It might sound rather ‘corporate’, but setting key performance indicators (KPIs) for your hotel team could be the best thing you do in 2020.

Tracking employee performance will help you identify areas in which they need to improve and reveal opportunities to lavish praise.

KPIs will also make it far easier to manage staff, keep up with the big chains and hit those all-important revenue targets.

Today, we’ve compiled a few simple tips for setting KPIs for your hotel team.

Relate them to the business goals

This is an obvious but easily missed step.

For KPIs to be effective, they need to be closely aligned with the overall goals of the business.

Yours might be to increase RevPAR, raise occupancy or offer significantly different guest experiences. Whatever it is you want the business to achieve, you need to make sure staff are on the same path.

Marrying the two isn’t always easy, but there are some quick wins. For instance, if you’re focusing on raising monthly sales, you may want to consider increasing the outbound call targets for your Sales Team.

For your desk and reservation agents, focusing on increasing the number of paid versus free room upgrades will offer a very useful, and trackable KPI.

Think about the customer

The guest experience will often start and end with a member of your team. This is why they need to be focused and incentivised to deliver the best possible experience.

KPIs for front desk staff are best linked to guest feedback forms and online review websites. The more input you receive from guests on the performance of your staff, the more you’ll spot where they’re going wrong and where they’re going out of their way to create an amazing experience.

Getting staff to buy in

There’s one problem with key performance indicators: they’re easily disregarded for being – here’s that word again – too corporate.

If you don’t introduce them in the right way, you’ll immediately set off on the wrong footing with KPIs in hospitality. Staff will smile politely but ultimately fail to engage with them.

Here’s how to get staff on board with your KPIs:

  • Let them discover and own the KPIs. Rather than educating your team on their KPIs, simply introduce them and let everyone discover them. Make it clear they are their KPIs and can be moulded (within reason) to suit each individual.
  • Never dictate. Dictating KPIs is a sure-fire way to turn people off. Instead, help the team explore the KPIs and ask for genuine feedback on them; if someone doesn’t like a KPI, ask why.
  • Invite people to create their own measures. Developing KPIs in hospitality isn’t easy, and if you’re struggling to devise a set for someone, ask them to create their own. This is a two-way process, after all.
  • Stop, collaborate and improve. This is the most important strategy, because KPIs should never stand still. Make sure you regularly review KPIs on a one-to-one basis with each team member and make changes when you both agree that something isn’t measurable or ambitious enough.

Wrapping up

If you’ve never put together KPIs for your hotel team, now is a great time to start.

Use our tips above to create KPIs that will raise the team’s performance, reduce staff turnover and create a better guest experience.

 

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CMS Hospitality holds over 30 years of experience in delivering hospitality software solutions. CMS offers the most complete solution in hospitality software, whether you’re running a hotel, a resort or a hostel. Our highly experienced support and installations team holds a unique understanding of the hospitality industry and will aim to provide software that suits your property’s needs.

Call us today at (+61) 2 9440 9711, or email us at sales@cmshospitality.com. We will be happy to guide you to the CMS Hospitality solution that’s right for you.