Unit 4 Conceptual Planning
UNIT
4
CONCEPTUAL PLANNING
MEANING OF CONCEPTUAL PLANNING
Something is
conceptual when it deals primarily with abstract or original thoughts. A
conceptual plan is one in an early stage. The concept, or idea, behind it is
that everyday objects become art when looked at outside of their uses. A
conceptual plan is a scaled drawing to help provide a concept of what will fit
on the site. It provides a starting point to help begin discussion. You may
provide to future consultants (engineers, landscape architects) as a base point
with community or elected officials. The Conceptual Plan — also known as the
Preliminary or Layout Plan — begins with an initial consultation.
THE NEW EXECUTIVE HOUSEKEEPER
Being
appointed executive housekeeper of an on-going operation has its challenges.
After a brief introduction and orientation, the new manager would normally be expected
to improve upon and bring about changes in operations related to the management
potential for which he or she might have been selected. An executive housekeeper
who has had this experience might comment about how trying the task of bringing
about change can be and how much easier it would have been if the operation could
be started over. There is considerable truth in such a statement. Being
involved in a soon-to-open operation in which department planning has yet to be
undertaken gives a manager the opportunity to influence how a department will
be set up. Involvement in such an experience is both rewarding and enlightening
and, once experienced, can prepare managers to bring about changes in an on-going
operation systematically and efficiently. The important point to remember, as
stated by John Bozarth, is ‘‘Good results without planning is good luck, NOT
good management.’’ It is therefore essential that planning any operation,
change, system, organization, or procedure be allotted a proper portion of the
manager’s energies.
THE EXECUTIVE
HOUSEKEEPER’S POSITION WITHIN THE ORGANIZATION REPORTING FOR WORK
In the model
hotel that we present in this text, the executive housekeeper is in the
position of a department head. This position and level of responsibility is not
uncommon in most transient hotels or hospitals that range in size from 200 to
3000 rooms. However, some executive housekeepers are below the department head
level, whereas others may rank even higher. Many become executive committee
members (top management within the facility), and others reach corporate
executive levels. Many seek careers that develop along housekeeping lines, and
others choose to be executive housekeepers and oversee the entire maintenance
function of their hotels or health-care facilities. Still others see an
involvement in housekeeping as an entry into the hospitality or health-care field.
Regardless of position, all should have the freedom to communicate within
channels to every level of the enterprise. For all illustrative purposes in
this text, we presume that our newly assigned executive housekeeper will
operate from the department head level and will report to the hotel resident
manager.
Reporting for Work
Assume that
you are in the position of the newly assigned executive housekeeper of the
model hotel and have been told to report for work only six weeks before first opening.
It is necessary for you to set priorities for your first activities. Recognizing
that the housekeeping department consists of only one person (the executive housekeeper),
you readily see that planning, organizing, and staffing functions are of first
importance, and the efficient use of time is paramount. Not only is the
planning of people functions important, but the design of systems, the
establishment of procedures, the determination of supply and equipment needs, and
reporting and coordinating relationships must be considered. The executive housekeeper’s
experience usually begins by having the person to whom he or she will report (resident
manager) introduce him or her to other members of the hotel staff who have been
hired. These people are usually located in temporary hotel quarters such as a
nearby office building. It is at this time that the executive housekeeper will most
likely be given the tentative chart of hotel organization, showing the positions
of principal assistants to department heads. Figure 2.2 is an example of
a hotel organization chart for our model hotel, showing the executive
housekeeper position as that of department head in middle management.
Note the positions of the executive committee members
at the top of the chart; this is the policymaking body of the hotel organization.
