Tag Archive for: Learning

Hospitality Taught me Humility

Hospitality Taught me Humility

This story is about how hospitality taught me humility.

Over the years, I have been part of, or supported owners and managers of, hotels, resorts, restaurants, tourism businesses, and hospitality platforms as they succeeded, struggled, recovered, and sometimes failed.

One observation has remained remarkably consistent.

Hospitality assets rarely fail for lack of capital, systems, brands, concepts, technology, or effort.
More often, they under-perform because of a lack of alignment between managers and owners about who is responsible and accountable; in other words, or more likely, the fancy language you may recognise from a poster put on the wall of the cantina: “Governance”.

Governance.
This word sounds distant when things are going well, or you may not know the full picture.
But it becomes the subject of each and every discussion when expectations are not aligned.

Much of what I know today was not learned in classrooms.
It came from years of operational exposure, difficult environments, blood, sweat, tears, mistakes, recovery, responsibility, and accountability.

Responsibility and accountability are not social media buzzwords.
They require standing up for what you believe in and taking the blame when you are wrong.
Managing operational crises, safeguarding debt service, payroll, supplier commitments, ownership transitions, business recovery, and complex stakeholder environments taught me that performance problems rarely exist in isolation.

Revenue, operations, commercial strategy, cost structures, governance, leadership, and capital allocation are interconnected.
Believe me, I have seen my share, and I have learned the hard way.
As a professional.
And as a family man.
Standing up for what is right, also when you realise the failings of the other party as well as your own, is not an easy call to make.
It requires maturity.
And over time, maturity shapes character.
Which proves my point.

Failure in one phase of your professional life, or your business, can lead to maturity in the next.
Failure becomes valuable when approached with humility, accountability, and a willingness to learn from operational reality.
The real danger begins when employees or organisations become emotionally invested in defending decisions that no longer serve the business.
That is when facts become inconvenient.
That is when reporting becomes selective.
That is when accountability becomes blurred.
That is when capital starts funding hope rather than strategy.

Over time, I have developed three core management principles that continue to shape my thinking about how to responsibly run a business.

  1. Commercial performance does not operate in isolation.
  • Revenue is not the starting point, and must not be limited to revenue management, but start by asking what is the optimal use of the property (“Highest-and-Best-Use”, or in short: HBU).
  • Revenue is the consequence of a much larger system involving governance, capital allocation, product definition, market positioning, sales execution, organisational capability, and ultimately the guest experience.
  • Equally, the outcome of commercial performance should not be measured solely through operating indicators such as Average Daily Rate (ADR), Occupancy, RevPAR, or Gross Operating Profit (GOP).
    These metrics are important, but they are not the final objective.

The real question is whether the business is creating value:
value for guests, value for employees, value for owners, and value that can be clearly explained and demonstrated to shareholders, lenders, and other stakeholders.
Sustainable commercial performance is therefore not merely about generating revenue.
It is about strengthening the long-term value of the business, the asset, and ultimately the land upon which it stands.

  1. Portfolio growth requires differentiated strategies.

Governance frameworks can often be standardised.
Economic reality cannot.

  • What works for a luxury resort will not necessarily work for a mid-market city hotel.
  • What works for an owner-operated asset may fail completely in a multi-property platform.
  1. Organisational capability remains the critical link between strategy and execution.
  • Many performance challenges are not caused by a lack of capital, systems, brands, concepts, technology, or intent.
  • They are caused by inconsistent application, unclear accountability, and weak execution at both management and ownership level.

Strategy is rarely the problem. Execution usually is.
The compass I use to navigate these situations is governance.
Not governance as bureaucracy.
Rather, governance is the operating system of decision-making.
It creates clarity around decision rights, accountability, expectations, information flows, and risk.
Because organisations generally perform well when people understand who decides, who executes, who is accountable, and how decisions translate into action.

After more than twenty-five years in hospitality, I remain convinced that sustainable EBITDA growth is rarely the result of individual initiatives.
It is usually the result of alignment.
Alignment between ownership objectives, organisational capability, commercial strategy, operational execution, and capital allocation.
When those elements align, performance follows.
When they do not, no amount of effort can compensate indefinitely.

Thank you for reading my story.

This story is part of a series—”The Banana Republic Hotel and What It Taught Me About Myself”—in which I share lessons learned throughout my professional and personal journey and how those experiences have shaped my thinking and led me to develop my own principles.

If you enjoyed reading the story and have the appetite to read another one, you are invited to visit G&A’s website, in particular its INSIGHTS page, where you can find all stories.
Alternatively, click here to be taken to the final story.

I hope it has provided some food for thought, encouraged curiosity, and inspired you to keep learning.

Curiosity, humility, and continuous learning remain among the most valuable tools we possess.

Terminology for non-hoteliers

  • SOP: Standard Operating Procedure – a documented process describing how a task should be performed to ensure consistency, quality, and compliance.
  • KPIs: Key Performance Indicators – measurable indicators used to monitor performance and progress against objectives.
  • ADR: Average Daily Rate – the average room rate paid by guests.
  • RevPAR: Revenue per Available Room – a measure combining occupancy and room rate to assess hotel revenue performance.
  • Occupancy: The percentage of available rooms that are occupied.
  • DOF: Double Occupancy Factor – the average number of guests staying in each occupied room. A DOF of 1.0 means every occupied room has one guest; 2.0 means every occupied room has two guests.
  • AGC: Average Guest Check – the average amount spent by each guest in a restaurant, bar, or other food and beverage outlet.
  • CRS: Central Reservation System – the central booking system that manages a hotel’s room inventory, rates, and reservations across all sales channels.
  • PMS: Property Management System – the software used to manage reservations, guest accounts, and hotel operations.
  • OTA: Online Travel Agency – websites such as Booking.com or Expedia that sell hotel rooms on behalf of hotels.
  • GDS: Global Distribution System – a worldwide booking network used by travel agents and corporate travel departments to reserve hotel rooms, flights, and other travel services.
  • CRM: Customer Relationship Management – systems and processes used to manage guest relationships and marketing.
  • F&B: Food & Beverage Department – all restaurant, bar, banquet, room service, and catering operations within a hotel.
  • Half-Board: A hotel meal plan that includes breakfast and one additional meal each day, usually dinner. Drinks other than those specifically included are generally charged separately.
  • MICE: Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Events – the hotel business related to corporate meetings, conferences, exhibitions, and incentive travel.
  • ERP: Enterprise Resource Planning – an integrated software system that connects key business functions such as finance, procurement, inventory, human resources, sales, and reporting into a single platform.
  • USALI: Uniform System of Accounts for the Lodging Industry – the internationally recognised accounting standard used by hotels to measure and compare financial performance.
  • GOP: Gross Operating Profit – the operating profit generated by the hotel before management fees, rent, financing costs, depreciation, taxes, and other non-operating expenses.
  • EBITDA: Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation and Amortisation – a widely used measure of an organisation’s operating profitability.
  • COS: Cost of Sales – the direct cost of producing the goods sold, such as food, beverages, or merchandise, expressed as an amount or percentage of revenue.
  • FTE: Full-Time Equivalent – a standard measure of staffing that converts part-time and seasonal employees into the equivalent number of full-time employees.

