THE INCREASING IMPORTANCE OF PROJECT MANAGEMENT IN HOSPITALITY

Elonique Dalhuisen
30 juni 2022

Good project management can deliver a range of benefits, says Alan Ridgell

The Project Management Institute projects the demand for project managers to  grow by 33% through 2027. This shows that businesses across different industries – hospitality included – are embracing project-based ways of doing work. As competition grows in the hospitality industry, and as business owners move to rebuild their businesses after the global pandemic, project management is proving an invaluable tool. It is one of the ways to ensure effectiveness in completing projects within the set timeline, budget, and resources as well as achieving the required quality. Moreover, this is important in meeting the growing clients’ demands to stay ahead of the competition and achieve strategic goals in the long run.

What skills does a project manager bring to the table?

A project manager is tasked with overseeing a project from initiation to completion. To do this successfully, he or she has a lot of responsibilities. They include:

  • Developing the project scope
  • Identifying team members who can bring the most value
  • Planning and defining project schedules
  • Identifying and planning for required procurements
  • Developing and controlling the budget
  • Managing communication with the team
  • Monitoring the progress of the project
  • Identifying risks

These tasks and others not mentioned call for an individual with a strategic business mindset. The individual needs to have impeccable leadership and team-building skills if he or she is to be able to manage and motivate the team. Organizational, prioritization, time management, communication, and problem-solving skills are also paramount.

While managers can learn and acquire these skills on the job, finding qualified project managers is important for achieving hospitality business goals. It is important to find individuals who have attained associate in project management, certified project management, professional in project management, certified project director,  and PMP certification training among others. These certifications equip individuals with the necessary skills needed to plan, monitor, and execute projects to achieve the set goals.

Areas to leverage project management in the hospitality industry

The hospitality industry is ideally a service industry. However, there are many areas that can use project management skills, especially where budgets, clear objectives, deliverables, and timelines are involved. Integrating these service-oriented operations with principles of project management goes a long way in ensuring efficiency in every area of the business. Take a restaurant that serves food and drinks as an example, the daily operations can really benefit from project management skills. Procuring supplies, analyzing recipes, monitoring food preparation to ensure food safety and timely delivery, maintaining safety and health standards in the restaurant, and coordinating the staff and the vendors require quality planning, financial, coordinating, communication and monitoring capabilities. These are skills that project management emphasizes.

In addition, other projects such as planning events and conferences, launching new services, establishing new branches as well as renovating the facilities among others require project management in planning, executing, monitoring, and successful completion.

Benefits of project management for hospitality businesses

It is without a doubt that hospitality businesses that have adopted project management realize enormous business benefits. Some of these benefits include:

  • Improved performance – With good project management, businesses can achieve much more with fewer resources. Project managers know how to control a project to complete it within the set resources in terms of financial, time, and human capital. Through such resources optimization, the team’s performance and productivity are enhanced
  • Enhanced quality – Project management principles emphasize creating steps that assure a quality end product. Project managers use their expertise and experience to monitor the progress of the project to ensure quality is observed in every phase
  • Increased teamwork and collaboration – Project managers do a great job of bringing the team together to achieve a common goal. The benefits of this enhanced teamwork and collaboration spill to other areas of running a business
  • Improved  customer satisfaction – Project management aims at understanding the client’s expectations and objectives clearly in the initiation phase. They structure clear deliverables and get clients’ approval throughout the project duration to ensure that the project is accomplished in a way that fulfills their expectations
  • Sets up the business for future success – Project management is all about creating templates, checklists, and standard operating procedures to ensure a successful project. These can be used in future projects to enhance success.

Conclusion

The demand for project managers has been growing tremendously in the hospitality industry. Businesses are leveraging skills that project managers possess to ensure success in different projects such as event planning, facilities renovations development of new services, and more.

Moreover, this brings a number of benefits including improved effectiveness and efficiency, enhanced teamwork, better quality service delivery and most importantly achieving customer expectations.