Pay special attention to the positions of chief engineer and human resources director,
which appear to be above the department heads and below the other members of
the executive committee. The incumbents of these two positions are actually
department heads, but by virtue of the fact that their staff functions cross
all departments to which they will provide a staff service, they are (ex
officio) members of the executive committee. They are, in fact, middle managers
with department head status. The executive housekeeper is on equal rank with the
front office manager, with both reporting to the resident manager. The executive
housekeeper will have an assistant, tentatively titled housekeeping manager. In
addition, operation of the property’s laundry will be placed under the direction
of the executive housekeeper, requiring another junior manager, the laundry
manager, to report to the executive housekeeper. Considering that we have a new
property under construction that has not yet begun hotel operations, it is
important to note the probable advance time when different members of the hotel
organization may have reported. The director of sales and marketing is usually the
first major manager on the site, being there since groundbreaking because
advanced group room sales were begun at that time. The next major manager on
site would probably be the chief engineer. This manager reports about the time
the new building’s foundation is completed and the first electrical and plumbing
development has started. The chief engineer must monitor the birth of the
mechanical systems, because this person will be expected to know these systems
with great thoroughness. Sometimes the chief engineer will work as an assistant
to the construction manager until construction is near completion. The third
manager to report will probably be the general manager (six months before
opening), followed by the resident manager and director of food and beverage (four
months before opening), and the rest of the department heads (between six and
eight weeks before opening). Junior management will report about four weeks
before opening. The significance of knowing who reports when becomes evident
when we realize that the executive housekeeper must learn in six weeks what
several others have been exposed to for a far greater time. For example, the
executive housekeeper has to learn about available supply, storage, and
security spaces before distribution of these spaces is undertaken to make sure that
the housekeeping department is not slighted in the assignment of such space. Reporting
relationships also are significant. Coordination between housekeeping and front
office personnel requires the respect and understanding of each of the department
managers for the others’ responsibilities. In addition, the executive
housekeeper will have many occasions to relate to other members of the total
hotel organization. It is therefore important to know and become known to each
of these managers, and develop a respect and understanding for each of them and
for their functions. Others should in turn develop an understanding and respect
for the functions of the housekeeping department and its significance in the
total operation. Becoming acquainted with the new surroundings includes
obtaining a set of working architectural drawings of the room’s portion of the
hotel. Such drawings will allow the executive housekeeper to study the physical
layout of the facility and will provide the basis for determining the scope of
involvement and delineation of responsibilities of the various managers’ areas.
In addition, working drawings will assist the executive housekeeper when
on-site inspections are begun Once the
executive housekeeper has an understanding of who is who in the organization,
has a knowledge of how long each person has been on site, how knowledgeable certain
managers are and how helpful they can be; has met all the members of the
management team thus far assembled, and has a copy of the working architect’s drawings
of the rooms department and related areas, he or she is ready to be shown the
temporary working area in which departmental planning may begin.
FIGURE 2.2 A hotel organization chart that might be
presented to the executive housekeeper of our model hotel six weeks before
opening.
EARLY PRIORITY ACTIVITIES
Given the
various activities that make up the functions of planning, organizing, and
staffing, there will be a mixture of activities that take place at the same
time. Whereas there is an obvious need to determine what is to be done and how
to go about doing it, there is an equal and urgent need to define the need for,
establish the requisite qualifications of, and recruit the housekeeper’s two
principal assistants as soon as possible—the housekeeping manager and the
laundry manager. Until these two managers are present, the entire planning,
organizing, and staffing function rests on the shoulders of the executive
housekeeper. Thus, we see the immediate need to specify the qualifications of
these two managers to the personnel director in order that advertisements may
be placed and recruitment begun. Recruitment is an immediate concern and will
remain a part of the daily concern of the executive housekeeper until these
people are hired, usually within ten days to two weeks.
i.
Recruitment
ii.
Developing a division of work document
iii.
Establish a clean as you go policy
iv.
Development of area responsibility plan
v.
Development of the Housekeeping department organization
Division Of Work Document
The work that
must actually be accomplished for the entire property needs to be recognized
and identified as soon as possible. The executive housekeeper should make
regular daily tours of the property under construction and, as soon as
possible, draw up what is known as the Division of Work Document. This document
is recognition of what will be required in cleaning the property; all
departments must become aware of this. The Division of
Work Document should include, but not necessarily be limited to, the care and
maintenance of the following:
Rooms Department: Includes
guestrooms, room corridors, elevators, elevator landings, stairwells, storage
areas
Public Areas: Associated with
the sale of guestrooms; the front desk, main entrance, public thoroughfares,
public restrooms, storage areas, and similar locations
Recreation Areas: Indoor and
outdoor pools, health clubs, saunas, game rooms, public restrooms, storage
areas
Restaurants: Dining areas
and service areas
Cocktail Lounges: Bar area,
service areas, liquor storage areas
Meeting Rooms: Each by name,
indicating the number of square feet in service and storage areas
Banquet and Ballrooms: Each by name,
indicating the number of square feet in service and storage areas.
