Confessions of a Hospitality Major: Life and Lemonade

It's been two years now since I began working in the hospitality industry, one year now since I left my little limited service world of the TownePlace Suites for the much, much lager world of Hilton. As with any anniversary, I feel like there should be life lessons I've taken away from my experiences and nuggets of wisdom that I've gleaned and stored away for future times. I suppose that, yes, I have learned a few things. You can't go a year in your life and not change as a person or learn something.

In the last year, I've learned that there are a lot of entitled, selfish people in the world and not all of them book through third party websites. Most of them come from the top tier honors programs and I find myself putting on my extra bright and sunny smile when checking the honors tier in to make sure they like me and don't decide to smash us on the review websites. I'd learned this to a certain extant at the TownePlace, but when you are only dealing with a hundred rooms and at the most sixty people checking in in a super busy day... it's not as noticeable as when you have almost four hundred rooms and regularly come in contact with two hundred + people on a regular basis.

I've learned that people can smile and say everything is fine and then later write a scathing review about how the service was terrible and leave you wondering what happened. I've learned that people are selfish, demanding, and not all of the nasty people you can encounter will be on the guest side of the desk. Sometimes one of the worst people you've ever met will be your boss, and you'll have to learn how to deal with the added stress and anxiety that can heap on an already fairly stressful job. (There's a reason why people in hospitality are most likely to become alcoholics.)

I've learned that common sense is virtually extinct, people don't know how to do things for themselves, they don't know how to solve their own problems or deal with when someone says "I'm sorry, but you can't do that." People will get angry over their own mistakes and gladly blame it on you, and you will have to smile and take it - to a certain extent. If they cross the line then go ahead and shut that sucker down because you aren't getting paid enough for that nonsense. I've learned that even after a year, I still am not very good at dealing with angry people. I wish I was, I wish I knew exactly how to be polite and courteous and tell people that they are acting like angry children with a smile. My face turns red, I freeze up, I get anxious because "shoot this person is mad at me, and if they leave here mad I'm the one who is going to get in trouble for not making them happy."

It's a lot to deal with, and I've learned that while I do enjoy the Front Desk on it's good days it's burning me out and I definitely can't do it forever. There's a lot of days when I leave work muttering how much I hate my job and I just can't deal with this s*** anymore. I've walked in the door to start my shift, had an encounter that pushed me up to the edge right away and gone to my computer and started looking for other jobs.

And I've learned that gosh darnit anyhow, I don't want to work in any other industry. It's frustrating at all get out sometimes (a lot of the time) but for some reason I love it. I love working in a hotel.

I've learned that there are genuinely nice, wonderful people out there who will be ecstatic at how beautiful your hotel is and they never imagined they'd be able to stay in a place like this but they found a really, really good deal on Hotwire. There are people who appreciate the things you do to make their stay as wonderful as possible and understand when you can't grant all of their requests. Nice, happy mother-of-the bride's do exist and will thank - and even tip! - you for helping them out. There are reasonable people out there still who will apologize for getting upset about something, and leave saying that you've made their awful stay into a great one.

I've learned that good co-workers can make all the difference. When our former manager was still around and making life miserable and I struggled to say that I liked my job, because most days I really didn't, I was still able to say with complete honesty that I love the people I work with. I've learned that social life can be a challenge when you never know what your schedule will be like from one week to the next and you work goofy hours that are different from anyone else, but getting to work with your friends helps to make up for that. I've learned that finding people you want to hang out with outside of work is awesome, and having people that I can comfortably be myself around is the best thing ever.

I've learned that your job is what you make of it, and you can choose to focus on the bad days and the negative encounters or you can decide to crack a joke, give a real smile to the people who come up to you and focus on the ones who smile back. I've learned that there's an awesome reddit board filled with stories from people who have the same guests and experiences as me, and it's quite fantastic. I've learned that sometimes your work can throw a ton of lemons at you, but if you take a few extra minutes you can get some fantastic lemonade out of it.

A Crash Course in Palestine

Working in a large hotel with meeting and event space is proving to have an educational aspect that I did not expect. We of course have our weddings, business meetings, and educational conventions. Those have proven to be interesting, but nothing quite like the group we had over the weekend of the 4th of July.

Our entire hotel - every guest room, and every inch of meeting space - was booked by a single convention, something you don't see everyday.  We're used to being sold out, of course, but being sold out with random guests who are not connected and being sold out with a single group of close to 1,000 people who all have the same schedule are two very different things. 