About the Author

Raoul Gransier is a Senior International Adviser and owner-focused hotelier with more than 30 years of operational and advisory experience in hospitality, tourism, governance, and performance improvement.

Website

https://gransier.com

/by

The People Who Taught Me

The People Who Taught Me

This story is about gratitude.

The most valuable teachers are not always the most impressive.
Often, they are simply the people who leave us unable to think exactly as we did before we met them.

I carry many such people with me.
Not their titles. Not their positions.
Not their achievements.
But, their lessons.
And in the end, that may be the only part of any of us that truly survives.

When people speak about mentors, they usually describe a senior figure who intentionally guided their development.
My experience was different.
Most of my teachers never applied for the role.

Some never realised they were teaching me at all.

  • An Executive Chef taught me humility
  • A Dishwasher taught me respect
  • A General Manager taught me authenticity
  • An HR Director taught me that people and performance are not enemies
  • A COO taught me pace
  • A CEO taught me to first set direction
  • A Peer taught me the difference between competence and trust
  • Others taught lessons they never intended to teach

Some through generosity. Some through discipline.
Some through conflict. Some through disappointment.
Many through example. A few through warning.
What connects them is not whether I agreed with them.
What connects them is that something survived the encounter.
A lesson. An idea.
A perspective. A question.

The more mature I become, the less interested I am in judging people as successes or failures.
Most people are both.
Most people possess strengths and weaknesses.
Most people are struggling with challenges invisible to everyone else.
The same is true of organisations.
And certainly, true of myself.

Looking back, I realise my career was shaped less by formal education than by observation.
Watching people. Learning from people.
Admiring people. Occasionally arguing with people.
And sometimes discovering wisdom in places I did not expect to find it.

The people who taught me rarely resembled the teachers I imagined I needed.
Perhaps that is why their lessons endured.

Thank you for reading my story.

This story is part of a series—”The Banana Republic Hotel and What It Taught Me About Myself”—in which I share lessons learned throughout my professional and personal journey and how those experiences have shaped my thinking and led me to develop my own principles.

If you enjoyed reading the story and have the appetite to read another one, you are invited to visit G&A’s website, in particular its INSIGHTS page, where you can find all stories.
Alternatively, click here to be taken to the next story.

I hope it has provided some food for thought, encouraged curiosity, and inspired you to keep learning.

Curiosity, humility, and continuous learning remain among the most valuable tools we possess.

Terminology for non-hoteliers:

  • SOP: Standard Operating Procedure – a documented process describing how a task should be performed to ensure consistency, quality, and compliance.
  • KPIs: Key Performance Indicators – measurable indicators used to monitor performance and progress against objectives.
  • ADR: Average Daily Rate – the average room rate paid by guests.
  • RevPAR: Revenue per Available Room – a measure combining occupancy and room rate to assess hotel revenue performance.
  • Occupancy: The percentage of available rooms that are occupied.
  • DOF: Double Occupancy Factor – the average number of guests staying in each occupied room. A DOF of 1.0 means every occupied room has one guest; 2.0 means every occupied room has two guests.
  • AGC: Average Guest Check – the average amount spent by each guest in a restaurant, bar, or other food and beverage outlet.
  • CRS: Central Reservation System – the central booking system that manages a hotel’s room inventory, rates, and reservations across all sales channels.
  • PMS: Property Management System – the software used to manage reservations, guest accounts, and hotel operations.
  • OTA: Online Travel Agency – websites such as Booking.com or Expedia that sell hotel rooms on behalf of hotels.
  • GDS: Global Distribution System – a worldwide booking network used by travel agents and corporate travel departments to reserve hotel rooms, flights, and other travel services.
  • CRM: Customer Relationship Management – systems and processes used to manage guest relationships and marketing.
  • F&B: Food & Beverage Department – all restaurant, bar, banquet, room service, and catering operations within a hotel.
  • Half-Board: A hotel meal plan that includes breakfast and one additional meal each day, usually dinner. Drinks other than those specifically included are generally charged separately.
  • MICE: Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Events – the hotel business related to corporate meetings, conferences, exhibitions, and incentive travel.
  • ERP: Enterprise Resource Planning – an integrated software system that connects key business functions such as finance, procurement, inventory, human resources, sales, and reporting into a single platform.
  • USALI: Uniform System of Accounts for the Lodging Industry – the internationally recognised accounting standard used by hotels to measure and compare financial performance.
  • GOP: Gross Operating Profit – the operating profit generated by the hotel before management fees, rent, financing costs, depreciation, taxes, and other non-operating expenses.
  • EBITDA: Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation and Amortisation – a widely used measure of an organisation’s operating profitability.
  • COS: Cost of Sales – the direct cost of producing the goods sold, such as food, beverages, or merchandise, expressed as an amount or percentage of revenue.
  • FTE: Full-Time Equivalent – a standard measure of staffing that converts part-time and seasonal employees into the equivalent number of full-time employees.

About the Author

Raoul Gransier is a Senior International Adviser and owner-focused hotelier with more than 30 years of operational and advisory experience in hospitality, tourism, governance, and performance improvement.

Website

https://gransier.com

/by

Hotels + Public Money

Hotels + Public Money

This story is about how institutional work taught me that trust is built when reality and representation remain aligned.

Years later, I entered institutional advisory work.
It was a very different world from hotel operations.

Instead of guests, employees, and owners, I found myself working with international financial institutions, donor-funded development programmes, procurement frameworks, governance structures, and advisory assignments supporting hotels and tourism businesses across emerging markets.

Many readers may wonder what that actually means.

In this context, a donor is not a charity.
A donor is typically a national government, a group of governments, or an international organisation that allocates development funding to strengthen economic growth and stability in other countries.
Rather than providing money directly to businesses, these funds are often channelled through international financial institutions and development programmes.
Part of those resources finances technical advisory projects for small and medium-sized enterprises.

The purpose is not charity.
It is sustainable economic development.
The idea is simple: Strong businesses create employment, generate tax revenue, attract investment, and contribute to more resilient local economies.
For hotel, restaurant, and travel trade owners, this often means access to highly subsidised advisory support covering subjects such as commercial repositioning, operational improvement, governance, financial management, leadership development, or business planning.

The objective is not to take over the business.
The objective is to leave behind knowledge that remains valuable long after the advisory assignment has finished.
In other words, the objective is not to create dependency on advisors but to build capability within the business itself.

Donor-funded advisory often provides SMEs with the support they need once they begin experiencing growing pains.
Examples of such SMEs include family-owned hotels and restaurants and travel agencies, all of which are based in developing economies.
Many of these enterprises are not yet ready for private equity or institutional investment because they have not yet developed the governance, reporting, and management capabilities required to manage third-party capital.
Many aspire to reach that stage, each progressing at its own pace.

I found that idea inspiring.
My role was to help SMEs become stronger businesses by improving governance, commercial performance, financial planning, and management capability, thereby preparing them to access finance and use investment responsibly.
No two businesses were ever the same. The principles often were.

The work took me to countries, businesses, cultures, and ultimately, people.
Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Croatia, Egypt, Georgia, Greece, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyz Republic, Moldova, Mongolia, Montenegro, Serbia, Slovakia, Tajikistan, Tanzania, Tatarstan, Tunisia, Uzbekistan, and Ukraine.

