Hotel General Manager’s role, from a Managing Director’s perspective

On the second day of the National Hotel Management Conference 2015, a Managing Directors’ Forum was held based on the title ‘Role of the Hotel General Manager – from a Managing Director’s Perspective’. Some of the renowned personalities in the hospitality industry in Sri Lanka were invited for the forum moderated by Daily FT Editor Nisthar Cassim.  The panellists were Jetwing Hotels Chairman Hiran Cooray, Kingsbury PLC and Amaya Hotels and Resorts Managing Director Lalin Samarawickrama and Serendib Leisure Management Ltd. Managing Director 

Ranil De Silva. 

Following are excerpts:

Jetwing Hotels Chairman Hiran Cooray addressing the panel discussion. Others from right: Kingsbury Hotel and Amaya Hotels & Resorts MD Lalin Samarawickrama, Serendib Leisure Management MD Ranil de Silva and Moderator Daily FT Editor Nisthar Cassim

By Radhi de Silva

Q: What is the role of the General Manager?

Cooray: The hospitality trade has grown so much and it is not the same business as we started in the 70s as the customers’ demands are now quite high and have high expectations. So the general manager’s role is so important on many aspects and not only to look after the customer but many stakeholders and must also look after the reputation of the business.

It is very important to maintain and manage the reputation of the business especially with social media and hotel websites coming in as the feedback provided by the customers on such platforms are permanent so the general managers must ensure the feedback is always positive by managing that reputation. 

Also, the General Manager’s knowledge in finance is extremely important. Those days most managers had zero knowledge in finance but today the general manager is almost an accountant and looks after the cost and must present to the board the budgets, etc and also must look into the marketing aspects of the business. 

Samarawickrama: The General Manager needs to be more responsible and target oriented and the managing director steers the operations. Those days a general manager was not business oriented and was not concentrating on budgets, etc but with the change of time more responsibility was added to the role of a general manager and to ensure that targets are archived the companies have introduced incentives and bonus schemes.

De Silva: Need to pay attention and be innovative and make plans to look into make further innovation and get better returns. The general managers must walk the talk and no longer are general managers working from a back office. 

Cooray: The post of General Manager is only for men but at Jetwing the top three general managers are females and they carry out their roles to the highest standards and the most profitable hotels in the group are those hotels handled by these three general managers.

Management by walking

During the forum, the managers at the conference were given the opportunity to provide their feedback and some of the feedbacks were that the concept ‘management by walking’ is the most practical as the general manager is aware of what is happening. And it was admitted that the general manager should know about financials.

Nisha Abu Bakar Maricair agreed that even in other countries most general managers do not know about financial management and marketing knowledge. It is very difficult to be customer centric without having the financial training. And most managers are not given proper training in these aspects. If you do not know the costs of running a hotel it is very difficult to target customers. 

Nisha further inquired from the panellists as to what they have done to address the issue of providing proper training to the general managers. 

Cooray: Jetwing has taken immense steps to ensure that the managers are given proper training even externally and now the managers are very much aware of the figures; they are required to prepare the budgets, etc. and they are not very focused regarding the financials of the company. 

Samarawickrama: Managers are required to go through the figures and ensure targets are achieved.

Cooray: It is very difficult to be a general manager today without the proper overall skills as they must look into all aspects unless the hotel is part of a larger group who has a team appointed to look in to each aspect but still the managers must be aware of what the teams are doing.

Finance matters

A question was drawn by the moderator to the organisers and attendees from the Ceylon Hotel School of Graduates Association whether finance is included in the curriculum of the Ceylon Hotel School and it was mentioned that it is and that the school provides a diploma course in finance.

De Silva: It must be mentioned that the corporates do not look for the managers to know about balance sheets etc. but look into cutting costs and making profits for the company.

Q: Is the panel suggesting that the general manager should be a jack of all trades?

Samarawickrama: It is more about the General Manager being able to multitask. 

Cooray: Knowing everything by a general manager depends on the size of the hotel as a general manager of the bigger hotel would not be practically able to handle everything but in a smaller hotel, yes. 

Q: How are the companies in the hotel industry addressing expansion and innovation; isn’t this something that needs to be seriously addressed?

De Silva: Outsource training and research is carried out and put through priority on the training as costs have been high due to the high demand for those engaged in the hospitality. 

Cooray: We take training seriously and different trainings. It is difficult with international head hunters keeping an eye on our workforce. 

A question was drawn by an attendee at the conference whether a General Manager should come from a finance background.

Cooray: It is much appreciated if they are coming from a finance background, as they tend to be tough and accountants are said to be critical.

De Silva: Yes it will be advantageous but it must be noted that hotels are made for guests and not for hoteliers and need to look at it from the perspective of a guest. But the general manager’s role has evolved and numbers play a bigger role than those days.

An attendee further informed that with general managers focusing on numbers and the margins getting tough every day the trade loses the main aspect of the trade which is entertainment.

Cooray: I admit that we must not lose focus and must ensure that the guests are well taken care of but a balance must be struck by the general manager. 

Entry of international chains

Q: Are the local hotel chains threatened by the international chains coming into Sri Lanka?

Samarawickrama: There is no threat as the local hotels promote on the tagline ‘Truly Sri Lankan’ which is based on the culture, etc. And we are definitely not worried as it is good to have competition and our people will learn and hopefully bring in more guests to Sri Lanka.

Cooray: It is good for the country to have more international brands and we are not scared, but we need to be ready by sharpening the saw or else we will get swallowed. 

Q: Are the local hotels equipped with the required skills with the increase in number of hotels in Sri Lanka?

Cooray: All companies have their separate skills development plans and in Jetwing prior to opening a hotel in an area we recruit and provide training for those who could thereby be trained with the proper skills to work in the hotel. There will be training in regional levels and a lot more hotels schools coming up for example in Jaffna. And those who have gone abroad will come back to Sri Lanka to join in with the local trade.

De Silva: We also have Sri Lankans with the international experience coming back to Sri Lanka.

Cooray: It is important that prior to hiring a foreign general manager they should be able to adopt and love the country and its culture so that they can work with the locals without any issue.

It was addressed by a guest in the audience that Sri Lankan expatriates who have much experience abroad and who would be able to come back should be given the opportunity. 

English language standards

An attendee at the conference further added that the language of hospitality is English and therefore the standard of the English language of those engaged in the trade must be maintained and the hotel schools must look into this. It was further added that, Sri Lanka has a very high number of days off compared to other countries so it is difficult to operate in the industry with so much leave being given to employees as it is required to employ a high number of staff because of this issue. Therefore, such issues need to be addressed by the Sri Lankan government.  

Q: How can we match the salaries abroad, in Sri Lanka?

Samarawickrama: It depends but they have been able to provide a decent salary for those who have come back.

Cooray: Hoteliering is based on passion so those who are interested will come and considering the cost of living abroad there are lot of benefits when working in Sri Lanka that cannot be matched elsewhere.

Jetwing is reluctant to hire at senior management level as we believe in grooming our junior staff over the years to take over the senior roles with time. Our group has a different culture and the way we take care of associates by being very friendly and welcoming, etc. so would like to have the people who understand this culture and has been aware of this culture over the years to take over. 

De Silva: Serendib employs foreign General Managers as the company deals with international brands so this makes it easier to handle the brands. The General Managers who faced the pre-war phase in Sri Lanka lack being innovative since a lot has changed over the years in the hospitality trade that our General Managers have not ventured out to, and now they need to catch up. Therefore the foreign General Managers will be able to add value to the company through their experience.

Pix by Upul Abayasekara