If your school or college does not have any arrangement for placing its graduates with hotels or chains, then you will be on your own. The following procedure applies also to the man or woman seeking employment in the hotel industry without the benefit of formal hotel training.
Most hotels or hotel chains have personnel or human resources departments. Write, telephone, e-mail, or visit in person the office of the employment director (assistant manager, personnel director) of those hotels or chains with which you wish to seek employment. Your goal will be not only to register for employment, but also to get yourself interviewed by the person in charge. If an opening exists, you must sell yourself as you would to get any job.
Where there are no openings, request information concerning other hotels or cities where possible openings may exist for you based on your experience, education, or background. Hotel people, especially those in the personnel departments, often know of such openings. If you have made a good impression, chances are that you may receive information concerning other opportunities.
In large hotels, besides contacting the person in charge of employment, communicate also with the heads of those departments for which you might qualify. Departmental heads often hire and fire their own employees. And, in some hotels, not all openings are cleared through the employment office. Some employment offices act as recordkeeping centers and perform routine personnel duties only.
If you can sell your personality and ability to the manager or executive head of the organization, he or she may wish to hire you as a trainee. Many managers are eager to find promising personnel for consideration as future executives. And they have the authority to add to the payroll.
THE AMERICAN HOTEL AND MOTEL ASSOCIATION
There are hotel associations in almost every state. One of the tasks they usually perform for members is to act as a clearinghouse for personnel. They often send out regular lists of available people to member hotels. Communicate with your state associations and with associations in other states. While permanent headquarters for these associations are maintained in some states, in most states the headquarters change each year with the election of new officers. For the correct address of the hotel association in your state, communicate with any hotel in your community.
The American Hotel and Motel Association, located in Washington, DC, represents practically all leading hotels and motels in the United States. Offering many services to its member hotels- such as legal, accounting, employee relations advice, and other helpful information-is also is a clearing center for specialized requests. If you are in Washington, it might be worth your while to call for information about opportunities in hotels. Or, if you are not in Washington, write or phone the association. It is located at 1201 New York Avenue NW, Suite 600, Washington, DC 20005, (202) 289-3100; web site: http://www.ahma.com. This website also lists individual state hotel/hospitality associations.
Another aid when you are making up a list of hotels to contact is the Hotel and Motel Red Book, published each year in June by the American Hotel and Motel Association. This is the bible of the hotels in this hemisphere. The Red Book lists hotels in the United States, Canada, Mexico, and other countries. You can use this volume as an address book of job leads.
The Red Book list addresses of hotels, describes the local railroad service, and provides detailed information about each hotel: the number of rooms; whether the hotel is a summer, winter, or all-year-round operation; whether the plan of operation is American or European; the minimum room rates; and the names of the managers. In addition, the Red Book provides the names of the officers and directors of the American Hotel and Motel Association, their affiliations and addresses, and a list of affiliated industries.
You do not need to purchase the book to use it. It can be found at most libraries and at the registration desk of most hotels. Most hotels will be glad to permit you to look at their copy and make notes.
INTERVIEWING
When applying for a position in a hotel, remember that hotel work is service work. A hotel's business reputation depends upon the quality of service it offers its guests. Service is best performed by people who are clean and neat. In a hotel, the personnel must always be polite, speak correctly, and use good manners.
Keep these points in mind when you apply for a position in a hotel. If you realize the interviewer's priorities, your own common sense should tell you how to act. You are being judged on your intelligence, your appearance, your manners, and your willingness to learn. Do not let hot-headed, impulsive emotions rule you. The interviewer is looking for a level-headed, self-controlled, flexible person. He or she is looking for someone who can adapt to changing situations and get along with all different kinds of people.
Above all, when you apply for a position in the hotel field, remember your appearance. One of the most important requirements in the hotel business is good appearance. Hotel people, by the very nature of their work, are required to be well groomed at all times. The hotel industry can probably claim the best-dressed people of any career field. You cannot expect to make a good impression when interviewing for a hotel job unless you are neat, clean, and appropriately dressed. Good grooming makes sense.