Much of the work was rewarding.
Some of it was frustrating.

What surprised me most, however, was how similar the underlying challenges were to those I had encountered years earlier in hotel operations.

  • People remained people.
  • Ambition remained ambition.
  • Fear remained fear.
  • And trust remained fragile.

The larger the system became, the easier it was for reality and representation to drift apart.

Reports could look better than facts.
Processes could appear stronger than their implementation.
Compliance could exist on paper while underlying problems remained unresolved.
Whenever reality and representation diverged, difficulties eventually emerged.

The larger the gap, the greater the consequences.
Over time, I realised that governance is often misunderstood.
Many people see governance as bureaucracy.
I came to see it differently.

Governance is simply the process of managing expectations.

  • Who decides?
  • Who is responsible?
  • Who is accountable?
  • Who knows what?
  • What happens when something goes wrong?

Without clear answers, trust slowly erodes.
That observation reinforced something I had learned years earlier while managing hotels.

Integrity is not a slogan.
It is the alignment between what is said and what is done.

I remain grateful for the opportunity to have worked with international financial institutions, donors, local entrepreneurs, and hotel owners across many countries.
The experience convinced me that these programmes remain important where markets, public administration, or political systems alone cannot fully support private-sector development.

But they also confirmed something even more fundamental.
No institution, governance framework, or procurement process can substitute for personal integrity.
In the end, every system still depends on people choosing to do the right thing when nobody is watching.

Thank you for reading my story.

This story is part of a series—”The Banana Republic Hotel and What It Taught Me About Myself”—in which I share lessons learned throughout my professional and personal journey and how those experiences have shaped my thinking and led me to develop my own principles.

If you enjoyed reading the story and have the appetite to read another one, you are invited to visit G&A’s website, in particular its INSIGHTS page, where you can find all stories.
Alternatively, click here to be taken to the next story.

I hope it has provided some food for thought, encouraged curiosity, and inspired you to keep learning.

Curiosity, humility, and continuous learning remain among the most valuable tools we possess.

Terminology for non-hoteliers:

  • SOP: Standard Operating Procedure – a documented process describing how a task should be performed to ensure consistency, quality, and compliance.
  • KPIs: Key Performance Indicators – measurable indicators used to monitor performance and progress against objectives.
  • ADR: Average Daily Rate – the average room rate paid by guests.
  • RevPAR: Revenue per Available Room – a measure combining occupancy and room rate to assess hotel revenue performance.
  • Occupancy: The percentage of available rooms that are occupied.
  • DOF: Double Occupancy Factor – the average number of guests staying in each occupied room. A DOF of 1.0 means every occupied room has one guest; 2.0 means every occupied room has two guests.
  • AGC: Average Guest Check – the average amount spent by each guest in a restaurant, bar, or other food and beverage outlet.
  • CRS: Central Reservation System – the central booking system that manages a hotel’s room inventory, rates, and reservations across all sales channels.
  • PMS: Property Management System – the software used to manage reservations, guest accounts, and hotel operations.
  • OTA: Online Travel Agency – websites such as Booking.com or Expedia that sell hotel rooms on behalf of hotels.
  • GDS: Global Distribution System – a worldwide booking network used by travel agents and corporate travel departments to reserve hotel rooms, flights, and other travel services.
  • CRM: Customer Relationship Management – systems and processes used to manage guest relationships and marketing.
  • F&B: Food & Beverage Department – all restaurant, bar, banquet, room service, and catering operations within a hotel.
  • Half-Board: A hotel meal plan that includes breakfast and one additional meal each day, usually dinner. Drinks other than those specifically included are generally charged separately.
  • MICE: Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Events – the hotel business related to corporate meetings, conferences, exhibitions, and incentive travel.
  • ERP: Enterprise Resource Planning – an integrated software system that connects key business functions such as finance, procurement, inventory, human resources, sales, and reporting into a single platform.
  • USALI: Uniform System of Accounts for the Lodging Industry – the internationally recognised accounting standard used by hotels to measure and compare financial performance.
  • GOP: Gross Operating Profit – the operating profit generated by the hotel before management fees, rent, financing costs, depreciation, taxes, and other non-operating expenses.
  • EBITDA: Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation and Amortisation – a widely used measure of an organisation’s operating profitability.
  • COS: Cost of Sales – the direct cost of producing the goods sold, such as food, beverages, or merchandise, expressed as an amount or percentage of revenue.
  • FTE: Full-Time Equivalent – a standard measure of staffing that converts part-time and seasonal employees into the equivalent number of full-time employees.

About the Author

Raoul Gransier is a Senior International Adviser and owner-focused hotelier with more than 30 years of operational and advisory experience in hospitality, tourism, governance, and performance improvement.

Website

https://gransier.com

/by

The Credit Policy

The Credit Policy

This story is about how systems and processes taught me that sustainable improvement is measured by what remains after you leave.

Another country. Another hotel. Another culture.
In that particular environment, petty theft and corruption at scale were part of daily life.
At the time, people would sometimes say, “If you don’t steal from your company, you steal from your family.”

I spent much of my time firefighting.
Cash disappeared. Controls were weak.
Responsibilities were unclear. Departments blamed one another.
There was confusion everywhere.

What fascinated me was not the theft itself.
It was how easily accountability disappeared once money started moving between departments.

I decided to approach the problem differently.
Not by punishing theft.
But by preventing it.

I did so by first following the flow:

  • How cash entered the business
  • Who touched it
  • How accountability was transferred
  • Where controls broke down

Slowly, patterns started to emerge.
Over many months, I developed a credit policy and control framework.
Not because I enjoyed writing procedures.
But because I wanted accountability to become visible.

Years later, I visited another hotel.
The Front Office Manager, whom I had trained while working in another hotel, welcomed me warmly.
Proudly, he showed me what he described as the best cash-control manual he had ever encountered.
He had discovered it in a previous hotel.
Not one where I had worked.

The document had travelled.
People had copied it. Adapted it. Used it.
Across multiple organisations.
My initials were still visible on the cover page.

The lesson was not about authorship.
The lesson was about systems and processes.
Good systems and processes survive the people who create them.
The best systems become part of the organisation itself.
Long after their creators have moved on.

Thank you for reading my story.

This story is part of a series—”The Banana Republic Hotel and What It Taught Me About Myself”—in which I share lessons learned throughout my professional and personal journey and how those experiences have shaped my thinking and led me to develop my own principles.

If you enjoyed reading the story and have the appetite to read another one, you are invited to visit G&A’s website, in particular its INSIGHTS page, where you can find all stories.
Alternatively, click here to be taken to the next story of this series.

I hope it has provided some food for thought, encouraged curiosity, and inspired you to keep learning.

Curiosity, humility, and continuous learning remain among the most valuable tools we possess.

