The Office Coin Toss

In the hotel business, like any other, premium office locations are rarely decided without some drama. This post offers some comical office memories and the story of today's coin toss...

I can remember in one of my previous Marriott hotels, there was a guest room sewage pipe that ran through the wall in one office - use your imagination. The adjacent office was on the opposite side of the wall from the men's public restrooms - the urinal section to be exact. Some of the conversations you could hear were funny, but it wasn't so funny for the office occupant when the urinals overflowed. Lucky for her, there was also a guestroom toilet and bathtub immediately above her office. She had bathroom fluids seeping in her carpet or ceiling tiles on a regular basis! Sometimes we were sympathetic, but we usually just chuckled and poked fun like middle schoolers. Needless to say, neither of those offices were occupied by the most senior management. Although next door, my office was a comfortable distance from the source of the leaks, and the General Manager's office was across the hall (and featured floor to ceiling windows of course). I remember the vicious negotiations that were taking place about who was getting my office when I left.

Oh, there was also the Residence Inn in Richmond - I was spoiled with an office suite there! There really wasn't a sales office, so we converted a one bedroom guest suite into our office. I had the bedroom area and my two associates officed out of the living room space. In addition to the private bathroom and in-office coffee pot, we had a full refrigerator and stove, so deluxe homemade cooking was a semi-regular treat at lunchtime! The icing on the cake was our direct view of the swimming pool, which was particularly nice during the summer months!

Anyhow, suffice it to say that all things considered, my offices have been reasonably well equipped by hospitality business standards. In Bethesda, although it was located in the basement and in desperate need of redecorating, I did have an executive size office complete with a parlor style sitting area for fireside chats. When I interviewed at LTD, I saw a couple of the VP's offices but never had a grand tour. On day one I figured out why - it was/is a strange maze of custom made cubicals built into the front section of a warehouse. Don't get me wrong, the space is functional but not exactly Class A. There are two offices for directors at the front of the building; that's where the coin toss comes into play.

In an earlier post I mentioned that my friend Dawn got promoted. Well, now as a manager of eight people, she needs an office. As with any growing company, the addition of staff sometimes requires a bit of musical chairs. After all, you want people nearby their peers and subordinates for synergy and ease of communication. It makes sense that Dawn and I will each have one of the two aforementioned offices. As it turns out I already occupy one of them, but it is the less desirable - the one immediately adjacent to the reception area and copy room, and it has access doors from both busy areas. There is a window, but the other has two.

I gently mentioned to Dawn that since the (better) office next door was being vacated, I would move in there and she could take my space. The jovial "uhh, no" was her immediate response. Dawn and I get along well and are level headed enough to know that the office really isn't a big deal. Plus neither of us had a decent argument as to why we should get the office over the other. So, we agreed to a fair and square coin toss - refereed by our colleague. I won.

So, go take a trip and stay in hotel so Dawn and I can keep our modest offices!

Family Matters

Today I had the pleasure of catching up with a bunch of old friends and colleagues from Richmond. We attended the annual holiday luncheon for the local MPI chapter. As we sat around the table trading updates on family and business, I found myself particularly excited about the upcoming Christmas holiday.

For one reason or another, in years past I've worked most of the holiday week, except Christmas day. I joked today that my typical Christmas Eve routine was to work until about noon, rush to the mall on the way home and pull into the drive just in time for dinner, with unwrapped, spontaneously purchased gifts in the trunk. This year is going to be different - I decided to take vacation time for the whole week.

To those who know me well, it's no secret that I am a workaholic and for better or worse my wife is very supportive and rarely complains about it. The truth is (as it is for most workaholics) that at the sacrifice of perhaps a more fulfilling personal life, my professional achievements have been accelerated. Well, with the economic situation as it is, the uncertainties of life seem to be highlighted of recent. This year I've come to appreciate this reality: that while the yo-yo stock market is humbling to investors large and small, and while jobs (and accompanying prestige) can change overnight, there is one constant - family. I've been fortunate (so far) to have maintained a good job, but I know many who haven't been so lucky and I've certainly lost the sense of security that I once had. I've lost half my savings like most Americans, but it wasn't ever enough to make or break my lifestyle so I don't dwell on it. Through this year and others the only permanent constant has been a great family.

So, this year I have decided to honor that by taking off all of Christmas week and spending it with my wife and beautiful children. My in-laws are coming to visit and we already live near my family, so we'll have the best of it all! Money or no money, job or no job, cable or no cable (we cut that out of our budget), we have each other and that is worth remembering this holiday season.

Merry Christmas!

Go, take a trip to see your family! It's good for the economy and your psyche!

School's Out - Now What?

Tonight marked the final evening of lecture in what has been my first semester as an adjunct faculty member at the local community college. As I sit here catching up on the news after my long day, I think to myself: "Wow, I'm glad I finished school when I did."

Thank goodness the markets were up today, but we can all predict what that means for tomorrow. For the past several months an up day is almost always followed by a bigger down day. Nearly every business and government entity is either cutting jobs, freezing vacant ones, or at the very least making contingency plans to implement if things don't turn around soon. Real estate markets are still tumbling, consumer confidence and spending are at record lows and America's three iconic auto makers are almost literally crawling to the government panhandling. Wow, what a contrast to when I graduated college!

I can remember in the late '90s when credit was flowing so generously guys like me had $10,000 credit card limits, with only $5,000 in annual income. Job fairs at Virginia Tech were packed with recruiters in a frenzy to scoop up young talent, and Realtors were writing escalation clauses (remember those?). In the hotel world, occupancies were healthy, rates were growing, management jobs were plentiful, and best of all supply and demand were relatively balanced! Times certainly have changed...While we stress about losing our savings in the volatile market, we can be thankful that at least we have a little something to lose. Imagine being a job hungry student right now, wondering how you are going to get a job, must less start saving.