ADVANCEMENT
The history of the hotel industry shows that the path to success lies wide open for ambitious, intelligent, energetic people. Hotel policy usually gives preference on job openings to present employees who are enthusiastic and efficient workers. Many of today's top hotel executives have come up through the ranks, some starting as far down that ladder as assistant waiters, bellhops, and clerks. Tomorrow's hotel leaders may be an assistant waiter in San Francisco, a room clerk in Dallas, an accountant in Philadelphia. Even if they never become top executives, beginners are often promoted to more responsible positions. Housekeepers often start as maids, chefs as apprentices, restaurant managers as assistant waiters.
The length of time between promotions in the hotel industry varies. There is no set schedule or plan of advancement in most hotels. The only organizations where regular promotions are given are those conducting executive-training or exchange programs. In the former, someone being groomed for executive work will be rotated into different hotel departments to become familiar with the operations of the hotel. In an exchange program, hotels exchange department or sub department heads with one another in order to share ideas and learn from each other's operations.
In general, there is greater turnover in a large hotel than in a small hotel. Accordingly, swifter advancement is possible in the large hotel because openings occur more often, and changes are made to fill vacancies.
Mathematically, the law of averages (e.g., deaths, retirements, resignations, and transfers) will operate more to your advantage in an organization with many employees.
Management in most small hotels is identical with ownership. This limits your future prospects unless you can raise enough capital to buy or become a partner in a hotel. Most large hotels, by their size alone, represent huge investments. Very few people in the United States have sufficient capital to purchase or build a large hotel. Most large hotels are, therefore, owned by corporations representing huge financial investments of banks, insurance companies, or joint stock companies. Some hotels have been financed by public stock issues. Since the large hotels are generally controlled or managed but seldom owned completely, their corporate structure creates opportunities that would not exist in a privately owned enterprise. Corporations offer greater opportunities for advancement and often make top posts available to rank outsiders.
Uppermost positions in the hotel industry are attained only after many years of managerial and executive experience in the industry. The larger the hotel, the more experience will be required. There is actually a great difference in managing a medium-sized hotel and operating a huge edifice of a thousand or more rooms with many public and dining halls. You can get to one of the top hotels' posts only after you have had considerable experience in larger hotels.
Advancement in the hotel industry is unique and quite peculiar. Comparatively rapid, it does not follow a regular pattern, and it may be indirect. In most industries, employees advance or receive increases only after they have spent long periods of time in each position they hold. And in private industry, advancement is more commonly indicated by salary increases rather than a change in position. A driller in the oil industry keeps receiving pay increases, but no one would think of promoting the driller to assistant credit manager. A post office delivery person receives automatic pay increases, but no postmaster would promote the delivery person to a higher position as engraver in the State Department.
In the hotel industry, employees who merit advancement step into positions higher up in rank and salary. But this step up may lead the employee into an entirely different department. The advancement may even mean a move to another hotel, sometimes in a different city or country.
Therefore, do not sit and wait for an opportunity to arise. Take outside training courses. Contact department heads in the hotel and ask to be considered for various openings. The opportunities are there. It is up to you to take them.
Mr. Alan S. Jeffrey, previous director, the Educational Institute of American Hotel and Motel Association, writes that the hotel and motel field offers a future in one of the most exciting industries in the world today.
If you are seeking an exciting future, enjoy meeting and working with people in a growing industry with good pay, job security, and the opportunity to travel and live in different places, you may be just the person who should seek a career in the lodging industry.
There is some excitement about the hospitality business that is like none other. It is interesting, challenging, and rewarding. However, there are times when it is also frustrating. It is fast-moving and hectic. Hotels and motels operate twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, catering to the needs of people on the move.
Today it is not unusual for hotels to contain as many as a thousand rooms or more, though there are many with fewer than twenty-five rooms. Big or small, their purpose is the same-to serve food and shelter the traveling public. Because of this, ours is considered a service industry.
Providing away-from-home lodging and meals is one of the largest and fastest growing industries in the country today. The need for qualified employees is growing just as fast as the industry. Since more people travel today than ever before, and because of the increasing amount of leisure time most Americans enjoy, hotels and motels continue to be built. This means increased job opportunities