Terminology for non-hoteliers:

  • SOP: Standard Operating Procedure – a documented process describing how a task should be performed to ensure consistency, quality, and compliance.
  • KPIs: Key Performance Indicators – measurable indicators used to monitor performance and progress against objectives.
  • ADR: Average Daily Rate – the average room rate paid by guests.
  • RevPAR: Revenue per Available Room – a measure combining occupancy and room rate to assess hotel revenue performance.
  • Occupancy: The percentage of available rooms that are occupied.
  • DOF: Double Occupancy Factor – the average number of guests staying in each occupied room. A DOF of 1.0 means every occupied room has one guest; 2.0 means every occupied room has two guests.
  • AGC: Average Guest Check – the average amount spent by each guest in a restaurant, bar, or other food and beverage outlet.
  • CRS: Central Reservation System – the central booking system that manages a hotel’s room inventory, rates, and reservations across all sales channels.
  • PMS: Property Management System – the software used to manage reservations, guest accounts, and hotel operations.
  • OTA: Online Travel Agency – websites such as Booking.com or Expedia that sell hotel rooms on behalf of hotels.
  • GDS: Global Distribution System – a worldwide booking network used by travel agents and corporate travel departments to reserve hotel rooms, flights, and other travel services.
  • CRM: Customer Relationship Management – systems and processes used to manage guest relationships and marketing.
  • F&B: Food & Beverage Department – all restaurant, bar, banquet, room service, and catering operations within a hotel.
  • Half-Board: A hotel meal plan that includes breakfast and one additional meal each day, usually dinner. Drinks other than those specifically included are generally charged separately.
  • MICE: Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Events – the hotel business related to corporate meetings, conferences, exhibitions, and incentive travel.
  • ERP: Enterprise Resource Planning – an integrated software system that connects key business functions such as finance, procurement, inventory, human resources, sales, and reporting into a single platform.
  • USALI: Uniform System of Accounts for the Lodging Industry – the internationally recognised accounting standard used by hotels to measure and compare financial performance.
  • GOP: Gross Operating Profit – the operating profit generated by the hotel before management fees, rent, financing costs, depreciation, taxes, and other non-operating expenses.
  • EBITDA: Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation and Amortisation – a widely used measure of an organisation’s operating profitability.
  • COS: Cost of Sales – the direct cost of producing the goods sold, such as food, beverages, or merchandise, expressed as an amount or percentage of revenue.
  • FTE: Full-Time Equivalent – a standard measure of staffing that converts part-time and seasonal employees into the equivalent number of full-time employees.

About the Author

Raoul Gransier is a Senior International Adviser and owner-focused hotelier with more than 30 years of operational and advisory experience in hospitality, tourism, governance, and performance improvement.

Website

https://gransier.com

/by

The Revenue Experiment

The Revenue Experiment

This story is about how curiosity taught me to look beyond the obvious.

While serving as Front Office Manager at a large hotel catering predominantly to leisure groups, I became fascinated by distribution.

At the time, revenue management – both in terms of systems and culture – was still emerging.
Convincing management and ownership to invest in dedicated systems and specialised staff often required as much selling as the rooms themselves.

Most business was negotiated with wholesalers and tour operators at fixed prices.

Something about the booking and distribution methodology fascinated me.
I wanted to understand how it actually worked.
Not the theory. The mechanism. The chain.
How did guests find us?
Why did some channels perform better than others?
Why did some market segments behave differently from others?

I became absorbed by questions such as:

  • Global Distribution Systems and Online Travel Agents
  • Distribution costs, commissions, mark-ups, kick-backs
  • Market segments and sources of business
  • Pricing, net or inclusive of VAT and city tax
  • Demand, pickup, cancellations, booking pace, and double-occupancy density
  • Room categories and benefits, addressing leisure, Meetings & Conference, and business needs
  • Yield management
  • Reputation management

I experimented relentlessly.
Without specialised software. Without automated tools.
This was long before today’s user-friendly property management systems and apps.
All I had were spreadsheets, observation, curiosity, and adjustment.

I changed one thing. Observed the result. Changed another.
Observed again. Slowly, patterns started to emerge.
The result was not merely better occupancy.
The result was a different business model. New market segments emerged.
Dependence on low-yield wholesale business decreased.
The hotel began attracting guests who had previously never considered it.

What had been considered an out-of-town wholesale hotel gradually became one of the city’s strongest online performers.

Looking back, the lesson was not revenue management.
The lesson was curiosity.
Understanding the mechanism often creates opportunities that remain invisible to others.

Thank you for reading my story.

This story is part of a series—”The Banana Republic Hotel and What It Taught Me About Myself”—in which I share lessons learned throughout my professional and personal journey and how those experiences have shaped my thinking and led me to develop my own principles.

If you enjoyed reading the story and have the appetite to read another one, you are invited to visit G&A’s website, in particular its INSIGHTS page, where you can find all stories.
Alternatively, click here to be taken to the next story.

I hope it has provided some food for thought, encouraged curiosity, and inspired you to keep learning.

Curiosity, humility, and continuous learning remain among the most valuable tools we possess.

Terminology for non-hoteliers:

  • SOP: Standard Operating Procedure – a documented process describing how a task should be performed to ensure consistency, quality, and compliance.
  • KPIs: Key Performance Indicators – measurable indicators used to monitor performance and progress against objectives.
  • ADR: Average Daily Rate – the average room rate paid by guests.
  • RevPAR: Revenue per Available Room – a measure combining occupancy and room rate to assess hotel revenue performance.
  • Occupancy: The percentage of available rooms that are occupied.
  • DOF: Double Occupancy Factor – the average number of guests staying in each occupied room. A DOF of 1.0 means every occupied room has one guest; 2.0 means every occupied room has two guests.
  • AGC: Average Guest Check – the average amount spent by each guest in a restaurant, bar, or other food and beverage outlet.
  • CRS: Central Reservation System – the central booking system that manages a hotel’s room inventory, rates, and reservations across all sales channels.
  • PMS: Property Management System – the software used to manage reservations, guest accounts, and hotel operations.
  • OTA: Online Travel Agency – websites such as Booking.com or Expedia that sell hotel rooms on behalf of hotels.
  • GDS: Global Distribution System – a worldwide booking network used by travel agents and corporate travel departments to reserve hotel rooms, flights, and other travel services.
  • CRM: Customer Relationship Management – systems and processes used to manage guest relationships and marketing.
  • F&B: Food & Beverage Department – all restaurant, bar, banquet, room service, and catering operations within a hotel.
  • Half-Board: A hotel meal plan that includes breakfast and one additional meal each day, usually dinner. Drinks other than those specifically included are generally charged separately.
  • MICE: Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Events – the hotel business related to corporate meetings, conferences, exhibitions, and incentive travel.
  • ERP: Enterprise Resource Planning – an integrated software system that connects key business functions such as finance, procurement, inventory, human resources, sales, and reporting into a single platform.
  • USALI: Uniform System of Accounts for the Lodging Industry – the internationally recognised accounting standard used by hotels to measure and compare financial performance.
  • GOP: Gross Operating Profit – the operating profit generated by the hotel before management fees, rent, financing costs, depreciation, taxes, and other non-operating expenses.
  • EBITDA: Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation and Amortisation – a widely used measure of an organisation’s operating profitability.
  • COS: Cost of Sales – the direct cost of producing the goods sold, such as food, beverages, or merchandise, expressed as an amount or percentage of revenue.
  • FTE: Full-Time Equivalent – a standard measure of staffing that converts part-time and seasonal employees into the equivalent number of full-time employees.