Now, that is not to say it was all easy, hoteliers certainly felt the economic blow of 9-11. I clearly remember big budget cuts that included mandatory 4 day work weeks (and the accompanying 20% reduction in pay). We certainly had a tough period, but there was a light at the end of the tunnel. There was a rational explanation for the why the markets tumbled. Everyone knew travel would come back - albeit when was big question. Nonetheless, we endured that period of uncertainty and sure enough within a couple short years the industry was thriving again! And so goes the cycle...

The good news is that regardless of how bad the economy is today or how much worse it may get tomorrow, this is America and we will rebound. After all, this is and always will be the land of opportunity. To those graduating soon, fear not for fear will only consume you. Continue to dream big! Although you may need to take a humbling job to get through today, rest assured that passion and strong work ethic will pave your road to success.

While the career opportunities may seem few and far between, and you find yourselves competing with experienced candidates, keep your head high and remember the famous words from Dr. Seuss:

"You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes.
You can steer yourself, any direction you choose."

"And will you succeed? Yes indeed, yes indeed!
Ninety eight and three quarters percent quaranteed."

To my non-student readers and rest of the world I close with this suggestion: go take an overnight weekend shopping trip to your favorite mall! Pamper yourself and enjoy your stay, the economy could use your help!

From Selling Fried Chicken to "I'm Kind of a Big Deal"

In the past week, our company announced a restructuring of the sales and marketing department. By in large, those involved directly and indirectly agree in principal with the new alignment that creates a structure with strong competitive advantages. I'm not going to reveal our secret formula, but I will highlight one change that stands out as notable...that is the promotion of our director of catering to an area director of sales.

What's the big deal? Well, overnight, this individual has gone from being responsible for two subordinates to seven. She has gone from a financial scope of accountability of about $1.5 million to more than $25 million. This person - who has little if any experience with STR reports, budgets, revenue management, goal setting, RFPs, group ceilings, patterns or MARs - in one felt swoop has landing a job of exponentially larger magnitude.

"Wow!" and "How?" are a couple of thoughts you might be having. Wow is right. It is an incredible accomplishment for which she should be very proud! How? Well, it's pretty simple really - she gets it. What do I mean - what is IT? "It" is the appreciation for the critical importance of self-motivation, work ethic, passion and taking initiative. If you truly have those characteristics (and a little bit of political savvy) and you exploit them at every opportunity, you will naturally position yourself for career progression. You will learn more than your peers through the initiative, your efforts will be noticed in the strong work ethic, your passion will be visible in the quality of your work and your self-motivation will exude a positive attitude and energy. That's what Dawn did.

I mentioned that she doesn't have much experience with some of the technical aspects of the job, but because she possesses those other fundamental characteristics, nobody doubts that she will be successful. The technical details can be learned pretty quickly through training and situational exposure. As I've said before, hotels sales is not rocket science.

So, the moral of the story is - if you want a rocket ride career (not everyone does and that is okay too), you need to "get it". Congrats to Dawn!

Time is an Investment - Maximize your ROI

Business leaders are perpetually evaluating their organization, looking for ways to improving efficiency – they have to in order to maintain/grow profitability. In essence, executives constantly seek to grow earnings and fuel expansion by doing more with less, without sacrificing quality. What does that mean for the associates? Well, they too have to figure out ways to improve their day-to-day productivity.

For us (sales professionals), that means figuring out how to maximize customer contact time, because customer contact is what produces results in our world. How? In short, discipline. We must discipline ourselves to focus our time and energy where we have the biggest opportunity to make an impact. In practical terms, here are some suggestions:
1. Find out where you are wasting your time. Whether we want admit it or not, there is probably some time in everyone’s day that could be better spent. Evaluate your day and fix that.
2. Prioritize ruthlessly. Start each day with a self time management session, prioritizing the tasks for that day. If you have 20 tasks for a given day, how many of them do you truly need to accomplish? Which of them will yield the best results?
3. Learn to delegate. Of those 20 tasks, which of them can someone else do? The front desk, night auditor, coordinator, receptionist? Maximize your resources!
4. Set appointments with yourself. Schedule time to perform your tasks and stick to it!
5. Limit distractions. Don’t let the incessant interruptions that are non-critical distract you from your daily agenda of customer contact priorities. If they are critical, deal with them and get right back your plan.

Sources: http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/time-management/WL00048 and http://sbinfocanada.about.com/cs/timemanagement/a/timemgttips.htm

How the Game Changes

In the midst of a recession, like most industries, hoteliers change their strategies to fill rooms. When times are good, there are more customers than available rooms and we get to play mathematical games and take risks with restrictions and rates in an attempt to maximize our revenue. More time is spent finding the best customer, but when times are not so good (now) we find ourselves to be far less picky and eager to settle for any customer. We become much more concerned about the prospect of having an empty hotel and we ask, "where can I find a guest to rent this room?".

Where do we look? Our competitors. We look at our direct competitors, but that's nothing unique - we do that even when times are good. Moreover, we look to steal business that we typically wouldn't target. For example, a Marriott might start pricing their discounts and group rates to compete with a Holiday Inn. They might also look to steal customers from the Ritz Carlton - typically that business may be considered out of thier league, but budget cuts might make that Marriott more attractive for high-end travelers seeking to save a buck.

The point is this: for travel managers, meeting planners and group travel coordinators out there looking for an upgrade to the next tier of accommodations - now is a good time to make that switch. For those who enjoy luxury properties, you can trim costs but still offer very quality accommodations for your executives. For individuals - the same applies. Government employee travelers may find this particularly true - many hotels that don't typically offer per diem have had a change of heart. So, go, take a trip and enjoy your stay.