and potentially at worst, a recipe for disaster. Whilst it is true that some individuals may be naturally more gifted than others in areas such as communication and empathy, it is also true that many of the above skills are unlikely to be innate. That is why hotel management courses could prove critically important in helping your organisation improve the quality of service it provides.Valuable techniques can be taught and existing skills enhanced or on-developed.
If you believe that your organisation already has first-rate skills in this area that are not capable of being improved, you may wish to put them to the test regularly through approaches such as mystery shoppers. This is hard-end testing and may occasionally show up gaps in your performance management. Remember that in a highly competitive marketplace, it might only take a single demonstration of poor inter-personal skills or a lack of service-orientation to irreparably damage your reputation with an individual client or potentially group of clients. That is something that might prove to be extremely expensive and which would put the cost of putting staff through hotel management courses into context.
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