About the Author

Raoul Gransier is a Senior International Adviser and owner-focused hotelier with more than 30 years of operational and advisory experience in hospitality, tourism, governance, and performance improvement.

Website

https://gransier.com

/by

The Flooded Hotel

The Flooded Hotel

This story is about how uncertainty taught me leadership.

Another country. Another hotel. Another lesson.
I was Night Manager of a high-profile hotel frequented by celebrities, heads of state, and captains of industry.

A Sales Manager had approved the use of fireworks in a ballroom.
The sprinkler system activated. The hotel began to flood.
Nobody knew how to stop it.
No one on the hotel team knew how. That included me.

Water poured from the building’s entrance onto the street and down into the basements.
The situation deteriorated rapidly, and the basement where the kitchens and stores were located was beginning to flood.
Cooks started building dikes out of towels, aprons, and bed sheets to contain the water.

The fire brigade eventually arrived.
They located the switch. The water stopped.
But the crisis was far from over. Night cleaning teams from across the city were mobilised.
The clean-up continued into the early morning, with me sweeping the floors.

The hotel survived.

Looking back, the event taught me something important.
Systems matter. Training matters.
Preparation matters.
But reality has a habit of introducing situations nobody anticipated.

No manual had prepared us for that night.
No training session had covered it.
No procedure explained what to do next.

Leadership often begins where procedures end.
One thing I have learned about myself is that I do not need to know everything before acting.
Sometimes leadership is not about having answers.
It is about helping people keep moving until answers appear.

When I eventually arrived home, mentally and physically exhausted, I switched on the television to watch a movie on a 24/7 cable channel.
The irony could not have been greater.
The running film was “Towering Inferno”.
A classic disaster movie involving exactly the kind of problem I had just spent the night dealing with.

For the first time after battling my way through the night and into the morning, I laughed.

Thank you for reading my story.

This story is part of a series—”The Banana Republic Hotel and What It Taught Me About Myself”—in which I share lessons learned throughout my professional and personal journey and how those experiences have shaped my thinking and led me to develop my own principles.

If you enjoyed reading the story and have the appetite to read another one, you are invited to visit G&A’s website, in particular its INSIGHTS page, where you can find all stories.
Alternatively, click here to be taken to the next story.

I hope it has provided some food for thought, encouraged curiosity, and inspired you to keep learning.

Curiosity, humility, and continuous learning remain among the most valuable tools we possess.

Terminology for non-hoteliers:

  • SOP: Standard Operating Procedure – a documented process describing how a task should be performed to ensure consistency, quality, and compliance.
  • KPIs: Key Performance Indicators – measurable indicators used to monitor performance and progress against objectives.
  • ADR: Average Daily Rate – the average room rate paid by guests.
  • RevPAR: Revenue per Available Room – a measure combining occupancy and room rate to assess hotel revenue performance.
  • Occupancy: The percentage of available rooms that are occupied.
  • DOF: Double Occupancy Factor – the average number of guests staying in each occupied room. A DOF of 1.0 means every occupied room has one guest; 2.0 means every occupied room has two guests.
  • AGC: Average Guest Check – the average amount spent by each guest in a restaurant, bar, or other food and beverage outlet.
  • CRS: Central Reservation System – the central booking system that manages a hotel’s room inventory, rates, and reservations across all sales channels.
  • PMS: Property Management System – the software used to manage reservations, guest accounts, and hotel operations.
  • OTA: Online Travel Agency – websites such as Booking.com or Expedia that sell hotel rooms on behalf of hotels.
  • GDS: Global Distribution System – a worldwide booking network used by travel agents and corporate travel departments to reserve hotel rooms, flights, and other travel services.
  • CRM: Customer Relationship Management – systems and processes used to manage guest relationships and marketing.
  • F&B: Food & Beverage Department – all restaurant, bar, banquet, room service, and catering operations within a hotel.
  • Half-Board: A hotel meal plan that includes breakfast and one additional meal each day, usually dinner. Drinks other than those specifically included are generally charged separately.
  • MICE: Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Events – the hotel business related to corporate meetings, conferences, exhibitions, and incentive travel.
  • ERP: Enterprise Resource Planning – an integrated software system that connects key business functions such as finance, procurement, inventory, human resources, sales, and reporting into a single platform.
  • USALI: Uniform System of Accounts for the Lodging Industry – the internationally recognised accounting standard used by hotels to measure and compare financial performance.
  • GOP: Gross Operating Profit – the operating profit generated by the hotel before management fees, rent, financing costs, depreciation, taxes, and other non-operating expenses.
  • EBITDA: Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation and Amortisation – a widely used measure of an organisation’s operating profitability.
  • COS: Cost of Sales – the direct cost of producing the goods sold, such as food, beverages, or merchandise, expressed as an amount or percentage of revenue.
  • FTE: Full-Time Equivalent – a standard measure of staffing that converts part-time and seasonal employees into the equivalent number of full-time employees.

About the Author

Raoul Gransier is a Senior International Adviser and owner-focused hotelier with more than 30 years of operational and advisory experience in hospitality, tourism, governance, and performance improvement.

Website

https://gransier.com

/by

The Overbooked Hotel

The Overbooked Hotel

This story is about how a crisis taught me to be calm.

I had built an early career in luxury hotels where discretion was valued above publicity and where guests occasionally reminded you that the world was larger than the building itself.

Being young and, arguably, naively stupid, I became increasingly fascinated by a completely different side of hospitality: scale.
Large groups, airports, convention hotels, and the logistics behind them fascinated me.
I wanted to know how it worked.

The saying is “be careful what you wish for,” and this story somewhat demonstrates that I landed the jackpot.

I joined one of the largest hotels in town as its front desk manager.
Shortly after being hired, I found myself managing a situation in which the hotel had somehow sold every room twice, an issue that remained unresolved until the day of arrival.
The problem did not start that day. It had been created weeks earlier.
An ambitious sales team, accustomed to significant wash-down and operating in an unstable market, had taken a gamble.
This time, the gamble failed.

The hotel had 400 rooms. More than 800 guests arrived. Simultaneously.
The front office team froze in horror.
Management panicked. Guests demanded answers.
Panic was not going to solve the problem. Reality would.
One thing I have learned about myself over the years is that the more panic there is around me, the calmer and quieter I get.

I am not a particularly extroverted person.
Nor would most people identify me as the loudest person in the room.
I may not have caused the problem.
Yet when a crisis emerges, I have a tendency to quietly assume ownership.
Not because of a title. Because somebody has to.

Over the years, I have learned that responsibility and accountability are not always the same thing.
Sometimes the person who solves the problem is not the person who created it.
But the guests do not care whose fault it is.
They simply need somebody to take charge.

The bookings were for single occupancy. The rooms were doubles.
So we started with the facts. I spoke openly with the group leaders.
I explained the situation honestly. No excuses. No attempts to hide the problem.
In exchange for compensation, many agreed to share rooms.
Additional reception teams searched the city for available accommodation.
Guests who preferred not to accept the proposed solution were relocated.
Hotel-chartered buses transported guests where necessary.

Slowly, the pressure began to ease. The problem was solved. What remained was another lesson.
Clarity becomes most valuable when everyone else loses theirs.
People often believe leadership is about having the right answers.
In my experience, leadership during a crisis is often about accepting reality quickly, staying calm, and helping others focus on solutions rather than emotions.

