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The following pages celebrate some of the country’s upcoming general managers, some of whom are keen first-timers. Punam Mohandas reveals their operational practices, and mantras for success.
Raring to go
First-time general manager, Deepak Manocha, is visibly excited, and has great plans ahead for the Courtyard by Marriott at Pune-Hinjewadi.
Manocha is unabashedly elated in his new role, and rightly so – for any hotelier who passes out of college, the ultimate objective is always ‘when do I get to be a GM’? The excitement and new-found sense of authority is palpable not just when you meet colleagues from across the industry, but also when you interact with guests in this different avatar.
“It took me a little while to swallow the news when I first heard, the feeling is unexplainable”, he admits. “With this comes the responsibility, the ability to lead your own ship.” A humble and simple man, Manocha is one person whom colleagues across the industry have a high regard for.
They also say he is a ‘man of few words’, to which he laughingly responds – “I’d really like to hear more about this. I’m sort of an introvert, and I like to stick to what I mean to say. However, being an operations person, I don’t like to be holed up in my office, I like to go out and about in the hotel during the busy hours.”
The best hoteliers are those who plan for a downturn; does he subscribe to this view? “Yes, for sure”, affirms Manocha.
“We all know and understand that hoteliering is a business cycle. It’s more about responsiveness; freeze on recruitment, taking staff internally from within the company, focus on training, retaining customers. This is also the time to revisit systems and processes that have always been there, cut short some steps, and still get the desired results. In good times, a long-term strategy used to be one year, and short term was six months to one month - now, long-term is considered three months!”
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Manocha is perceived as being something of a ‘launch specialist’, having opened a couple of properties earlier as well. Does he agree with the general perception?
“If there is an opportunity, I’d be very happy to go out and do that, or, if it’s to run another hotel, that’s fine too – there is a lot of learning on both sides,” he says.
The earlier hotel strategy used to be ‘increase ARR to meet costs’, now, lower ARR’s means reducing on operating costs. How is he addressing this issue? “There’s a fine line between quality and cost-line specific to us.
A lot of technology comes into play here, newer best practices come into place. We always were a firm believer in that we would never take the ARR to the bank – we would take RevPAR to the bank.
Definitely, it means reducing on operating costs. We opened in the midst of this (economic) scenario, so we have minimal staffing ratios, more emphasis on efficiency and productivity, and we work on cost-efficient food which is nonetheless high on quality.
These steps have been taken not to impact on a customer’s experience, but more from the back-end operations point of view,” he says.
“The way businesses fluctuate, you’ve got to be dynamic to change the course of how you do business. Pune’s currently going through this epidemic of swine flu; for us, to create the necessary steps was essential...sure its modern-day management simply because, if a situation like this goes out of hand, it will have a negative impact on the industry. According to me, modern-day management means being hands-on; working alongside the team, and realising the need of the hour. I think I have the liberty to take action for things within my control,” Manocha concludes.
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