Kitchen Areas: Main kitchen,
banquet kitchens, salad preparation areas, refrigerators, freezers, holding
boxes, food storerooms
Employee Areas: Includes locker
rooms, employee restrooms, employee cafeteria
Offices: All offices,
such as sales, reservations, and executive offices, that the public might be
expected to frequent.
Maintenance Shops: Main
engineering work area; TV workshops; electrical, plumbing, refrigeration, and
paint shops.
Building Exterior
Landscaping
Lighting
Laundry
Other
Once it is
completed, the executive housekeeper should present the Division of Work
Document to the executive committee for review, listing the areas by name,
noting anything unusual about expected cleaning requirements, and offering a
recommendation as to who should be responsible for cleaning and maintaining each
area. Whereas most executive housekeepers are involved only in the guestroom portion
of the hotel and relate public areas, it is not unusual to be assigned the responsibility
for nightly cleaning of kitchens, after-event
ballroom
cleaning, swimming pool maintenance and similar tasks. There is essentially
nothing wrong with inheriting such responsibilities provided sufficient
fund and staff is allocated to compensate for the additional workload. Many
times trade-offs are reasonable, such as the food and beverage department
maintaining the employees’ cafeteria at no cost to other departments, and the
housekeeping departments maintaining all public restrooms regardless of where
they are. However, if the housekeeping department is expected to clean an area
foreign to the rooms department, such as kitchens, banquet space, restaurants,
or cocktail lounges, then budgetary compensation and personnel must be provided
to the housekeeping department and charged to the department receiving the
service. It is always proper that costs be levied against the revenue generated
in each of the various departments.
A
Recommendation for Clean-as-You-Go: It might seem
most efficient to place all cleaning responsibilities under one manager for
control, but employees are inclined to be more careful and make less mess if
they are required to clean up after themselves. Thus, departments charged with
cleaning their own facilities create their own cost category for cleaning
expense, which is to be charged against revenue generated rather than to
another department. At any rate, if the housekeeping department is to be
responsible for cleaning any area aside from the actual rooms department, monetary
and personnel compensation is in order.
Area Responsibility Plan
Once the
Division of Work Document has been submitted to the executive committee for
review, and the executive housekeeper has made recommendations to the resident
manager (member of the executive committee), the Area Responsibility Plan can be drawn up by the executive committee.
This plan is an assignment of responsibility of the various areas mentioned in
the Division of Work Document and shows various cleaning area boundaries on a copy
of a floor plan blueprint. Such boundary lines are important to ensure that no space
is left unassigned and that no overlaps in cleaning responsibilities occur. An
equitable Area Responsibility Plan is usually the result of the advance thinking
and planning by an experienced executive housekeeper who has made multiple
tours of the property when preparing the Division of Work Document. The plan
should be forthcoming from the executive committee within the first week of the
housekeeper’s tenure.
Continuous Property Tours
An important
reason for regular and frequent tours of the property before opening is to
learn the various locations of storerooms and service areas. There is little question
regarding the main linen room, the laundry, and major storage areas. However,
most hotels have small storage or service areas located in secluded places throughout
the facility. It is important that the executive housekeeper note these
out-of-the-way areas in order that enlightened negotiations for their use can
take place when the time comes. For example, the executive housekeeper will
need satellite (floor) linen rooms, and the chief engineer will need storage
areas and TV repair space. Joint tours with the chief engineer and other department
heads are highly recommended so all of those involved can reason with one
another and reach an equitable agreement about the use of such space.