This group was essentially a giant family reunion.  Each member of this federation is directly from, or has a parent or a grandparent from, a single town in Palestine.  In the years since they relocated to America, they have all kept in touch and gotten together for a weekend during the summer for 57 years.  To me, that is pretty amazing that there are that many people, from the same town, all related in someway that have consistently kept in touch for over half a century.

Prior to this weekend, I honestly didn't know anything about Palestine.  I thought it might be a country, officially, but I was not completely sure.  I assumed they were primarily Muslim, but again I wasn't sure.  We had been preparing for this group for a long time, so I took the opportunity to do some research and learn more about this culture.

I still don't know very much, but I did learn that Palestine is loosely considered to be an independent country by some, and a region of Israel by others.  Currently the majority are Muslim with a minor Christian population, but historically the population was much larger.  Since the 1940s, however, large amounts of Palestinians - many of them Christian - have fled to other countries as a result of persecutions and attacks by Israel; the group staying at the hotel was made up of those Christians who left Palestine during and since that time.  During their stay, I had the opportunity to see parts of a performance by an ethnic dance troupe which was fascinating to watch in the traditional Palestinian garb with large agricultural influences. They set up large trees in the lobby that were meant to represent the olive and almond trees, both important in Palestinian agriculture and symbolism as I was told. As far as I could tell, every guest could speak Arabic, even the younger generations.  You could tell they loved and were very proud of their heritage.

From a hotel standpoint, it was definitely a different kind of weekend.  The day they all checked in was nuts, and then the next two days were quiet in a busy way as we didn't have any guests to check in or out, and fell into the role of a concierge desk instead.  The day they all left was especially crazy... of course there were hiccups along the way, but overall the group coordinator told us that everyone loved their stay here and were very happy.  And that, after all, is our main goal.

So that was my unexpected educational weekend.  It just goes to show you never know who will walk through your front door.

Settling In

At the same time that I finished week three of my very first full-time job, I also finished living on my own for three weeks while I house sat for family friends of my parents. It's been a busy couple of weeks, and gone a long way in disrupting my normal blogging flow.  But the waves seem to be calming a bit, and there are hopes of more frequent posting in the near future.

The new job has been going very well.  It has been absolutely fascinating to go from a small, 112 room hotel that served only breakfast, to a resort with nearly 400 rooms, thousands of square feet of meeting and event space, four different restaurants, room service, more departments than I know what do with and a golf course.

Coming from a small hotel where I was the front desk, housekeeping, maintenance and everything else after 6pm when everyone left, it has been a strange experience being... just the front desk. When a guest wants a toothbrush or new linens, I just page housekeeping and they take care of it, there is overnight houskeeping as well.  If someone gets locked out, I can call security because we actually have security.  No more unclogging toilets because that's what engineering is there 24/7 for!  All I have to do now is check guests in and out and help resolve issues at the front desk, and then answer phone calls when I'm back working in the PBX room because that's right - we have a PBX room where all the phone calls go and the Front Desk gets only the calls that are directly for them.

Working in a large hotel is proving to be very interesting, and I am enjoying it very much so far.  Of course, not everything is perfect, and there are definitely management issues that need to be worked out, but I love all of my co-workers, and I am excited to be a part of this new team.  It does make me feel very grown up... working at least 40 hours a week, getting paid well, having the opportunity for insurance and vacation time down the road, dressing up every day in a blazer and dress pants as part of my uniform.

I do miss my old job at times, and the people I worked with there.  But over all, I am excited to be venturing into this new stage in my life and getting one step closer to the goals and dreams that I have for my career.

You Don't Know It's There Until It's Not

It's the little things, the things we don't even pay attention to half the time, that make the difference.  The things we don't notice that  play a big role in our decision making process and the forming of our personal preference.  This (absolutely hilarious) story from Eli's bog about  bad customer service inspired me to write a post about some of my experiences with good customer service.  (Also, if you don't follow Eli's blog already - what on earth is your problem?  It's the best blog out there.  Twice up the barrel, once down the side.)

Anyhow.

Customer service isn't really a thing that you notice, not unless it's really bad, or above and beyond the call of duty.  I've always been the person who tries hard to care about the people providing me service... treating waiters and waitresses like they are human, being polite and friendly and patient, smiling at the person on the other side of the register and sincerely asking them how their day is.  They have a tough job, and I know what a smile can do to make someone's day a thousand times better.  I've made an effort to pay attention to the people, but never really thought that much about the actual service until this semester.

