Executive Summary

This report explores the suitability of Courthouse Hotel in hosting a powerful German delegation for a week. The recent refurbishments and improvements that preceded its ascension into a four star hotel are not enough to guarantee high standards of service. The report thus identifies the main issues of consideration in the planning of the delegation’s visit. Further, it explores the different skills necessary for smooth running of the office front department during the visit. Further, different motivation techniques are proposed for use in encouraging higher performance amongst the members of staff. In this undertaking, different theories of motivation are applied. In the last section, the report addresses concerns over the possibility that the hotel may not meet the required standards. Consequently, it proposes actions necessary in addressing the situation and a course of action to implement the proposed solutions.

Introduction

The Courthouse Hotel is a privately owned establishment within a large city. It was recently transformed into a four star hotel following a change in ownership. The hotel is predominantly run by full time employees that form over 95% of the total number of staff. Following its refurbishment, it has the opportunity of hosting a German delegation for a week led by the Chancellor. However, it faces challenges of maintaining high standards of service and must undergo changes to guarantee success.

Question One

The location of the Courthouse Hotel within the center of a large city is an important aspect in its long term sustainability. It is not surprising therefore that the hotel has been selected to meet the hospitality needs of a German delegation in an intergovernmental meeting. The recent refurbishment and upgrading of the hotel into a four star standard makes it suitable to host a delegation led by the German Chancellor for a period of one week. One of the most important departments in any hotel is the front office as it is the center of interaction with the client (Olsen et al, 1998, p. 63). Obviously, the hotel despite having had an improvement in service will have to improve its front office department to impress the new visitors. Indeed, the opportunity presents the hotel with a chance to either improve or damage its reputation based on the reviews from the Germans. In light of these developments, the supervisor needs to take consideration of several issues in planning for the anticipated visit. In particular, realignments and adjustments in the front office department have to be made to ensure that the Germans receive high standards and are impressed by the hotel’s hospitality. In so doing, the supervisor may consider changes to the staff, information, resources as well as the processes in the front office department.

Issues to Consider

Staffing

Staffing is one of the most important aspects of any front office as the department is actively involved with the clients. The supervisor must make changes to the staff to include only people that have the best set of skills. The nature of the hospitality industry is that staff members are bound to make regular contact with the client thus directly affecting the loyalty and satisfaction of the customer. In fact, Germans are considered very thorough with a tendency of correcting any wrongdoing. As such, the supervisor must make changes to include the requirements of German behavior for the entire duration of the stay. For instance, most Germans consider chewing of gum while talking to someone to be rude and the staff must be discouraged from such. In the very least, the supervisor must rotate the team to ensure that they understand the various needs of the guests and offer quality service. In attaining this objective, the supervisor has the responsibility of training the staff members on basic requirements of the front office department. For instance, the staff must be taught to use the last names of the German guests when refereeing to them directly.

Resource Utilization

The hotel anticipates a huge delegation of German guests and it is only in order that the resource allocation is increased during the stay. Perhaps, the supervisor could do with an increased number of available rooms and the amenities required. The front office must be adequately equipped to meet the anticipated needs of the guest during the entire period of their stay. For instance, the quality of the resources availed to the guests should be high enough to leave a lasting impression among the customers. In particular, the allocation of resources in anticipation for the customers should include the increment in staff (Morrison, 1996, p. 36). Also, the front office should have enough security and storage space to cater for the valuable luggage that customers have within the premise. A key installation would be the enhancement of CCTV surveillance both at the front office and within the individual guest rooms. Finally, the employees should be supported in a manner that enables the execution of tasks and responsibilities with minimal challenges.

Communication

The front office is also a hub of information that couples up as the center of communication. Indeed, the front office has been labeled as the heart and epicenter of any hotel with the potential to result in either success or failure. A huge delegation of high level officials requires that the supervisor invests immense resources in ensuring that there is communication flow to and from the customers. Moreover, the fact that the front office is the main point of interaction with the customers makes it suitable to have the right communication mechanisms. The supervisor should ensure that customers access the right information from the front office regarding their stay in the hotel (Yoo et al, 2011, p.524). For instance, personnel working at the front office should have an idea of all the rooms within the hotel and should be able to track customer requests until their execution. Further, the personnel should be able to provide feedback as well as ask questions to get a clearer picture of the situation. Most importantly, the front office personnel should be able to capture feedback from the customers and use it to improve their experience within the hotel. All these considerations can only be sustained through the implementation of requisite infrastructure including an effective database management system.

