Hotel Park Royal At Melbourne Airport: A Four-Star Transitory Hotel

Overview of Hotel Park Royal at Melbourne Airport

Hotel Park Royal at Melbourne Airport is my workplace. This is a transitory hotel with four-star facilities. Main target audience of this hotel is airport-bound passengers and airport officials with special need of meeting and event. This hotel offers to its clients 368 rooms with all modern facilities and amenities required by them during their stay including dining service round the clock including bar and meeting and event hosting places.

This hotel is maintaining a state-of-the art ambience to justify its fame and it is my good luck that I was chosen to serve this hotel as my first workplace. This work placement would help me to know the basics of hotel and hospitality management under the right guidance of my supervisors. This assignment would also help me to enhance my communication and interpersonal skills to match the latest trend of hospitality industry in Australia. The area of interpersonal skill development can be done in best possible way by meeting the guests, who are both of domestic and overseas in nature. Hospitality industry needs proficiency in man management-be it client, team member or supervisor; and this assignment will give me the scope to learn those qualities to sustain in long run with this industry as an efficient worker. This work placement would give me best scopes to understand the etiquette and the manner in which I should present myself to the stakeholders of the organization which includes clients, colleagues and supervisors.

As a fresher, I was assigned to the meeting and events department of the park Royal Hotel. My entire assignment was for three days. I was introduced to different meeting and banquet rooms which were counted as twenty. The hotel employees were equipped with customized I-Pads to identify the rooms and the assigned guests with the timing and the needs of them. My first day job was to clear the plates and the dishes to the bins and the serving trays during lunch time and afternoon-tea time.

Second day was started around 8 AM, while I was introduced to the team Leader, Josh. He had showed a white board at the back of the rooms, which showed the number of rooms and the timing of engagement. This was the basic guideline to ensure smoothness of service to the clients along with the arrival time of guests, their food and beverages requirement timing, etc. The job assigned to me on the second day was to stack the cleaned dishes in the shelves and to polish the cutleries to make them looks glittering. Next job was to manage the storage of beverages-both hot and cold by following FIFO method. Cleaning the floors and clearing tables were next duties. This duty was followed by cleaning of plates for buffet lunch.

Author’s experience in working with the meeting and events department

Third day was started early at 7 AM. This day I was assigned with two other colleagues to manage hot and cold beverages for meeting rooms with provision of water jugs as per requirement fixed in the pantry white board. Moreover, tea and coffee stations were to be arranged for the guests with special emphasis on fixation of espresso coffee cart. Additionally, I was assigned to collect cash for coffee cart from finance department.

Then, my normal assignment included clearance of morning tea and lunch plates and cutleries with proper cleaning and subsequent placement in the respective shelves.

The department of meeting and events contributes good share to the business of the hotel. This department is part of operation and is closely connected to other departments like HR or F & A. the supervisory delegation of authority is dawned upon Ms. Ceylan, while she had other team members in the form of team leader, like Josh and other colleagues to execute their duties as framed by the management to meet the needs of clients of meeting and events department.

To ensure critical analysis of my work placement, I have to analyze the same in perspective of different relevant theories related to front-line management of hospitality industry with leadership approach.

Findings of Triad Theory endorses that brand building is the key factor of success for hospitality industry and frontline managers have to play crucial role in this regard by contributing value addition by exhibiting their interpersonal and communication skills with professional services. (Lishan Xie, 2015)

As per the study of Zhenyao Cai et.al featured in the research paper “When Do Frontline Hospitality Employees Take Charge? Pro-social Motivation, Taking Charge, and Job Performance: The Moderating Role of Job Autonomy” published in September,2018, emphasis had been given in trait activation theory to identify the role of frontline manager of hospitality industry in respect of factors like pro-social motivation to perform by accepting charges. The study endorses the concept of direct relationship between pro-social motivation to own up responsibility and ensure deliverance of service to the clients with assured job autonomy. (Zhenyao Cai, 2018)