To understand the situation, it is important to realise the context.

This was an upcoming Central European destination in the years following the fall of the Berlin Wall.
The city was changing at extraordinary speed. Tourism was booming, international investment was arriving, and demand often seemed limitless.
It felt at times as if an entirely new hospitality market was being invented in real time.

New hotels were opening, reservation systems were far less sophisticated than today, and market demand often exceeded available supply.
Some hotels could only be booked by joining a waiting list — something that may be difficult to imagine today.
Occupancy levels that would be considered exceptional today were normal.

Our 400-key hotel operated at approximately 92% annual occupancy.
In such an environment, substantial overbookings on the day of arrival were not unusual.

It was a commercial risk many hotels accepted, based on historical cancellation patterns and expected no-shows.

Most of the time the calculations worked.
Occasionally they did not.

What struck me afterwards was how quickly established procedures became irrelevant.
The reservation system could not solve the problem.
The manuals could not solve the problem. Escalating the issue could not solve the problem.
Only people could solve the problem.
The solution emerged through judgement, communication, improvisation, and a willingness to accept responsibility for difficult decisions.
It reminded me that systems and processes are valuable, but they are tools.
Their purpose is to support decision-making, not replace it.
Perhaps that is why I remain cautious whenever a process becomes more important than the judgement it was designed to support.

For me, however, the lasting lesson was different.
Crisis does not create character. Crisis reveals it.
And sometimes it reveals qualities in ourselves that we did not know were there.

Thank you for reading my story.

This story is part of a series—”The Banana Republic Hotel and What It Taught Me About Myself”—in which I share lessons learned throughout my professional and personal journey and how those experiences have shaped my thinking and led me to develop my own principles.

If you enjoyed reading the story and have the appetite to read another one, you are invited to visit G&A’s website, in particular its INSIGHTS page, where you can find all stories.
Alternatively, click here to be taken to the next story.

I hope it has provided some food for thought, encouraged curiosity, and inspired you to keep learning.

Curiosity, humility, and continuous learning remain among the most valuable tools we possess.

Terminology for non-hoteliers:

  • SOP: Standard Operating Procedure – a documented process describing how a task should be performed to ensure consistency, quality, and compliance.
  • KPIs: Key Performance Indicators – measurable indicators used to monitor performance and progress against objectives.
  • ADR: Average Daily Rate – the average room rate paid by guests.
  • RevPAR: Revenue per Available Room – a measure combining occupancy and room rate to assess hotel revenue performance.
  • Occupancy: The percentage of available rooms that are occupied.
  • DOF: Double Occupancy Factor – the average number of guests staying in each occupied room. A DOF of 1.0 means every occupied room has one guest; 2.0 means every occupied room has two guests.
  • AGC: Average Guest Check – the average amount spent by each guest in a restaurant, bar, or other food and beverage outlet.
  • CRS: Central Reservation System – the central booking system that manages a hotel’s room inventory, rates, and reservations across all sales channels.
  • PMS: Property Management System – the software used to manage reservations, guest accounts, and hotel operations.
  • OTA: Online Travel Agency – websites such as Booking.com or Expedia that sell hotel rooms on behalf of hotels.
  • GDS: Global Distribution System – a worldwide booking network used by travel agents and corporate travel departments to reserve hotel rooms, flights, and other travel services.
  • CRM: Customer Relationship Management – systems and processes used to manage guest relationships and marketing.
  • F&B: Food & Beverage Department – all restaurant, bar, banquet, room service, and catering operations within a hotel.
  • Half-Board: A hotel meal plan that includes breakfast and one additional meal each day, usually dinner. Drinks other than those specifically included are generally charged separately.
  • MICE: Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Events – the hotel business related to corporate meetings, conferences, exhibitions, and incentive travel.
  • ERP: Enterprise Resource Planning – an integrated software system that connects key business functions such as finance, procurement, inventory, human resources, sales, and reporting into a single platform.
  • USALI: Uniform System of Accounts for the Lodging Industry – the internationally recognised accounting standard used by hotels to measure and compare financial performance.
  • GOP: Gross Operating Profit – the operating profit generated by the hotel before management fees, rent, financing costs, depreciation, taxes, and other non-operating expenses.
  • EBITDA: Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation and Amortisation – a widely used measure of an organisation’s operating profitability.
  • COS: Cost of Sales – the direct cost of producing the goods sold, such as food, beverages, or merchandise, expressed as an amount or percentage of revenue.
  • FTE: Full-Time Equivalent – a standard measure of staffing that converts part-time and seasonal employees into the equivalent number of full-time employees.

About the Author

Raoul Gransier is a Senior International Adviser and owner-focused hotelier with more than 30 years of operational and advisory experience in hospitality, tourism, governance, and performance improvement.

Website

https://gransier.com

/by

The Dishwasher

The Dishwasher

This story is about learning respect.

As a trainee in food and beverage, one of my responsibilities was serving coffee and tea during the hotel Food & Beverage Management meetings.

It was an ideal place to observe.
Around the table sat the General Manager, the Director of Sales & Marketing, the Chief Accountant, the Food & Beverage Manager, the Executive Chef, and several other senior managers.
They discussed important matters that, at the time, I barely understood.

One thing puzzled me.
Why was the Chief Steward participating in the meeting?
I understood why the Executive Chef was there. I understood the Food & Beverage Manager.
But the dishwasher?

At least, that was how my young and inexperienced mind looked at it.
Only later did I realise how wrong I had been.

For readers outside the hotel industry:
The Chief Steward is responsible for the stewarding department—the people who wash dishes, maintain kitchen equipment, manage waste, and ensure the back-of-house operation functions safely and efficiently.

  • Health and safety start and end with stewarding
  • Cleanliness starts and ends with stewarding
  • A perfectly prepared dish served on a contaminated plate remains a failure and a risk to guest safety
  • The most talented chef cannot succeed without clean equipment
  • The most beautiful restaurant cannot function without clean glasses, cutlery, and plates

Stewarding is the backbone of food and beverage.
In much the same way that housekeeping is the backbone of rooms, engineering is the backbone of infrastructure, and night audit is the backbone of financial control.

The lesson was simple: The most important functions are often the least glamorous and the least visible.
As young professionals, we are often attracted to titles, uniforms, status, and visibility.
Life eventually teaches a different lesson.
Organisations do not succeed because of the people who receive the most attention.
They succeed because of the people who quietly do their job every day, often without recognition.

That observation shaped how I view organisations today.
Respect is not determined by title.
It is determined by contribution.

This lesson in humility has stayed with me throughout my life and career.

Thank you for reading my story.

This story is part of a series—”The Banana Republic Hotel and What It Taught Me About Myself”—in which I share lessons learned throughout my professional and personal journey and how those experiences have shaped my thinking and led me to develop my own principles.

If you enjoyed reading the story and have the appetite to read another one, you are invited to visit G&A’s website, in particular its INSIGHTS page, where you can find all stories.
Alternatively, click here to be taken to the next story.

I hope it has provided some food for thought, encouraged curiosity, and inspired you to keep learning.

Curiosity, humility, and continuous learning remain among the most valuable tools we possess.

