Discussion As you read about this week in your eBook, technology is the backbone
ID: 470389 • Letter: D
Question
Discussion As you read about this week in your eBook, technology is the backbone of almost every successful business today. This is true of the luxury hotel business, where innovative technology is at the heart of the business. While technology may be at the heart of the business, it is just as important to balance this with that personal touch that valued guests expect and require. For example, technology allows guests to easily order room service from their smartphones or from their television sets in their hotel rooms. The personal touch then comes in when the orders are personally delivered by staff members on antique-looking carts with the meals on fine china and drinks in crystal glasses. One of the biggest challenges of a luxury hotel is balancing technology while consistently delivering that personal touch. In order to get a better look into this challenge, address the following questions based on the key ideas outlined in the reading this week: What are the key customer service processes and related procedures that a hotel will typically perform? What processes would you automate? How? What processes will you choose to conduct with that human touch? For the processes that you will, keep “hands on,” how can you use technology to improve their efficiency? For the processes that you will automate, how can you add that personal touch to them?
Explanation / Answer
Key customer service processes and related procedures a hotel will typically perform:-
1) Laundry service
2) Room delivery of food and other supplies
3) Attending to other adhoc requests of customers
4) Pick up and drop of customers
There are many processes that a hotel typically carries out. But the above are some of the main customer facing processes. Automation can only be carried out to the extent of initiating the process by the customer. But the process can only be completed by room attendants or some service executives. The initial automation can be through an application which the hotel can build. It can have trigger buttons for all the above services and times for customers to book. Once the customer books a specific service, the hotel can confirm it on their side and start the process.
The processes that will require a special human touch would be the food delivery, laundry service and adhoc requests. For food delivery, the restaurant can ask the customer if they have any special taste which they want in their food (for eg:- spicy, sweet etc). The food can then be delivered in some special trays with the stickers with the customer name. The laundry can also be delivered in a bag with customer name. And, adhoc requests can be attended to on a best effort basis and in ways which make the customer feel special.
For hands on processes, the technology that can be used is to develop an app for the customer to use
For the automated processes, human touch is anyway being added as the process is getting completed with human touch,