In the hospitality industry, hotels allocate guest room inventory across multiple channels to optimize guest room revenue. As an industry, we typically do this very well for transient business. However, when it comes to group revenue the discipline is not always the same. Group revenue for many hotels is an integral part of their business plan but all group revenue should not be treated equally. Smart hoteliers leverage data to know the difference between available revenue and preferred revenue. With the help of strong group and meetings dataset, hotels can leverage these insights to improve sales productivity, make smart revenue choices, and ultimately optimize profitability. READ MORE

Jeff Hart, General Manager of the Los Angeles Airport Marriott explores the evolution of hotel club lounges and the everyday ways in which they can elevate their spaces and offerings. Hart discusses tactical tips and strategies that hotels can take to stand out and provide a unique experience for guests. From concierge access to exceptional views, and stellar food and beverage, hotels are finding that guests are willing to pay a premium to have access to a heightened hotel lounge experience, and Hart dives into simple touches and more modern renovations that show the unique ways in which they can level up their spaces, offerings and approach. READ MORE

Sales of economy hotels in 2019 registered a healthy level, despite a decline in the number of limited-service hotels that sold during the year. Approximately 10% fewer hotels sold in 2019 than the number that traded hands in 2018, according to Real Capital Analytics (RCA). This decline was attributed entirely to a dearth of major portfolio transactions, while individual property transactions increased slightly for the year. The U.S. economy continues to hold strong, showing great resiliency. The overall strength in consumer spending and confidence has benefited the U.S. hotel industry, driving this healthy transactions market as hotel demand remained at heightened levels. READ MORE

Mishaps are inevitable in the hospitality industry. But these mistakes don't have to be fatal. In fact, the strategies you put in place to respond to service missteps can become some of your strongest tools to win customers and drive revenue. However, recovery is impossible when you don't know where problems lie in the first place. Recent research shows that only 1-in-4 hotel guests say they'll report any issue that impacts their experience. This is worrisome news for hotel operators. But there are ways to overcome these blind spots and create service recovery strategies that boost your reputation and bottom line. READ MORE

The hospitality industry is witnessing the increasing need for specialization of current and future employees in order to attract and retain a qualified workforce. Accordingly, workforce development and how higher education may aid in this process is of considerable interest. Future trends may see more partnerships between industry, organizations, and higher education to use more credentialing outside of the undergraduate and graduate education models that currently exist. The importance of certifications and the development of specialized programs in higher education to respond more rapidly to market needs of specialization in hospitality are discussed. READ MORE

Finding talent for your hospitality business is harder than ever. Unemployment is low and fewer people are in an active job search. Competition is fierce for top performing candidates. How do you attract great people to your open positions, then once you have their attention, how do you keep them engaged during the interview process and close the deal? We can no longer expect highly qualified candidates to respond to our job postings. We must actively recruit, move quickly and streamline the interview process. Candidates have many options…if you take too long…you will lose them. READ MORE

For years HR professionals have battled the war for talent. A phrase coined in the 1980s by business consultant McKinsey to highlight the challenges in attracting, recruiting and retaining high-caliber people in a stagnant employment market. With unemployment rates at their lowest levels in a decade, standing at just 3.7%, many would argue the war has yet to be won. With ongoing uncertainty in the economy, Eugenio Pirri, Chief People and Culture Officer believes more needs to be done to address this challenge. In this article, he shares his views on the battle for talent and how they are tackling the shortage within luxury hotel management organization, Dorchester Collection. READ MORE

Creating a strong culture within the hotel business is not only important, but essential. Depending on core values and internal priorities, the answer to what culture looks like might vary slightly from one company to the next. There's one thing that's most important to creating and maintaining a strong culture in a workplace-collaboration. Efficient communication, understanding employees, open mindedness and willingness to make changes are just the beginning building blocks of this process. A strong culture doesn't just happen, it takes consistent and continuous work that will pay off with employees, guests and professional partners alike. READ MORE

Many employers are implementing or expanding paid parental leave policies. Christine Samsel, shareholder at Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck, reviews the challenges of implementing and administering such policies, from avoiding discrimination and gender stereotyping to differentiating between pregnancy/childbirth-related medical leave, on the one hand, and baby bonding and parental leave, on the other hand. Her article also provides recommendations for employers on considerations in auditing or expanding existing leave policies. Read more… READ MORE

Many hotel brands invested heavily in customer experience (CX) and loyalty programs without a cohesive business strategy. As a result, today they are having trouble measuring the return on their investments. Loyalty programs are hard to measure because they were expanded to include infrequent travelers, offering them perks earlier in the customer journey. Many hotels also plunged substantial dollars into CX without fully understanding their customers – or how to recoup their investments. As hotel brands plan for the future of their loyalty and CX programs, it is important to learn from past experiments. READ MORE

Justin Arest, co-owner and managing partner of Kixby, a boutique hotel opened in Midtown Manhattan in November 2019, describes the current hotel landscape in New York City. He shares how hotels can attract urban travelers in 2020, particularly in the trending Midtown neighborhood. Arest explains the core elements of a successful city hotel, drawing from his own experiences working in every department of a Manhattan hotel beginning at the age of six years old, overseeing the Hotel Metro for over a decade, and leading its recent renovation and rebranding into the modern and sophisticated Kixby last year. READ MORE

The hotel industry is currently facing a labor shortage of unprecedented proportions. This has led employers to look for innovative ways to find and keep their top talent. Recruiting from outside the sector holds tremendous promise for hospitality, because it opens the door for fresh thinking and ideas, best practices from other industries, and a new way of looking at old problems. Technology, in particular, offers a multitude of possibilities for hotels to revamp everything from their financial systems to in-house entertainment, marketing methodologies, and even to introduce environmentally sustainable operations. Here are some innovative ways hotels can implement cross-industry recruitment to build the strength of their organizations. READ MORE

Tired of watching thousands of dollars walk out the revolving door of employee turnover? Have you begun to proactively invest those same dollars on the front end of your employee relationships to help keep people longer? Or is the door spinning faster each year? Too often, it's assumed that the solution to a workforce shortage is increased recruiting. But if the real problem is employee turnover, then a bigger-picture approach is needed. Instead of just putting a Band-Aid on today's staffing shortage, redirect your dollars to solving the source of the problem. Don't make the mistake of investing more in the staff you're missing than in keeping the staff you already have. READ MORE

A long-time pillar of hospitality business education at the university level is that we are preparing traditional and non-traditional students for careers in the hospitality industry. Our students have held jobs to gain experience and positioned themselves for leadership positions with multiple levels of responsibility and authority. A career path model can assist an organization in the planning and retention process at all employee levels. Organizations viewing themselves as career pathway champions can benefit their employees and themselves by creating a great place to work that embraces employee goal and career aspirations, while meeting the employer's business goals creates a positive work environment. For those searching out what direction they should take, career paths need to be obvious, evident and manageable and approachable. READ MORE

One recent, you-can't-miss-it trend in the marketplace is online recruiting companies are investing large sums of money into advertising, likely reflecting the even-larger revenues they are earning in return. And the underlying reason why so many companies are recruiting more is because their employee retention strategies don't work…or they don't have any strategy at all. Confronting this difficulty of finding qualified employees in a labor market of low employment, companies are finding themselves understaffed and incurring overtime to serve their guests. Few hospitality companies realize that the shortest path to people management success is by hiring employees who will stay longer. This requires fresh thinking. READ MORE