It's a wake-up call for the hotel industry to fix its service standards and upskill the workforce

Being a frequent traveller, having spent considerable time on airports, flights and hotels, I am experiencing a significant drop in service levels across the different hospitality industry segments. There appears to be a severe disconnect in hotels where the guest experience was a paramount focus. There are glaring surprises in the entire gamut of services, from the front office to housekeeping, dining to room service. Even the usual amenities from the gym and spa are all gone for a toss. What is appalling is that these blatant misses are not any more considered lapses by most hospitality establishments; I can confirm having spent substantial room nights in the recent past. This appears to be a neo-normal, with most managers citing this as areas of improvement with tagging apologies. A typical response I come across by most personnel on the floor is that due to business uptake, there is work in progress to address these issues. I believe these responses are inappropriate as these are serious problems and need immediate action. These are deep crevasses and free falls in services ruining the guest experience.?

Most hospitality staff and executive professionals are struggling to formulate their responses amidst this chaos and are at a loss on how to fix this. Is this a post-pandemic phenomenon, or is it due to a paradigm shift in the hospitality industry focus in context to its service offering, moving away from comprehensive offering to basics? Very likely, besides retaining basic politeness with the word "sorry" in abundance, there is nothing else in common or context to service consistency. I understand if it is a budget hotel proposition, but if it is a 5-star segment with atrocious price tags of over USD300 a day, then where are the add-ons, if not the luxury? The delicate balance between attention and details is itself in jeopardy.

Many factors contribute to this mess across the entire industry that, unfortunately, is not limited to a region, brand or particular class, be it budget, 5-star or super-luxury. Fundamentally, many factors contribute to this free fall. One of the foremost factors in the list of issues troubling hotel services is the quality of built environments and delipidated, old and poorly maintained assets. Of course, the pandemic did also impair this aspect. However, the years of maintenance underspent is the real culprit where every hotel general manager is struggling with maintenance issues and no easy solution.

The second issue is the staff unavailability leading to shortages or under-skilled people joining the workforce. Third and possibly a glaring issue to be noted is the management and executive level disregard for the basics of hospitality where far sight, foresight and customer profiling sensitivities are compromised. Hotel service professionals require adequate training, especially mid-level management, which lacks due sensitivities centred around the guest experience. The hotel managers were supposed to be the primary foot soldiers ensuring close monitoring and supervision of the ground staff. Yet, I seldom see the sight of senior managers or general managers on the floor.

Where did this all begin? Blaming it on the pandemic is incorrect, as I saw the decline much earlier than the pandemic. The hotel maintenance problem is historical and conventional; the corona crisis has added to this colossal issue. However, the issue of upskilling and attracting talent with apt mapping of the requisite skill levels has been a big problem. Hotel staff salary scales with the shift in jobs is too under pressure. Hiring people with adequate competencies and skills in the given dynamics is a challenge. There is a dearth of job openings with such competencies, and that too at higher compensations. Therefore there is a definitive shift from hospitality jobs, putting more pressure on the hotel industry. With the conventional focus on talent pools moving to other jobs, this brain drain is a worry.

Where do we go from here? Lots of fixes are needed across each. The budget segment is much easy to fix as expectations therein are limited. Much can be solved if built environments are adequately maintained with a strong emphasis on adequate capital spending and maintenance service level alignments. There are indeed sufficient successful case studies to demonstrate this. However, the bigger problem lies with the luxury segment, as their situation requires a macro-level fix. This depends on a multi-pronged strategy, with hotels requiring their definite focus on improving built environments and upgrading service infrastructure to meet the evolving needs of their guests, notwithstanding the need to upscale the service standards and protocols in line with the guest profiles. The ground-level staff and the executive must be well compensated and thoroughly trained to manage the delicate balance between personalized attention and the requisite attention to detail.

Indeed the industry is at a crossroads with the change in customer profile; with many newer people seeking luxury with an eye on attention, the detailing element critical to luxury is getting diluted.