Housekeeping Department Organization
The next task of
the executive housekeeper is to develop the housekeeping department organization. Let us assume that the Area
Responsibility Plan indicates that the housekeeping department personnel will
be responsible for cleaning the rooms and associated public facilities areas,
the offices, the recreation facilities, and all public restrooms. Figure 2.3
sets forth an organization chart that indicates the assignment of such responsibility.
Note that a portion of the organization devoted to cleaning rooms is not yet firm and may undergo considerable change before the final departmental organization is arrived at. However, assistant managers are clearly in place, and the task of organizing the laundry will be delegated to the laundry manager as soon as he or she is selected. The first-line hourly supervisory structure provides for evening operations (3:30 p.m.to midnight), linen room operations (communication central), public area and utility personnel supervision, and supervision of recreation areas (two swimming pools, whirlpool, game room, sauna, and associated public restrooms). The actual size of the largest part of the organization (that which is associated with pure guestroom cleaning and servicing) is accommodated by applying a technique known as zero-base budgeting. Zero-base budgeting refers to worker use that takes into account actual occupancy on a specific day or for a specified period of time. Worker staffing and eventual scheduling are limited on a daily basis to the service of that specified occupancy and no more
HOUSE BREAKOUT PLAN
The next major planning
step that the executive housekeeper must undertake is the development of the House Breakout Plan. In order to ensure
maximum familiarity with the facility, it is highly recommended that the
executive housekeeper personally develop this pictorial representation of every
guestroom as it is located within the hotel. This is done by making a line
drawing of the guestroom portion of the hotel, showing the relative positions
of guestrooms, corridors, service areas, and other areas significant to
guestroom cleaning. Figures 2.4 through 2.5 are examples of such drawings for
our model hotel.
FIGURE 2.4
Floor
plan layout of the model hotel; 94 first-floor rooms.
FIGURE 2.5
Floor plan layout of the model
hotel; 114 second-floor rooms.
FIGURE 2.6 Floor plan layout of the model hotel; 112 third-floor rooms.
FIGURE 2.7 Floor plan layout of the model
hotel; 33fourth-floor rooms.
Criteria For Workloads
As the House Breakout Plan is being created, certain
criteria must be established: specifically, the workload of room attendants.
The U.S. national average for rooms cleaned per day by one person ranges from
14 to 16 rooms, but the actual number may range from 13 rooms per day (8-hour
shift) to a high of 20 rooms per day, depending upon the type and nature of
hotel activity. In resort hotels with many metal surfaces to polish, mirrors to
clean, and multiple-occupancy guests who sleep in late, the workload of a room
attendant may be only 13 rooms per day. In transient operations of
standard-size rooms, where room occupancy consists primarily of business people
(usually single occupancy) who arise and vacate early each day, room attendants
can clean as many as 18 rooms per day—and clean them well if properly equipped
and trained for efficient operation. (It is not a matter of working harder,
just smarter.) However, recent trends in guest room design, including more pillows
on beds, triple sheeting, duvet covers, thicker towels, and more guest
amenities have added to the workload of the guestroom attendant (GRA). If the hotel has not planned out how
these new time-consuming activities should be handled (working smarter), they should
expect their GRA room productivity levels to diminish. In our model hotel,
experience dictates that approximately 18 rooms per day would not be
unreasonable, taking into account special areas of the hotel in which cleaning
loads might be dropped to 17 rooms per day. A recent trend in some
forward-thinking hotels is to assign room attendants ‘‘points.’’ These points
represent a standard daily workload. Then each room is evaluated and receives a
point assignment by the executive housekeeper. Larger rooms, rooms with kitchens,
and other rooms with special cleaning concerns, have more points assigned to
them. Thus, some rooms may be equivalent to 112 or even 212 standard rooms. The
purpose of this approach is to ensure that individual workloads are comparable.