Required Skills

Organization

The nature of the hotel industry requires that managers and supervisors possess planning and organization skills. The supervisor must exhibit organization skills in coming up with short term plans of action aimed at serving the customers. In this regard, the manager must understand the needs of the German guests and come up with an actionable plan to improve their experience. However, the role of the supervisor is not limited to the formulation of plans of action but extends to the actual implementation. Excellent organization skills are important in the assignment of different roles to ensure a balance in the execution of different tasks and responsibilities. The front office department is quite vibrant and requires that all the different members of staff function as a unit. In this undertaking, the supervisor will occasionally apply their organization skills in ensuring correct allocation of resources to the right tasks (Morrison, 1996, p. 41). For instance, the front office team could have different uniforms from the normal staff thus making them easily identifiable by the customers. During the period of stay, the hotel would need to have personnel that understand the different aspects of the enterprise to ensure that they provide the right information to the guests. This process can only be attained through the use of sound organization skills in matching the different skill sets among the personnel to the hotel requirements.

Teamwork

The assimilation of a large delegation of German guest would first require the appointment of more personnel to meet the demand for services within the hotel. In this respect, therefore, the supervisor must possess excellent team work skills to ensure flow in the execution of different tasks. Indeed, the front office cannot be treated as a different department in isolation of the other departments. Rather, it can only be viewed as part of a bigger team that function best as a whole. It is therefore prudent that the supervisor demonstrates excellent team work skills in the handling of different tasks. Most importantly, the supervisor must lead from the front and function within the team of front office personnel to achieve a pleasant environment for the guests. Front office personnel have to work with other people in solving difficult problems and the supervisor must lead in achieving the same. Also, this department has to work in conjunction with people from other departments in handling cross cutting problems. For instance, the front office must communicate complaints to the relevant departments for resolution and improvement. Clearly, the supervisor must be willing to use team work skills while working with his team or people from other departments.

Motivation Techniques

Motivation is an integral component in performance with the latter resulting into the former. In the hotel industry, a lack of motivation among the employees could spell doom for a particular hotel. In this respect, supervisors must adopt applicable motivation theories that push their staff to achieve greater performance. In particular, the current situation at Courthouse Hotel calls for increased incentives to motivate the staff to perform even better. The cognitive evaluation theory asserts that there are two motivation systems: extrinsic and intrinsic (Weiner, 2001, p. 21). The front office supervisor should embark on a theory of motivation that inculcates both intrinsic and extrinsic motivations. One of the surest sources of motivation is in staff involvement because it gives the staff a sense of importance in the organization. The supervisor should strive to ensure that workers feel involved in integral parts of the whole organization. In this respect, members of staff should be called for numerous meetings to capture their suggestions and feedback. The benefit of such an approach is that the organization also benefits from increased awareness since employees interact with the consumers and therefore provide honest feedback. In similar fashion, the front office staff should be made to interact with staff from other department to allow for development of social relationships. Studies have shown that an improved social development results in improved employee motivation at the workplace.

Still, the improvement of motivation among employees is not dependent on the use of just one theory. In fact, studies have shown that different workers have different motivating factors and the supervisor must thus work towards meeting the needs of all employees. The reinforcement theory is partially helpful as it encourages the rewarding of good behavior and the removal of stressors upon termination of bad behavior (Miner, 2015, p. 172). The consequence is that both actions are motivating to the employees thus resulting in higher performance. For instance, the supervisor may come up with daily targets with the help of the employees and then reward people that achieve these targets. On the other hand, poor review from the customers may qualify one for a suspension which is then lifted upon improved conduct. The benefit of such an approach is that it encourages employees to perform better as they target the reward thus improving general performance. Even when the target is met, the employees will have worked hard and therefore improving the overall experience of the customers.

The hotel industry is rather complicated in terms of motivational factors and the supervisor must understand the different needs of the staff. In this regard, incentives should be explored with an intention of encouraging better performance among the employees. High performing employees must feel they are getting an extra incentive to continue performing better. In similar fashion, poor performing employees should feel a need to perform better so as to attain the most rewards. For instance, one of the most used incentives is the granting of day offs to high performing employees. However, the supervisor should be vigilant and ensure that the competition among employees remain healthy at all times. There have been suggestions that the provision of business cards to employees is a source of motivation in the hotel industry (Steel & Konig, 2016, p. 896). Indeed, having business cards provides a feel good factor especially when meeting customers. Employees who have business cards feel more important in their workplaces simply because they have more confidence. In the end, the feel good factor translates into a higher motivation and a desire to perform better. With the application of these techniques, Courthouse Hotel can be guaranteed of improved performance among employees during the stay of the German guests.

Question Two

Despite the Courthouse Hotel having undergone numerous improvements and refurbishments, it is not guaranteed of a high standard of service. In fact, there are concerns regarding the hotel’s ability to maintain such high standards with no prior experience in hosting such a high delegation. The hotel’s management is particularly concerned that the standard may not be met thus running its reputation in the long term. The short notice with which the opportunity arose is partly to blame coupled with the fact that the hotel only upgraded into a four star recently. Also, the use of part time staff may be detrimental to the hotel’s image as they have little knowledge about the workings and traditions of the hotel. Regardless, the supervisor insists that the hotel is on track and that the opportunity should be taken. In order to raise the confidence of the management, the supervisor has proposed immediate actions to address the situation. Further, the supervisor has come up with a recommended course of action to ensure the implementation of required changes.