Last semester, I took a class in customer service, and it was so much fun.  I have an awesome job at my hotel with management that is very focused not only on providing excellent customer service to our guests, but giving good service to us, the employees, as well.  I would go into class and learn things, then go to work and get to see those same lessons in action. Since then, I have started to pay attention more.... and when you pay attention, it is interesting to see the things you otherwise would take for granted.

Most of the people employed in customer service are there just do their job, it's not bad, it's nothing extraordinary, it meets a need and that's that.   And that's perfectly fine because, really, that's the definition of good customer service - service that works so well that you don't even notice it happening.

I've wondered if maybe that is the reason why the hospitality industry is one of those "Surprise!" jobs, as one person put it.  The hospitality world is every where - every time you go out to eat, stay at a hotel, get on a plane, visit a conference, a meeting, a convention or attend a party, that is hospitality.  You can't have the hospitality industry without customer service, because customer service is the hospitality industry.  It's everywhere, but it it's one of those majors and career paths that you don't really think about until you run into it and go "Oh, I didn't even know this was a thing!"  The hospitality industry is like customer service... when it's good, you don't even realize it's there.

Maybe People Aren't That Bad After All

I am still more or less in the "honeymoon" stage of my job - as in, I don't hate humanity yet... well...  some of the time. There's been days.  I've heard that working in Hospitality really makes you hate people, and I can believe it.  I could tell you about some guests that we've had... yeah.  I don't completely hate humanity yet, but I'm well on my way.

To be fair though, the majority of our guests are really awesome people.  They are friendly, kind, easy to please.  The ones who come back for multiple visits get to know us, and it's always a pleasure to look up and see a familiar face walking through the doors.  We've made some good friends from our guests, and it's usually these guests that remind us that warm, wonderful human beings aren't mythical creatures after all.

My example for you today...

Last night, one of our frequent guests checked back in for his last visit before Christmas.  As I was getting the keys for his room, he pulled out a small stack of envelopes and handed them to me, asking if I would mind giving them to our sales manager and assistant general manager, and the staff.  And then he handed me my own envelope and one for the girl that I had been working with earlier that night.

Inside, I found a $10 gift card to Starbucks and just the sweetest note.  It said:

Thank you for your warm and inviting welcome each week to my second home for the past 6 months.  You have truly made these trips more enjoyable. You and others on this staff are one of the only things I look forward to when travelling here each week. Keep flashing me that beautiful smile and I will be sure to continue having wonderful stays. Thank you very much.  Wishing you a warm and Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from my house to yours.

It's guests like that who make dealing with the problem guests all worth it, and really make me love my job.

Maybe people aren't that bad after all. =]

Confessions of a GSA/Hospitality Student: An Inauguration

I'm in my second year as a double major in Hospitality Management and Meeting and Special Events at a junior college, and should be graduating next December.  Yay!  For six months now, I've been working as a Guest Service Agent, GSA at an awesome hotel and let me tell you, both things have been an adventure!

So consider this a trial run of an ongoing, sporadic series I'm thinking of starting up.  The hospitality industry is full of people and stories and adventures, and I'm thinking that I'll have a lot of things to share with you.  Not a single day is ever the same, and you can never predict what is going to happen - either in the workplace, or in my classroom!

Does this sound like something you, my dear readers, would be interested in?  If you have any questions, and curiosity about the world of hospitality feel free to ask me and I'll do my best to give you a blog post answering your questions.

While this is meant to be an inaugural post for my series, I feel like I should share at least something with you... so... my first confession.

Being a Hospitality major isn't a life long dream I've had, or even something I thought about doing prior to starting school.  After I had to leave my first college because of financial issues, I was pretty much done with school, and done with figuring out what I wanted to do with my life.  My parents let me flounder around for about a year and before they started pushing me to do something other than the little dead end part time job I had.

I resisted for a while, but the idea of going back to school grew on me and then it was two weeks before the start of the fall semester at my junior college when I found myself scurrying to apply and sign up for classes.

I needed to figure out what the heck I was going to be even studying, and none of the areas that I could think of off the top of my head were very appealing.  So I went to the junior college website and scrolled through their list of majors.  The one that struck my eye was the Hospitality Management and Meeting and Special Events Majors.  Hmm.... Meeting and Special Events sounded like it could be fun.  I checked out the required classes and liked what I saw, so I thought "Why not? Sounds more interesting than anything else I've checked out."  So I did. And I fell in love.

And that, dear readers, is how I became a Hospitality Student.