Whether rooms or points are used to set workload criteria, management must
remain flexible. When the condition of a room left by a guest is beyond the norm,
this must also be factored into a room attendant’s workload for the day. It
seems that every time the union contract for room attendants expires, this
author receives a call from representatives of management asking for a study showing
that room attendants can clean more rooms than they are presently required to
do. At the same time, the union circulates press releases arguing that room attendants
are overworked and underpaid. Typically, slight concessions are won by one side
or the other and no real improvements to productivity and working conditions
are made. Would it not be in both parties’ interests if they concentrated on
how to make the occupation of cleaning safer, healthier, and less stressful to
the workers? This focus would not only improve productivity, but would also
help to improve worker satisfaction.
Room Sections And House Divisions
Based on the
workload criteria, the House Breakout Plan can now show the facility divided
into room sections. A room section is
a group of 13 to 20 guestrooms, reasonably contiguous to each other, that may
normally be cleaned and serviced by one person in one 8-hour shift. The room
section will normally be assigned a number and, for purposes of illustration,
will be cleaned by the GRA. In order for the room sections to be grouped into logical
units for supervisory and control needs, house divisions will be used. A house division is a group of four to
six room sections with associated and/or specified corridors, elevators,
stairwells, service areas, and storage areas. It may be assigned a colour or letter
designation and placed under the charge of a supervisor. For demonstration
purposes with our model hotel, house divisions will be color-coded and placed under
a supervisor known as a senior GRA or
supervisor.
FIGURE
2.8 House Breakout Plan of the model hotel; first floor.
FIGURE 2.9
House Breakout Plan of the model
hotel; second floor.
E =
Electrical Switch Room
GL =
Guest Laundry
S =
Storage
V =
Vending
X =
Elevator
FIGURE 2.10
House Breakout Plan of the model
hotel; third floor.
We can use the pictorial drawings in Figures 2.4– 2.7 to determine
the room sections and house divisions in the model hotel. We have the
18-room-per-day criteria and 353 rooms that must be cleaned under 100 percent occupancy
conditions. If we divide 353 rooms by 18 rooms per day, we get 19.6 room
sections. Because a partial section is not practical or economical, we divide
the house into 20 sections of either 17 or 18 rooms each. In addition, five
GRAs will form a house division for supervisory and control purposes. The House
Breakout Plan may now be completed by considering the size of sections,
assembly of house divisions, location of contiguous rooms, position of
elevators, and transportation from room to room.
Figure 2.8 shows how the first floor of the model hotel in Figure
2.4 has been divided into room sections 1 to 5, of 18 rooms each. In addition,
the rooms of entire first floor of the model hotel have been combined to form
the red division, which contains a total of 90 rooms for supervision and
control by the senior housekeeper. Note the four excess rooms on the first
floor (rooms 1023, 1025, 4027, and 1029). At 100 percent occupancy, these rooms
are not a part of the red division but will be cleaned by a section housekeeper
from the second floor, who will pick up these rooms as part of another section.
Figures 2.9, 2.10, and 2.11 show the same planning procedure used in Figure 2.8
for Figures 2.5, 2.6, and 2.7, respectively.
Note that the number of rooms on the second and
third floors is much greater than that on the first floor. This requires
consideration when forming the remaining house divisions. Figures 2.9, 2.10,
and 2.11 show the creation of the yellow division on the second floor (composed
of sections 6 through 10 on the west end of the second floor), the brown
division on the third floor (composed of sections 11 through 15 on the west end
of the third floor), and the green division on the second, third, and fourth
floors on the east end of the building. Section 7 is completed by including the
four rooms on the first floor that are not a part of the red division. Note the
proximity of these rooms to section 7 (directly below and adjacent to an
elevator). The House Breakout Plan developed in this chapter is by no means the
only way the model hotel can be broken into logical work units. It does,
however, reflect an efficient method of division of the workload. This
particular technique also lends itself to a form of work scheduling
STAFFING
CONSIDERATIONS
Most hotel
housekeeping departments will hire and individually schedule section housekeepers
on an as-needed basis depending on occupancy. Whereas union operations may
require the guarantee of a 40-hour workweek for regular employees, most
union houses have few such regular employees. Union operations have
considerably more people, referred to as steady extras, which can be
called upon on an as-needed basis (when occupancy exceeds 25 to 40 percent). No
union operations guarantee a 40-hour workweek but will staff in such a way
(based on expected occupancy) so as to provide between 35 and 40 hours of work
each week for their regular employees. Recognizing that labour costs within a
housekeeping department are the highest recurring costs in a room’s department budget,
it is highly inefficient to guarantee a set number of regular employees 40
hours when occupancy is low. For this reason a practical number of employees
will be hired based on expected occupancy for a given period of time. Section
housekeepers are scheduled on an individual but rotating basis to ensure a fair
and equal spread of the available hours. Sometimes the size of the hotel might
warrant the scheduling of several hundred such employees on a daily basis. Such
scheduling techniques are time-consuming and tedious. As a result, we will use
a different scheduling concept that has been tested and proven to have many
advantages over individual housekeeper scheduling.
