There is a subtle difference between hotel management and hospitality management. Hotel management is all about hotels, including branded, starred, small hotels, lodges, resorts, etc. On the other hand, hospitality management has an immense scope covering malls, starred hotels, humble lodging, and entertainment.
What opportunities does a degree in hospitality management provide?
A degree in hospitality management from a reputed institution does open the industry doors, especially if you have the skills to manage several roles. Here are the kinds of jobs that pay well in the hospitality management industry.
- Facility/ Hotel General Manager
Their daily activities range from:
- Managing and supervising housekeeping, front desk staff, and so on.
- Working with suppliers to ensure a lean and mean inventory flow.
- Implement procedures related to financial efficiency, budgeting, payroll, expenses, and trend forecasting.
The salaries vary from $79,600 to $146,000 in the US.
- Operations and Property Manager
The manager’s responsibilities could include:
- Generating new business opportunities and group travel leads.
- Cater to daily management issues and property acquisitions.
- Ensure guest satisfaction by maintaining and improving high service levels.
The salaries for this job are not mean either and can range from $88,506 to $117,297, depending on the responsibilities and experience.
- Restaurant Manager
The daily chores in this job may include:
- Food-quality standards and safety maintenance.
- Supply ordering for use by customers and employees, as well as optimal inventory management of restaurant supplies.
- Relationship management with services vendors and stock suppliers.
- Research new opportunities and services.
The salaries here could range from $45,098 to $66,100.
What traits do hospitality managers need?
Most hospitality and hotel managers need to be on call day or night as the hospitality industry and hotels have non-stop services. Also, many customers are hard to please, and therefore, this job requires a lot of thinking on your feet.
Certain traits are a must for you to succeed in the hospitality industry, such as:
Motivation: You need to stay motivated and also be a great motivator for others. Hospitality management puts the customer first and makes them feel like kings or special, which requires a team effort. Moving from an empathetic front desk to room and concierge services, you need to lead your team to create a seamless and outstanding experience. The job will need motivation, leadership, and inspiration from you.
Communication: Polish your communication skills as you will need to stay focused on communicating with the guests and your team. When things go wrong for the customer, you at the firing end will pick up the tab for being unable to provide stellar services.
Decisiveness: This business is all about being decisive and thinking on your feet. A great hospitality manager can make fast decisions, is innovative, and attentive and can avert problems before they occur. In this line of work, problem resolution is about stepping in responsibly, making the customer feel attended to, and ensuring your team escalates issues rapidly for solutions by offering amazing discounts on services, upgrade packages, free services, etc.
How to become a professional in hospitality management?
Follow these three steps to place your career on a solid foundation on your path to becoming a successful hospitality management professional with a competitive resume and skills that stand head-over-shoulders compared to others.
- Get the right certifications and a hospitality degree:
Getting the “right” certification or a reputed degree from a reliable institution always places you ahead of the competitive line. If you already are in the industry, work towards the best affordable and available certifications in the online mode. A reputed degree can enhance your skills in niche areas of specialization, and must be affordable for you. It must provide you with the opportunity to earn and learn simultaneously.
- Enhance your skills through doing:
Skill development can only be enhanced through practice and more practice. While getting your education, ensure the degree you choose allows you plenty of scope for project work, assignments, quizzes, etc. You can also improve tremendously by listening to podcasts on interview trends, industry trends and pay packets, the successful transition of people in the hospitality management sector, etc. Polish your listening and customer handling skills treating both external and internal customers of your organization with a smile and excellent service.
Consider doing the best digital marketing MBA programs available to you, so you do not learn by rote. Rather your course, be it a degree or certificate course, should stress addressing your skills and practical do-it-yourself methods.
- Use digital marketing, networking, and social media to your advantage:
Explore targeted brands while studying to let them know you are interested in hospitality management. Use digital marketing tools, social media connection trees, and keep your networking channels like LinkedIn, etc., open! Remember, you can network from home at your own time and pace scouring those lucrative and learning opportunities. You should also include participating in roundtables, virtual conferences, career fairs, etc., to get better and train your skillset.
Essential tips:
Want to impress the hospitality management hiring managers at job interviews or improve your career standing? Follow these tips:
- Work on knowing every department’s nitty-gritty issues and resolutions. For example, if you are in hotel management, study event management, catering, front-desk management, etc., improve your career prospects.
- In these pandemic times, ensure you abide by the country’s restrictions, Tourism Department, and World Health Organization’s (WHO) guidelines.
- Be proactive in familiarizing yourself with the latest cutting-edge BI or business intelligence, cloud services, digital marketing, and hospitality management software to improve your efficiency on the job.
- Put together new cross-department templates covering the daily task list for every department you are responsible for. This will help standardize the work management and flow and help train the new recruits much faster.
- Hone your listening skills and ensure you collect guest feedback for further improvement measures and elevating customer experiences. Perhaps you can incentivize the offline feedback cards placed strategically or monitor the social mentions on your website.
The bottom line:
Now that you know more about hospitality management and hotel management, do you still want to pursue this field as a career? Enroll in Great Learning’s master’s degree in business administration to get specific career advantages from the best digital marketing MBA programs. The courses provide fast-tracked courses, constant mentorship, placement drives, career fairs, plenty of skill-polishing projects under the tutelage of industry-drawn instructors, weekend and online course facilities, and tie-ups with the best industries and colleges. Doing courses in business management puts you in the driver’s seat to further your career in the hospitality management segment.
Reference:
https://www.greatlearning.in/mba-data-science-digital-marketing-jain
https://blog.capterra.com/what-is-hospitality-management-and-is-it-the-career-for-you/
https://www.cvent.com/en/blog/hospitality/what-is-hospitality-management
Thomas Jackson is a dynamic and talented content writer at WonderWorldSpace.com, renowned for his engaging and informative articles. Beyond his professional pursuits in writing, Jack is also known for his deep passion for fitness, which not only shapes his lifestyle but also influences his work.