Terminology for non-hoteliers:

  • SOP: Standard Operating Procedure – a documented process describing how a task should be performed to ensure consistency, quality, and compliance.
  • KPIs: Key Performance Indicators – measurable indicators used to monitor performance and progress against objectives.
  • ADR: Average Daily Rate – the average room rate paid by guests.
  • RevPAR: Revenue per Available Room – a measure combining occupancy and room rate to assess hotel revenue performance.
  • Occupancy: The percentage of available rooms that are occupied.
  • DOF: Double Occupancy Factor – the average number of guests staying in each occupied room. A DOF of 1.0 means every occupied room has one guest; 2.0 means every occupied room has two guests.
  • AGC: Average Guest Check – the average amount spent by each guest in a restaurant, bar, or other food and beverage outlet.
  • CRS: Central Reservation System – the central booking system that manages a hotel’s room inventory, rates, and reservations across all sales channels.
  • PMS: Property Management System – the software used to manage reservations, guest accounts, and hotel operations.
  • OTA: Online Travel Agency – websites such as Booking.com or Expedia that sell hotel rooms on behalf of hotels.
  • GDS: Global Distribution System – a worldwide booking network used by travel agents and corporate travel departments to reserve hotel rooms, flights, and other travel services.
  • CRM: Customer Relationship Management – systems and processes used to manage guest relationships and marketing.
  • F&B: Food & Beverage Department – all restaurant, bar, banquet, room service, and catering operations within a hotel.
  • Half-Board: A hotel meal plan that includes breakfast and one additional meal each day, usually dinner. Drinks other than those specifically included are generally charged separately.
  • MICE: Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Events – the hotel business related to corporate meetings, conferences, exhibitions, and incentive travel.
  • ERP: Enterprise Resource Planning – an integrated software system that connects key business functions such as finance, procurement, inventory, human resources, sales, and reporting into a single platform.
  • USALI: Uniform System of Accounts for the Lodging Industry – the internationally recognised accounting standard used by hotels to measure and compare financial performance.
  • GOP: Gross Operating Profit – the operating profit generated by the hotel before management fees, rent, financing costs, depreciation, taxes, and other non-operating expenses.
  • EBITDA: Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation and Amortisation – a widely used measure of an organisation’s operating profitability.
  • COS: Cost of Sales – the direct cost of producing the goods sold, such as food, beverages, or merchandise, expressed as an amount or percentage of revenue.
  • FTE: Full-Time Equivalent – a standard measure of staffing that converts part-time and seasonal employees into the equivalent number of full-time employees.

About the Author

Raoul Gransier is a Senior International Adviser and owner-focused hotelier with more than 30 years of operational and advisory experience in hospitality, tourism, governance, and performance improvement.

Website

https://gransier.com

/by

Growing Pains in the Restaurant

Growing Pains in the Restaurant

This story is about how perseverance is often learned long before competence arrives.

One of my earliest memories in hospitality dates back to my trainee period at a classical grand restaurant, one of the most prestigious dining establishments in town.

This was not merely a restaurant in the modern sense.
It belonged to a different era of hospitality.
Guests expected classical service, silver service, guéridon preparations, carving and flambéing at the table, and a level of product knowledge that is increasingly rare today.

I struggled with systems. I made mistakes continuously.
I mixed up dishes. I confused a Caesar Salad for Mixed Salad, Rösti with Pommes Frites, Chicken with Pork, and so on…
Orders arrived in the kitchen one way and occasionally emerged as something entirely different.
The Executive Chef, not my direct supervisor but obviously frustrated with me as a young man, took me aside and told me I was the worst trainee he had encountered in his career.
At the time, he was probably right, and his feelings were shared by many in both the kitchen and service teams.

Every day, before the dinner shift, the Maître d’Hôtel assembled the service brigade for a formal briefing.
It always began with questions about the menu delivered in almost military fashion.
We were expected to know every dish, every ingredient, every garnish, every wine pairing, the correct serving temperatures, and even which vintage might be most appropriate.
We were also expected to execute the full repertoire of classical service techniques, from guéridon service to carving and flambéing tableside.
Orders were committed to memory as they were taken, and executed.
No handheld devices, no POS terminals, no technology beyond the NCR cash registers.
The service brigade consisted of the best of the best, many of whom would later become celebrated sommeliers, fromagers, maîtres d’hôtel, restaurateurs, and hospitality professionals around the world.
The Maître d’Hôtel’s management technique was not to correct or reprimand those who did not know the answers to his questions.
The stares from the rest of the team did the job, and I received many of them.

Yet, for some reason, they kept me on the most prestigious shift: dinner service.
Looking back, I still do not know why.
It would have been easier to move me to polishing silverware or room service.
At the time, I would have considered that a demotion.
Later, I learned that those duties were no less important than any other role in the operation.
Hospitality is built on respect for every task, not just the visible ones.

I was a young kid, alone in a different country, trying to find my place in a profession I did not yet understand.
The venue I was working in was clearly in the highest league I could have found myself in.
To make matters worse, I was far too proud to admit how lost I felt.
Or that some evenings I cried myself to sleep.

What stayed with me was not the criticism.
It was what I chose to do with it. And what happened afterwards.
I became determined to face the failure. To understand.
Not to defend myself. Not to explain. To learn.
I started asking questions. I watched.
I listened. I practised.
Slowly, things started to make sense.

At the end of my training period, the same Executive Chef took me aside once again.
This time, he told me he had never experienced a trainee who had transformed so completely.
Looking back, this may have been one of the most important moments of my career.
Not because I received praise.
But because I learned something much more valuable.
Weaknesses are not permanent.
Provided one is willing to confront them.

Today, whenever I encounter something, I do not understand, I often think back to that restaurant and kitchen.
The lesson remains the same.
Failing at something is not the problem.
Refusing to learn is.

Thank you for reading my story.

This story is part of a series—”The Banana Republic Hotel and What It Taught Me About Myself”—in which I share lessons learned throughout my professional and personal journey and how those experiences have shaped my thinking and led me to develop my own principles.

If you enjoyed reading the story and have the appetite to read another one, you are invited to visit G&A’s website, in particular its INSIGHTS page, where you can find all stories.
Alternatively, click here to be taken to the next story.

I hope it has provided some food for thought, encouraged curiosity, and inspired you to keep learning.

Curiosity, humility, and continuous learning remain among the most valuable tools we possess.