TEAM CONCEPT IN STAFFING
Rather than
scheduling housekeepers on an individual basis, housekeeping teams may be
formed. A housekeeping team consists of one supervisor (senior GRA) who is in
charge and one section GRA for each section within a division. Because a house
division includes the cleaning and care of corridors, stairwells, elevators,
and designated service areas, as well as associated guestrooms, the additional
position of section housekeeping aide is required on a team. This position may be
filled by any person capable of performing the work set forth in the job
description. Teams consisting of one senior GRA, five guestroom attendants
(GRAs), and one housekeeping aide can now be formed, identified by a
corresponding colour designation, and assigned to corresponding house divisions
(for instance, red team to the red division; yellow team to the yellow division).
Recall that the team system of organization thus far deals only with the
subject of staffing. The actual day-to-day scheduling within teams will be
based on actual occupancy.
SWING TEAMS
The assignment of regular teams to house divisions for staffing purposes satisfies the need for division coverage, but it becomes obvious that the hotel operating on a seven-days-per-week basis will require additional personnel to work when regular teams have days off. To accommodate days off, swing teams may be formed. Consider the requirement that no employee may work more than a 40-hour week without the provision of overtime. It becomes prudent to assume that a 40-hour week consisting of five regular 8-hour days will be the standard and that the sixth and seventh day of work in a house division must be accomplished by using additional employees. Recall that the housekeeping department in the model situation will also operate a laundry. The laundry has about the same staffing requirements and will face the same situation of a seven-day operation, with employees requiring two days off each week. By combining the total workforce of the GRAs and laundry attendants (20 GRAs, 5 laundry attendants, supervisor, and aides for each group), a relief situation can be developed as follows:
20
GRAs + 5 laundry attendants = 25 employees
25
employee’s × 7 days/week
requires
175 man-days of effort
175
men 1 days/5 maximum numbers of days allowed
=
35 employees needed
This same formula can be applied to supervisors and section housekeeping aides. The original 25 employees will require an additional 10 employees to relieve them if a five-day workweek is to be adhered to. By forming two extra teams from the 10 extra employees, with each team having a supervisor and a housekeeping aide, a staffing rationale may be created as follows:
Regular Assigned Employees Relief
Red team Swing
team 1 relieves two days per week
Yellow team Swing
team 1 relieves two days per week
Brown team Swing
team 2 relieves two days per week
Green team Swing
team 2 relieves two days per week
Laundry team Each
swing team relieves in the laundry one day per week
As you can see, not only are the four regular teams and the laundry staff now regulated to five days each week for staffing purposes, each swing team is also staffed for a five-day week. It should be remembered that the development of these criteria pertains to staffing only.
THE STAFFING GUIDE
A major phase of
human resources planning may now be completed by formulation of the Department
Staffing Guide. Table 2.1 sets forth a staffing guide showing each and every
position that must be filled within the department, using the team concept of
staffing.
The Department Staffing Guide provides for personal and numerical identification of every person who must be hired for the department. A copy may be given to the human resources department and the resident manager for review and critique of staffing plans. Note that space is provided for writing in the employees’ names opposite the position numbers. When vacancies occur, they will occur by position numbers and may be readily identified. Should projected occupancy be less than 90 percent for the upcoming year, certain established positions may be left unfilled until such time as increased occupancy is forecast.
Comments
Post a Comment