As per Judi Brownell in the article Leadership in the Service of Hospitality published in the Scholarly Commons of Cornell University School of Hotel Administration in 2010, a new theory had been evolved in this industry named as servant leadership. The leadership theory endorses the concept of leadership through support and empowerment of followers, which is named as transformation leadership. As this industry is based on service industry principle, this leadership extends its role beyond routine work and concentrates more on adding value to the larger society. (Bronwell, 2010)

Analysis of different relevant theories related to frontline management of the hospitality industry with a leadership approach

In this case, frontline leaders are the team members of the meeting and events department. Their main roles are to ensure coveted level of service to the clients by meeting their requirements in respect of serving food, beverages and other allied services as required by them.

Skills required for frontline managers in hospitality industry are:

• Commitment;
• Interpersonal skills;
• Problem solving;
• Team work;
• Organized mode of deliverance;
• Flexibility of individuals. (Gittins, 2014)

Basic challenges faced by frontline managers in hospitality industry are:

• Effective profiling of guests- It is required to ensure conversion of new customers to repeat customers through data gathering from different sources.
• Effective use of social media- It is required to gather feedback from reviewers and guests as positive feedback enhances the scope of business and vice versa.
• To meet the expectation of demanding customers- The customers are demanding to meet their expected level of requirement as this business is rolling on make or break experience.
• Enhancement of revenue by reduction of cost- There should be constant endeavor to ensure new mode of revenue and reduction of cost by exercising proper cost management for the hotel. (Directions, 2011)

Selection and development of frontline leaders

Normally, the selection procedure of frontline leaders is to choose them from hospitality management schools when they are on the verge of completing their graduation. Development of frontline leaders can be ensured through proper training and provide scope of leadership development practices. As this is a service industry, innovation is to be encouraged to ensure development of frontline leaders.

Role in development and management of team

Frontline managers can play role to ensure development and management of team by practicing effective interpersonal and communication skill and ensuring team work.

Frontline managers have to learn communication skill as part of effective interpersonal skill as this can make them effective in terms of communicating. Challenges in this domain is lacking of communication, which may lead to wrong signal to the stakeholders-both internal and external.

If I am with Royal Park Hotel as employee, I need proper training to understand and due empowerment to perform my duties effectively. Development of basic skills in this field is necessary for this transformation. Leadership demands setting of trend through innovation in working domain for proven ability to become a leader. (Peter Songan, 2016)

Conclusion

This article highlighted my personal experience as a working professional in hospitality industry. The background section had shown brief discussion about that. In critical analysis, discussion is evolved in respect of theoretical knowledge about different aspect of workmanship.

References:

Bronwell, J. (2010). Leadership in the Service of Hospitality. Scholarly Commons , 51 (3), 363-378.

Directions, A. T. (2011). The Top 4 Challenges Facing Hospitality Today. Avaya.com.

Gittins, S. (2014, July 16). 6 SKILLS AND CHARACTERISTICS YOU NEED TO WORK IN THE HOSPITALITY INDUSTRY. (R. T. Services, Producer) Retrieved November 5, 2018, from RAM Training Services: https://www.ramtrainingservices.com.au/blog/6-skills-and-characteristics-you-need-to-work-in-the-hospitality-industry/

Lishan Xie, Y. L.-H.-C. (2015). Triad theory of hotel managerial leadership, employee brand-building behavior, and guest images of luxury-hotel brands. International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management , 28 (9), 1826-1847.

Songan, N. N. (2016, July). Empowerment of Front-line Employees in the Hospitality Industry: A Survey of Three Five –Star Hotels in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. ResearchGate.

Zhenyao Cai, Y. H. (2018). When Do Frontline Hospitality Employees Take Charge? Prosocial Motivation, Taking Charge, and Job Performance: The Moderating Role of Job Autonomy. SAGE Journals , https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1938965518797081.