Top 6 Hospitality Management Skills

If you’ve ever dreamed of owning a cozy country inn or greeting guests at the entrance to an opulent hotel, you’ve either watched too many movies or you were born for a career in hospitality management.

What those movies don’t focus on are the practical skills the hospitality industry needs. If you’re planning to work in hotels, restaurants, or tourism, taking hospitality courses can make all the difference. A degree in hospitality management is an excellent way to prepare for a career in the industry.

What is the Hospitality Industry?

The $247 billion U.S. hospitality business is made up of hotels, restaurants, convention centers, lodging such as bed and breakfasts, and tourist attractions. The business model of the hospitality industry is to make people welcome and feel at home.

Hotels are the best example of a hospitality business. Guests reserve rooms and stay for a weekend or longer. They use hotel amenities such as the pool, exercise room, gift shop, breakfast buffet, or laundry services. Depending on the level of service, hotels may have a spa, full dining restaurant, and expensive shops. All of these businesses within the hotel are part of the hospitality business, but they also require specific skills as well.

Specific hotel management areas include:

Front desk. Staff and managers greet guests, provide local information, and help solve guests’ concerns.

Maintenance. The maintenance team fixes and maintains hotel facilities, landscaping, and outdoor amenities such as the pool.

Housekeeping. Housekeeping makes sure that guest rooms are clean and fully stocked. They also clean the public areas of the hotel.

Food service. Depending on the hotel, a hotel may also have a full-service restaurant, which includes cooks, wait staff, and bussers.

Back office. Back office staff include accounts, bookkeeping, payroll, and human resources.

This wide range of hotel activities is the reason that hospitality management skills are so important to the industry. Managers who understand how to make guests feel welcome and have business and people management experience are in high demand. 

Important Hospitality Management Expertise

Navigating an industry like hospitality means that employees have to have a wide understanding of everything that goes into a hospitality company. This includes business, computers, marketing, human resources, building maintenance, and federal and state laws.

Hospitality professionals also have to be warm and welcoming to guests and comfortable with their concerns and criticisms. At the most formal level they will need to know etiquette and protocol to serve the most elite clientele.

A degree in hospitality management covers all of these topics and more. It lays the groundwork for the six top skills you’ll need for a successful career. 

1. Business Management

From small mom-and-pop outfits to multinational hotel chains, business knowledge is the backbone of the hospitality industry. Managers need to understand accounting, bookkeeping, payroll, and marketing.

You’ll learn financial management, marketing and sales, business licensing and permitting, purchasing – everything you need to understand what goes into a successful enterprise.

Make sure that a hospitality management degree includes classes on business administration before enrolling.

2. Human Resources

Hospitality staff are on the front lines of guest relations and have the greatest impact on guest experiences. That’s why it’s truly important for managers to focus on hiring, training, and retaining employees. Hospitality work is hard work, and it’s not well paid. Therefore, managers have to focus on retaining employees with incentives, training and advancement programs, and recognition of good work.

A human resources education background, as well as experience as hotel and restaurant staff, can be an unbeatable combination for a manager. This practical knowledge along with best practices that you can learn in school provides an excellent foundation for managing staff.

Human resources strategies include:

Competitive wages. This goes beyond compensation and includes benefits, vacation time, and performance incentives.

Recognition. Employees work hard. Guests can be demanding. Employee recognition can range from a simple thank you to cash or bonuses.

Work-life balance. Regular schedules allowing for set days off can go a long way to providing employee satisfaction. Irregular schedules that change weekly lead to burnout, absenteeism, and high turnover.

Career paths. People who know they can move up and make more money are more likely to stay with a company.

3. Computer Skills

Hospitality-specific computer software handles everything from booking to inventory to payroll and scheduling and more. Managers will need to be experts in these computer systems.

But you may also need to be proficient in spreadsheet applications (Excel, Google Sheets), word processing software, PowerPoint, and other presentation software. These are all part of being a manager. Being comfortable with computer use will help you grow your hospitality career.

4. Housekeeping and Maintenance

Hospitality is an industry in which hands-on experience is crucial toward having a successful career. Managing maintenance and housekeeping staff means knowing what these workers do. It means knowing what it means to clean rooms and public areas and maintain and fix the physical structures of a hotel. Housekeepers need to know how to clean fast and effectively, sanitizing and refreshing a hotel room as fast as possible. Housekeeping staff also need to be detail-oriented and discreet, as well as welcoming and helpful to guests.  

Maintenance staff should be certified in HVAC, plumbing, electric, and pool maintenance and have experience in using equipment for their jobs.

Housekeeping and maintenance staff work closely together in identifying issues and seeing that they are fixed quickly.

5. Kitchen Management

You don’t have to be a chef to run a restaurant or manage a hotel kitchen. You do have to know food service, food handling and safety, and regulations around running a safe kitchen. At the very least you should have food handling certification.

 Kitchen management includes:

• Food quality and safety
• Inventory and vendor relationships
• Equipment maintenance
• Staff hiring, training, and development
• Scheduling
• Wait staff and host/hostess management
• Customer relations
• Knowledge of health and safety regulations

Practical knowledge in these areas come from working in a kitchen. A hospitality management degree or certificate can provide more understanding of these areas and can help ensure that a restaurant meets health and safety regulations and customer experiences.

6. Business and Leisure Travel Trends

Keep up to date with trends in travel. Since the pandemic, travel has changed in several ways. As a hospitality professional, keeping up with these trends will help you better understand what your customers need.

Road trips. RVing is back. People are renting or buying RVs and hitting the road. They save on lodging but are spending tourism dollars on food, fuel, and experiences.

Combining business and leisure. The pandemic and the shift to remote work has changed the landscape of business travel. More and more travelers combine business and leisure travel, a category known as “bleisure.” Bleisure travel may start with a conference or trade show, but then travelers will add days on to their trip for vacation travel. They may travel with their family, coming together at the end of the business trip to enjoy hotel and area amenities.

Eco-friendly travel. There is a growing interest in eco-friendly hotels and experiences. Hotels can tap into this trend in a number of ways, including updating their infrastructure to include solar energy, chemical-free guest amenities, and healthier food choices. 

Wellness and medical tourism. The increased interest in wellness and health care has caused a boom in medical tourism. Wellness destinations, such as spas, yoga retreats, and healthy food, can be a draw for hotels seeking to capture these guests.

Business meetings and trade shows. The rebound in business travel means that hotels will see more business travelers. Trade shows are also seeing growth, which means higher demand for lodging and meals for travelers.

Why Choose a Hospitality Management Degree?

Hospitality management is a booming industry sector. Companies are looking for employees who have the desire to learn on the job and also have the management basics that are the foundation for a career. The ACC Hospitality Management program provides the training you need. You can choose among associate degrees and certificates that meet your goals. Explore these hospitality programs and find your path.