Guests Not Receiving Their Profile Requests? Maybe It's Your Morning Meeting.

               The morning management meeting is a major piece of organization which has a ripple effect on a daily, weekly and even quarterly basis. Let's talk about how your morning meeting should run.

• Make sure you have a large circular or oval table. It is important that everyone be able to make eye contact with everyone else for proper communication. Make sure there are enough chairs. This sounds silly, but you won't believe how many times people have to go hunting for chairs. People that have desks nearby don't like other people taking and sitting in their chairs. If you want to keep staff relations at a positive note, trust me and have enough separate chairs for everyone.

• Meetings are never in guest areas. Do not have this during business hours in the restaurant or front lobby. You don't want distractions and a restaurant in full service will create just that, especially if it is making people hungry. Also, you may unknowingly take up space a large group may have taken for their breakfast or meeting. It also sets a bad precedent if the meeting takes place in full view of guests in the front lobby. Information about hotel guests and operations is proprietary. Again, seems redundant, it happens.

• Encourage a breakfast drink. Most people brought in a coffee, the resident manager had an espresso that always smelled great. People are tired in the morning. Everyone has seen someone doze off.

• Have daily arrivals reports printed for everyone. Having them done by each manager can create late arrivals as some are half asleep and can't work the computer. Go ahead and laugh, but it's never fun to be the one who shows up late to a meeting in progress. Notice I did not say a V.I.P. report. You may very well have V.I.P.'s however, that report will exclude guests not rated as such. Non V.I.P.'s will never become V.I.P.'s if their requests are not met, so it is important to cover everyone. You can easily discern a V.I.P. on the standard arrivals sheet.

• Have someone funny or personable read the arrivals report. At that time of the morning, monotone reading causes sleepiness and boredom, and that is not conducive to paying attention to your arrival report. Managers that have a good time and experience levity are more apt to be relaxed when they return to their departments and that translates to the staff encouraging productivity.

Here's where the biggest difference in success occurs.

• Read Every Name. If you do not have a GRM or concierge that reviews every arrival searching for V.I.P.'s, as in celebrities, business figures etc...then this is very important to implement. Your staff comes from many different walks of life. You never know what name one person may recognize where no one else will. This of course will change everything from the arrival experience to amenity placement and so on.

• As the designated person reads each arrival profile, the department head for each department will read his own specific guest requirements. This means that everyone will have to be reading their reports. This guarantees a portion of accountability. They have read it, everyone saw and heard them read it. This requirement is then circled by the department head so they can find them again easily in the stack. This completes your accountability for the said requirement. Accountability is key here. Now there is no excuse, and no reason why this beginning portion of the overall service ethic should be missed.

• When all is said and done, all service challenges will be brought up with the right department. This brings more accountability as the item is discussed with the departments involved and the resident manager, general manager, or whichever senior department head is there. More accountability. This paints a picture of success and at the end of the day, if we are successful, we keep our guests, and a positive attitude moving forward as we have the tools for success.