Terminology for non-hoteliers:

  • SOP: Standard Operating Procedure – a documented process describing how a task should be performed to ensure consistency, quality, and compliance.
  • KPIs: Key Performance Indicators – measurable indicators used to monitor performance and progress against objectives.
  • ADR: Average Daily Rate – the average room rate paid by guests.
  • RevPAR: Revenue per Available Room – a measure combining occupancy and room rate to assess hotel revenue performance.
  • Occupancy: The percentage of available rooms that are occupied.
  • DOF: Double Occupancy Factor – the average number of guests staying in each occupied room. A DOF of 1.0 means every occupied room has one guest; 2.0 means every occupied room has two guests.
  • AGC: Average Guest Check – the average amount spent by each guest in a restaurant, bar, or other food and beverage outlet.
  • CRS: Central Reservation System – the central booking system that manages a hotel’s room inventory, rates, and reservations across all sales channels.
  • PMS: Property Management System – the software used to manage reservations, guest accounts, and hotel operations.
  • OTA: Online Travel Agency – websites such as Booking.com or Expedia that sell hotel rooms on behalf of hotels.
  • GDS: Global Distribution System – a worldwide booking network used by travel agents and corporate travel departments to reserve hotel rooms, flights, and other travel services.
  • CRM: Customer Relationship Management – systems and processes used to manage guest relationships and marketing.
  • F&B: Food & Beverage Department – all restaurant, bar, banquet, room service, and catering operations within a hotel.
  • Half-Board: A hotel meal plan that includes breakfast and one additional meal each day, usually dinner. Drinks other than those specifically included are generally charged separately.
  • MICE: Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Events – the hotel business related to corporate meetings, conferences, exhibitions, and incentive travel.
  • ERP: Enterprise Resource Planning – an integrated software system that connects key business functions such as finance, procurement, inventory, human resources, sales, and reporting into a single platform.
  • USALI: Uniform System of Accounts for the Lodging Industry – the internationally recognised accounting standard used by hotels to measure and compare financial performance.
  • GOP: Gross Operating Profit – the operating profit generated by the hotel before management fees, rent, financing costs, depreciation, taxes, and other non-operating expenses.
  • EBITDA: Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation and Amortisation – a widely used measure of an organisation’s operating profitability.
  • COS: Cost of Sales – the direct cost of producing the goods sold, such as food, beverages, or merchandise, expressed as an amount or percentage of revenue.
  • FTE: Full-Time Equivalent – a standard measure of staffing that converts part-time and seasonal employees into the equivalent number of full-time employees.

About the Author

Raoul Gransier is a Senior International Adviser and owner-focused hotelier with more than 30 years of operational and advisory experience in hospitality, tourism, governance, and performance improvement.

Website

https://gransier.com

/by

Numbers in the Ballroom

Numbers in the Ballroom

This story is about how numbers helped me to channel my curiosity.

Growing up, my biggest anxiety was around numbers.
I still remember receiving a Chinese abacus during “Sinterklaas”, a Dutch festivity before Christmas during which children receive presents.
As the photograph shows, I had absolutely no idea what to do with it.

Looking back, perhaps that was the beginning of a much longer story.
Years later, working night audit in hotels, I had to face that same anxiety.
Excel. Daily reconciliations. Accounting.
Basic spreadsheets. Basic financial reporting.

The problem was simple.
I was unable to see the forest for the trees.
I could not connect the dots.
I made many mistakes and gave both the accounting and IT departments a headache.
Back then, I was certainly not on the shortlist for Employee of the Month.
Quite the opposite.

One night, after once again frustrating accounting and IT by breaking reports and spreadsheets, I decided to do something different.
I printed everything. Every tab.
Every page. Hundreds of pages.
I covered the floor of an unused ballroom with all these hundreds of sheets, blocked its availability for a week, and spent several nights walking through the process.
Page by page. Report by report. Formula by formula.
Slowly the connections became visible.
Not because somebody explained them.
Because I followed the chain.

That lesson stayed with me.
Whenever I struggle to understand something, I still look for the chain.
The outcome rarely explains itself. The path that created it usually does.

Today, numbers are part of my daily bread and butter.
I overcame my anxiety by facing it.
More importantly, I learned that weaknesses are often invitations to learn rather than reasons to stop.
My colleagues and managers recognised the effort and supported me.
I owe them my respect and gratitude forever.

Looking back, I do not think the lesson was really about numbers.
It was about humility.
Acknowledging what you do not understand.
Being curious enough to keep asking questions.
And being persistently stubborn enough not to give up until the pieces start fitting together.

That lesson has stayed with me far beyond accounting.
In operations. In commercial strategy.
In governance. And increasingly, in life itself.
Curiosity and humility are a powerful combination.
Together, they allow us to transform weaknesses into strengths.

Thank you for reading my story.

This story is part of a series—”The Banana Republic Hotel and What It Taught Me About Myself”—in which I share lessons learned throughout my professional and personal journey and how those experiences have shaped my thinking and led me to develop my own principles.

If you enjoyed reading the story and have the appetite to read another one, you are invited to visit G&A’s website, in particular its INSIGHTS page, where you can find all stories.
Alternatively, click here to be taken to the next story.

I hope it has provided some food for thought, encouraged curiosity, and inspired you to keep learning.

Curiosity, humility, and continuous learning remain among the most valuable tools we possess.

Terminology for non-hoteliers:

  • SOP: Standard Operating Procedure – a documented process describing how a task should be performed to ensure consistency, quality, and compliance.
  • KPIs: Key Performance Indicators – measurable indicators used to monitor performance and progress against objectives.
  • ADR: Average Daily Rate – the average room rate paid by guests.
  • RevPAR: Revenue per Available Room – a measure combining occupancy and room rate to assess hotel revenue performance.
  • Occupancy: The percentage of available rooms that are occupied.
  • DOF: Double Occupancy Factor – the average number of guests staying in each occupied room. A DOF of 1.0 means every occupied room has one guest; 2.0 means every occupied room has two guests.
  • AGC: Average Guest Check – the average amount spent by each guest in a restaurant, bar, or other food and beverage outlet.
  • CRS: Central Reservation System – the central booking system that manages a hotel’s room inventory, rates, and reservations across all sales channels.
  • PMS: Property Management System – the software used to manage reservations, guest accounts, and hotel operations.
  • OTA: Online Travel Agency – websites such as Booking.com or Expedia that sell hotel rooms on behalf of hotels.
  • GDS: Global Distribution System – a worldwide booking network used by travel agents and corporate travel departments to reserve hotel rooms, flights, and other travel services.
  • CRM: Customer Relationship Management – systems and processes used to manage guest relationships and marketing.
  • F&B: Food & Beverage Department – all restaurant, bar, banquet, room service, and catering operations within a hotel.
  • Half-Board: A hotel meal plan that includes breakfast and one additional meal each day, usually dinner. Drinks other than those specifically included are generally charged separately.
  • MICE: Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Events – the hotel business related to corporate meetings, conferences, exhibitions, and incentive travel.
  • ERP: Enterprise Resource Planning – an integrated software system that connects key business functions such as finance, procurement, inventory, human resources, sales, and reporting into a single platform.
  • USALI: Uniform System of Accounts for the Lodging Industry – the internationally recognised accounting standard used by hotels to measure and compare financial performance.
  • GOP: Gross Operating Profit – the operating profit generated by the hotel before management fees, rent, financing costs, depreciation, taxes, and other non-operating expenses.
  • EBITDA: Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation and Amortisation – a widely used measure of an organisation’s operating profitability.
  • COS: Cost of Sales – the direct cost of producing the goods sold, such as food, beverages, or merchandise, expressed as an amount or percentage of revenue.
  • FTE: Full-Time Equivalent – a standard measure of staffing that converts part-time and seasonal employees into the equivalent number of full-time employees.

About the Author

Raoul Gransier is a Senior International Adviser and owner-focused hotelier with more than 30 years of operational and advisory experience in hospitality, tourism, governance, and performance improvement.

Website

https://gransier.com

/by

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