2. FOMs had added to the predictable role of
department manager responsibilities as facilitator
and broker of communication in its various forms
among the other hotel departments, the front office,
and the hotel guests.
One of the negative aspects is that the front office
serves as a lightning rod for guest complaints.Dealing
with complaints can be one of the most difficult tasks
for the front office staff to learn, especially given the
frequency and sometimes the intensity of guest
complaints and expectations.
Hotel’s front office referred to as the
hub, the nerve center, the brain, or
some other name suggesting
centrality.
3. Successful FOMs ideally possess
demonstrated competencies in
both oral and written
communications to deal with
these complexities and
challenges. The FOM, therefore, is
not only a manager and a
communicator among the front
office staff, the hotel departments,
and the guests but also a
communicator in yet another
way—that of teacher and trainer.
4. The exciting atmosphere of a hotel lobby
often intrigues students of hotel
management. Is someone in charge here? The
preprofessional who sets as his or her career
objective being the general manager of a hotel
and hopes the required tenure as a front office
manager (FOM) proceeds with haste will find
the role challenging. If you begin your career in
hotel management as a front desk clerk,
bellperson, or cashier, you have a vast
opportunity to explore just who is in charge.
THE ELECTRIFYING JOB OF THE
FRONT OFFICE MANAGER
5. FOM’s job, including communications,
facilitation, and organizational
interface and technical minutia.
Selected job functions reported in the
research findings included
communications with guests and
employees; facilitating medical
emergencies, selling up, power failure
procedures, walking guests due to
overbooking, and design of computer
systems for the front office; and
organizational interface with the director
of marketing,controller,food and beverage
manager, and catering manager.
6. INTERDEPARTMENTAL COMMUNICATION
The FOM must embrace the charge of becoming a proactive communicator and facilitator.
This hotel executive must analyze and seek the pieces of information guests will probably
need and figure out which departments must interact to fulfill these needs.
7. • Marketing—Preparing and administering customer surveys with concern for guest satisfaction, advertising methods, and
incentive promotions.
• Reservations—Developing and monitoring a reservation system with respect to ease of access to toll-free numbers, fax, national
reservation system, and telephone manner of personnel handling reservations, cancellations, accommodation availability,
complimentary services and products, and general information.
• Registration—Developing and monitoring a registration system with respect to concern for managing a guest transportation
shuttle system, ensuring a firstc ontact greeting; providing assistance with luggage; organizing an efficient check-in procedure;
maintaining a room status system; processing credit cards; operating a guest information system that centralizes all
communication between the guest and the hotel about housekeeping, food and beverage, maintenance, and other hotel
departments.
• Guest stay—Coordinating guest communications with all departments in the hotel to ensure guest satisfaction in restaurants,
lounges, room service, gift shops, housekeeping services, security, wake-up calls, telephone system, and guest folio availability
• Check-out—Developing and providing an efficient check-out system with respect to coordinating flexible check-out times,
providing assistance with luggage, maintaining in-room video check-out option, monitoring guest wait-time in line, and providing
folio accuracy and printout
8. This list of components in a guest
service cycle suggests the vast array of
duties the FOM encounters in
managing the delivery of hospitality
services. However, one piece of
“electrifying magic” is still required
to make front office hospitality relevant
to modern service delivery realities:
employee empowerment.
For example, many guests of a hotel feel they are in the middle of a
bureaucracy when they want to have a charge adjusted on their account
folio.“Step aside and I’ll call my supervisor” is too often the response to a guest’s
inquiry about a charge adjustment.The cashier is only doing what he or she was
trained to do. However, the guest doesn’t care what the training was; he just
knows the system isn’t user-friendly. As Sternberg emphasizes, if guidelines are
established and communicated, the cashier should know what to do.Here is the
manager’s chance to provide that first electrifying jolt of empowerment.
9. A DAY IN A LIFE OF A FRONT
OFFICE MANAGER
READ!!!
10. YIELD MANAGEMENT:
CHOOSING THE MOST
PROFITABLE RESERVATIONS
Yield management, as a term, is not
very exciting. However, the results
of a well-run yield management
program are certainly exciting!
Properly implemented, it means
that a business can make more
money. The keys are to sell more
and to sell more profitable items.
11. First step in a Yield
Management
Is to determine who is the best customer.
The best customer is the one who can spend
the most money at your property
purchasing profitable items. The products
and services you provide are the best fit for
their needs. The best customers for the
property are the ones who receive the
greatest benefit from your services. They
are willing to pay more, buy more
frequently, and remain more loyal because
you are satisfying their needs.
12. Many operations do not know who the best
customers are. However, the answer is in a
property’s data collection system. Guest
histories, food and beverage checks, cash
register receipts, and the records of
strategically allied business partners
contain most of the information any property
needs to determine the ideal customer base.
In order to properly implement a yield
management project, the property must be
viewed as a collection of profit centers. A
profit center is a place where value is
created and exchanged.
13. An important part of analyzing the potential
of each profit center is to identify all the
possible sources of revenue. This means
analyzing both the revenue-producing
outlets and the people who spend the money.
Every establishment has a wide variety of
revenue outlets.They can range from the sale
of rooms to valet service, flower delivery,
specialty drinks, cigars, and creative take-
out services.