Possible Actions

The hotel industry is quite unique in terms of the problems and challenges as well as the solution to these problems. While some other businesses have clear channels of problem solving, the hotel industry is best solved depending on their nature. The problem is further compounded by the fact that problems in the hotel industry have the potential of crippling a hotel. For instance, if a customer complains about poor services and posts the same online, then the hotel suffers poor reputation resulting to high losses. One of the most immediate strategies in problem solving is the correct identification and definition of the problem. Problems of quality in Courthouse Hotel include poor customer service as well as mismatch of products to the customers and low quality service. In this process, the supervisor must identify the areas affected by the problem and the reason for the occurrence of the problem. The mapping of different departments in the hotel can provide a better overview of the problem at hand thus presenting better opportunities of solving the problem (Burnes, 2005, p. 86).

Depending on the nature of the problem identified, as its scope, the supervisor should come up with a range of possible solutions for eventual implementation. The selection of possible solutions should be thorough to avoid a repetition of the problems in future. However, since most of the anticipated problems are occasioned by the expected increase in guests, solutions will include both short term and permanent solutions. After the nomination of possible solutions, the supervisor should then analyze all the different solutions for their feasibility and applicability. The process involves the testing of the different solutions to identify the most applicable in that particular situation. For instance, the solution to customer service can be based on the individual employees since the supervisor knows them in person. After this stage, the implementation stage follows in which the supervisor practically solves the identified problems (Bacharach, 1989, p. 502). The problem of low standards is best solved through training of the employees involved. The process of training can be achieved either internally or externally and would involve the transfer of requisite skills to improve performance.

The process of problem solving, when handled correctly, is a great source of motivation for the employees. Indeed, the supervisor should not victimize the failing employees but should base the process on a desire to improve their skills and knowledge of the subject. The staff should be inducted on the different services offered within the hotel as well as the different packages available to guests. Further, employees should be briefed on the nature of the anticipated guests and the requirements for a successful stay. By so doing, the supervisor paints a clear picture of the level of standards required in serving the expected guests. In house training is necessary for the employees to understand the basic structure of the hotel and the different rooms. In so doing, employees improve their knowledge of different sections of the hotel and provide better services to the guests upon arrival.

Course of Action

The successful implementation of proposed changes depends on the goodwill of both the supervisor and the employees. Although changes are necessary in any work place, they have the potential of either elevating the business or contributing to its failure based on how they are handled. The supervisor should consider different factors in imposing change including communication, cultural diversity as well as active participation. In managing the change anticipated, Lewin’s Change Management Model is quite handy. The model consists of three stages: unfreeze, change, and refreeze (Burnes, 2005, p. 85). The first component involves the preparation of the involved parties for the change. The benefit of having this component is that it prepares all the employees for change thus limiting the resistance to change from different quarters. The supervisor should thus explain to the employees the reason for the changes and the potential benefits of having the change.

The next component involves the stage of change where the actual transition occurs. The nature of the identified problem requires that changes are effected immediately to avoid poor services to the highly valued guests. The training modules proposed will be incorporated in this stage as well as the organization of staff to reflect their strengths and weaknesses. During this stage, sound leadership is required as well as good communication and motivation of employees. In the last stage, refreezing occurs where the organization gains stability again. The process involves the resumption of normal operations of the hotel and is backed by a continued application of the implemented changes.

Conclusion

The Courthouse Hotel has undergone immense refurbishments and improvements in the recent past. Indeed, the transfer of ownership has enhanced a change in strategy transforming the hotel into a four star. Despite these developments,. The hotel faces challenges in maintaining high standards of service. In particular, the management is concerned that the hotel may not attain the required standards during a visit by a high level German delegation. That notwithstanding, the hotel has the capacity to deal with the situation by improving employee motivation and enhancement of skills. In addition, the implementation of the proposed actions can guarantee a smooth operation during the visit.

References

Bacharach, S.B., 1989. Organizational theories: Some criteria for evaluation. Academy of management review, 14(4), pp.496-515.

Burnes, B., 2005. Complexity theories and organizational change. International Journal of Management Reviews, 7(2), pp.73-90.

Miner, J.B., 2015. Organizational behavior 1: Essential theories of motivation and leadership. Routledge.

Morrison, A.M., 1996. Hospitality and travel marketing (No. Ed. 2). Delmar Publishers.

Olsen, M.D., Ching-Yick Tse, E. and West, J.J., 1998. Strategic management in the hospitality industry (No. Ed. 2). John Wiley and Sons.

Steel, P. and König, C.J., 2016. Integrating theories of motivation. Academy of management Review, 31(4), pp.889-913.

Weiner, B., 2001. Intrapersonal and interpersonal theories of motivation from an attribution perspective. In Student motivation (pp. 17-30). Springer US.

Yoo, M., Lee, S. and Bai, B., 2011. Hospitality marketing research from 2000 to 2009: topics, methods, and trends. International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, 23(4), pp.517-532.

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