TH1805

ACTIVITY: Case Analysis

At a recent staff meeting, the General Manager of The Times Hotel asked if anyone wanted to address any
conflict within the group. The Director of Housekeeping indicated he was at a loss in trying to work with the
front desk clerks. He had repeatedly called the desk clerks last Tuesday to let them know that general house
cleaning should have been performed on the seventh and eighth floors on Wednesday morning, and that they
should not assign rooms on those floors to guests on Tuesday night. When the cleaning crew came to work
on Wednesday morning, they were faced with 14 occupied rooms on the seventh floor and 12 occupied rooms
on the eighth floor. This cost the hotel since the cleaning crew was from an outsourced contract company,
which charged the hotel a basic fee for failing to comply with the contract. The Front Office Manager
responded that a bus group called two (2) weeks ago and asked if any rooms were available because there was
a mix-up in room rates at the group’s original hotel. The Front Office Manager indicated something must have
gone wrong in the computer system. After all, this was a good opportunity to bring in 26 additional room-
nights.
Reference:
Bardi, J. A. (2007). Hotel front office management (4th Ed.). NJ: John Wiley & Sons.

QUESTIONS:
a. What is the problem based on the case? If you were the General Manager (GM), how would
you solve such a problem? Discuss your recommendations.
The main problem in the case is lack of communication of the Front Office Manager and the
Director of the Housekeeping department. As stated in the case a bus group contacted the
hotel two weeks ago, and according to the Director of the housekeeping he contacted the
front desk clerk that Tuesday to inform them about the general house cleaning, it is evident
that they did not communicate well so that they could accept the bus group that week and
to reschedule the house cleaning after the bus group will check out. If were the General
Manager, I would first talk to them calmly that it already happened so they should learn
from their mistakes and avoid the reoccurrence of the said problem, and I will encourage
them to implement a good communication within the organization to avoid such problems
and to have a smooth flow in the work place.

b. What key job functions and roles of a GM are exercised in solving this case? Support your
answer.
The key job function that was exercised in the case is Operational Controller because the
problem was a short run frame problem and the roles that were evidently exercised by
the General Manager was being a Leader that is responsible for handling, motivating,
and supervising the workers, and He was also a Handler disturbance because he took
action on the problem that was raised during the staff meeting.

04 Case Analysis 1 *Property of STI

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