14. Profits are the only true measure of business success. The
following groups all benefit from enhanced profits:
1.Guests—They are one of the
primary beneficiaries of
increased revenues and
profits. If revenues are on the
rise, it can mean only one
thing: You are serving the
guest better. Guests are
happier, more loyal, and eager
to tell others about the great
experience they had.
2. Employees—In order to
achieve longterm success,
employees must be involved
in the profit making and the
profit taking. Let them earn as
much money as they possibly
can by making more money
for the property.
15. Profits are the only true measure of business success. The
following groups all benefit from enhanced profits:
3. Management—
Structured reward systems
are necessary for
management. These
systems reflect their need
for income and
achievement and further
the profits of the property.
4. Shareholders and investors
—Return on investment,
dependable growth, share
prices, and so on are all
outcomes of increased
revenue. Money attracts
money, and the investors will
relish the long-term
16. Managers face six major obstacles in their efforts to implement a
yield management system.These impediments are:
1.Lack of creativity—Does your
company do things the way
they have always been done?
There is a need for
standardization in recipes
and operating procedures;
however, this sometimes
spills over into other areas.
Training sessions in most
organizations do not stress
the creative side of customer
satisfaction.
2. Lack of attention—
It is difficult to stay
in focus all the time.
The minute you stop
paying attention,
things go wrong.
3. Monitoring the wrong
signals—We tend to
monitor the easy things
to measure, such as food
cost and inventory. We
should be looking for
opportunities, not
statistics.
17. Managers face six major obstacles in their efforts to implement a
yield management system.These impediments are:
4. Conflict between sales and
service— When profits
depend on a mutual delivery
of both the sale and the
service, conflict can arise.
Front-of-the-house and back-
of-the-house employees must
work together for the
common cause of serving and
satisfying guests.
5. Targeting the wrong
customers—The right
customers are those who will
purchase the most of your
products and services. Look for
the customers with the money
to spend to give you a
reasonable profit. Use the
marketing mix variables of
product price, promotions, and
distribution to attract and hold
the right customers.
6. Rewarding the wrong behavior
—Many sales management policies
are designed to encourage
occupancy and average daily rate.
Restaurants, by allowing
customers to reward the waitstaff,
may encourage promotion of
higher-priced items. In either case,
the sale may not reflect the best
interests of the property. Yield
management is designed to
increase profit, not just gross sales.
18. BASIC CONCEPTS OF YIELD MANAGEMENT
Yield management requires knowledge of guests’ expected
behavior, plus an understanding of which business is most
beneficial to a hotel—but it does not necessarily require high-power
computers. Three main revenue management concepts allow hotels to
pick up relatively easy money, or low-hanging fruit. The three concepts
are simplifying the yield management system to make it manageable;
examining the rate controls to make certain they allow acceptance of
the business that yields the strongest revenue return; and using length-
of-stay controls to shift demand from sold-out periods to slack periods.
19. BASIC CONCEPTS OF YIELD MANAGEMENT
The goal of yield management is to select which
business to accept and which business to turn away
(when demand exceeds supply), based on the relative
value of each booking.
Seasonality rates
20. Key Components of Hotel Yield
Management
1.Demand Forecasting
• Analyzing market trends, historical data, and current booking
patterns to predict room demand.
1.Dynamic Pricing
• Adjusting room rates in real-time based on demand fluctuations,
competition, and seasonality.
1.Segmentation
• Dividing customers into segments (e.g., business travelers,
tourists, group bookings) to offer targeted rates and packages.
1.Inventory Control
• Restricting the availability of discounted rates during peak
demand periods while offering promotions during low demand.
1.Use of Technology
• Yield management often relies on revenue management systems
(RMS) that use algorithms to suggest pricing strategies.
21. EXAMPLE: A beachfront resort implements yield management as
follows:
1.Off-Peak Season (e.g., during the rainy months)
• The hotel offers discounted rates to attract budget travelers and groups.
Additional perks like free breakfast and spa credits are added to enhance
value.
2. Peak Season (e.g., summer holidays)
• The hotel increases its room rates due to high demand. Discounts are
eliminated, and bookings are restricted to a minimum 3-night stay policy.
3. Last-Minute Bookings
• If the hotel has unsold rooms a day before check-in, they might list them
on OTAs (Online Travel Agencies) like Booking.com or Agoda with
moderate discounts to fill them.
4. Corporate Travelers
• For business guests, the hotel offers fixed corporate rates throughout the
year to ensure steady revenue, regardless of the season.
By adjusting pricing and promotions based on demand patterns, the hotel
ensures optimal revenue while balancing occupancy.
22. Scenario:
Sunrise City Hotel has 100 rooms and operates in a business
district where most guests are corporate travelers during
weekdays and leisure travelers on weekends. The hotel's
management faces challenges with maximizing revenue
because:
1.Weekday occupancy is high (90%) due to corporate bookings.
2.Weekend occupancy drops to 60%.
3.Events and conferences occasionally create spikes in
demand.
4.Competitors offer aggressive discounts on weekends.
Management's Questions:
5.How can the hotel increase revenue during weekdays
without losing its loyal corporate clients?
6.What strategies should be implemented to boost weekend
occupancy?
7.How should the hotel manage room rates during city-wide
events?
CASE STUDY: YIELD
MANAGEMENT IN A CITY HOTEL
BY PAIR
1/2 CROSSWISE
