Best Practices Redefined; Industry Looks To Operate Leaner, Meaner

NATIONAL REPORT— Few will forget this period of slashing staff, locking down unused hotel floors and physically removing light bulbs from their outlets to save a few dollars on energy. But equally important is the fact that just as many in the industry readily admit that going forward, they’ll forever implement best practices they’ve learned from the experience to run their operations in a smarter, leaner manner. It’s taking place on the corporate level and at actual properties. Wyndham International, for example, after Sept. 11 eliminated several managerial positions whose role it had been to oversee the line level jobs at its hotels. It then empowered its line-level staff through additional training to not only oversee themselves, but to take a more active role in taking care of its guests. Wyndham plans to keep this strategy in place, even as market conditions improve, as it empowers employees at all levels of its organization, and provides guests with a more personalized guest experience, said Fred Kleisner, chairman/CEO of Wyndham. Richfield Management, meanwhile, distributed systemwide a composite of best practices it culled from its approximately 26 properties after Sept. 11. The listing, covering topics from marketing, accounting, maintenance and food & beverage, were also transmitted to the 13 Millennium Hotels & Resorts properties it manages. While some practices were quick fixes that will go away as the economy regains it footing, the management company is eyeing the idea of keeping some dramatic changes in place for operating efficiencies. While Sept. 11 mandated that Richfield reevaluate when to keep its restaurants, coffee shops and lounges open, it is going to take a long, hard look at the hours of operations for its food and beverage outlets as it goes forward, said Bill Zollars, vp/operations. “We’re really looking at some changes we have made,” he said, noting that perhaps f&b outlet hours should be set on a limited basis according to customers’ needs. It’s also possible that going forward, group functions could be held in a hotel restaurant that is not being used “instead of utilizing labor to set up and tear down banquets and things of that nature,” he said. Filling underutilized restaurant or lounge space with group business could also send a psychological message to other hotel guests, who— upon seeing an empty restaurant on property— could doubt whether they want to go there for dinner, if the hotel is unable to keep it open during the day for breakfast or lunch. Starwood Hotels & Resorts made dramatic moves in the best practices arena after Sept. 11, particularly since it had just completed black-belt training for its Six Sigma corporate training program, which focuses on process-management redesign. The company immediately assumed it would break a 60% occupancy on an annualized basis after the terrorist attacks, wherein the previous year it had run 75% occupancy. It looked at its two categories of operations, front-of-the-house labor (which has direct impact on customers) and back-of-the-house labor, which typically does not impact the customer directly. While front-of-the-house labor typically scales according to business volumes, with the hours of housekeepers and front-desk clerks dependant on how much business the hotel has, back-of-the-house labor tends to be fixed, said Ted Darnall, president/North America hotel operations. After Sept. 11, in an effort to go after cash preservation, Starwood focused immediately on the back-of-the-house labor at its properties and restructured it at a level it felt was appropriate for a 60% annual occupancy. “We flat-lined that straight through 2002,” said Darnall, “So even as business comes back, the plan is to only scale up our front-of-the-house associates, and not necessarily rescale the back-of-the-house staffing levels.” Starwood will be able to accommodate this lower percentage of workers because its Six Sigma Black Belts are now being assi