The hotel operations manual is a unique document because it is the key to assuring that consistency in looks, service, products and performance is the same from franchise to franchise
August 18, 2011 by Fran
Filed under Franchise Articles
It is smart to create a great hotel operations manual because it is a dynamite way to enforce consistency in your franchises. When you franchise your company, that is a great way to grow your empire in a big hurry and to take the winning formula for making piles of money and spreading it like wildfire across the land. The key to that explosion of success and wealth is tied up in making sure every one of your franchises lives up to the name you plaster on the building. The hotel operations manual is a great way to achieve that compliance to franchise standards.
You cannot be in every location in your far flung franchising empire every day. But making sure that every one of your hotels lives up to the corporate name, logo, reputation and advertising is absolutely essential to the success of your business. That is why a franchise operations manual will become your way of extending your management fingers into each franchise to make sure that franchise lives up to expectations.
You may think that the franchise owner will resent how specific the hotel operations manual is about the operations of every facet of the operation of that hotel. The opposite is usually the case. A hotel franchise owner knows he or she is buying into a very successful name in the hotel industry and the one thing they want to know is how to turn this opportunity into their golden ticket to success in running a hotel.
You didn’t come by your initial success in running a very profitable hotel overnight. But by buying a franchise of your hotel, the franchise owner “inherits” the good name of your hotel which can turn into instant success because of the trust the public has in your corporate logo. So they need that hotel operations manual to tell them how to hit that high mark of success that you are giving them with their franchise ownership. The more detailed and specific the hotel operations manual is, the better things will run for everyone.
That hotel operations manual can virtually clone your years of hotel experience.
When you begin to draft your hotel operations manual, you already are in possession of a huge bank vault of great stuff to put in there. In fact, if you already have a hotel operations manual that served you well before you ever gave a waking thought to franchising a hotel chain, that can serve as a perfect template for a hotel operations manual for every one of your franchises to swear by.
You bring to the table an impressive wealth of information about how a great hotel runs. You have an instinct for turning hotels into huge profit making empires and that is why you are ready to spread that magic formula for success to your franchise owners. Naturally you will put together orientation materials and training classes or videos so that you can mold every new franchise owner into a virtual spitting image of yourself in terms of hotel management.
So keep on your to do list to transcribe into a neatly laid out hotel operations manual every detail of that orientations and training material to become a permanent on site resource that can help your hotel franchise buyers to overcome problems, recruit great help and build a massive and loyal customer base so every one of your franchises realizes just as much explosive success as you expect.
Making the hotel operations manual a part of every standard operating procedure you employ to keep your hotel running great is just smart business.
June 18, 2011 by Fran
Filed under Franchise Articles
Too often the hotel operations manual is considered a big nuisance when you have a big hotel franchise to run. While the policies and procedures of running a prosperous hotel franchise are very unique to this exciting industry, the format of the hotel operations manual will often follow a common operations manual template that is frequently useful in running a money making franchise.
Running a hotel can be a frantic situation. But with the help of a good hotel operations manual, you will have prepared ways to deal with the many unusual situations that spring up when you are running a money making hotel franchise operation. A hotel operations manual is much more than a dusty book you pull out once in a blue moon just to say you reviewed it.
This book is often referred to as a SOP or the big book of standard operating procedures. But whatever you or your employees call it, the hotel operations manual for keeping your franchise running like a top is an essential tool for you to be sure your customers are happy, your employees are happy and that you keep those rooms filled which makes your bank account very happy indeed.
The hotel operations manual is a book with a purpose.
Like any good tool you will use to run your hotel, the hotel operations manual has many reasons for existing and many ways it pays its way in your operation. Because you will get a template for your hotel operations manual from the franchisee, the hotel operations manual’s first purpose will be to give you franchise information that you need to keep your nose clean with the people who own the logo that you hang on the building.
The hotel operations manual should also become the bible of how to handle just about every situation imaginable in a busy hotel on a daily basis. You don’t have to be in the hotel business long before you know that you can all kinds of situations that come up because of all that goes on each week in your hotel. Your employees need to know what to do if a guest fall off a chair and breaks her pink finger or if there is a more serious emergency such as a serious storm or a terrorist attack. While some emergencies may be a little far fetched, a good hotel operations manual will give you the standard operating procedure so you, your staff and your guests will know what to do.
Above all the hotel operations manual is written to be sure you are providing the very best service on the planet to your guests. If you can make sure you provide the best service imaginable to those paying hotel guests, they will come back and send you tons of referrals as well. That is how you find yourself dealing with a hotel that is constantly booked to the rafters with happy customers with lots of money to spend. Those happy customers mean a happy hotel franchise owner and happy franchise partners as well because you took the time to know your hotel operations manual inside out. That will always be time well spent.