The Beginning: In the last installment, Yawa-Attah faced the disappointment of not gaining admission to pursue her dream career due to weak examination results. She found herself at a crossroads, uncertain about which direction to take. After intensive training in hotel front office operations, she found herself for the first time at a premier hotel, with her new boss, Mr. Aanani.
Learning the Ropes Part 1
The schedules for the front office personnel were:
– Morning Shift: 6 am – 3 pm
– Mid Shift: 10 am – 7 pm
– Evening Shift: 1 pm – 10/11 pm
– Graveyard Shift: 10 pm – 7 am
Placing Yawa-Attah on a permanent 6 am – 3 pm shift for her first 4 months, Mr. Aanani took it upon himself to guide her, teaching her the intricacies of front office operations.
Smallish in stature and of average height, Yawa-Attah wouldn’t accept that she was timid, but she acknowledged that she was quiet, reserved, sensitive, and shy by nature.
Being an experienced and mature person, Mr. Aanani could read the signals Yawa-Attah was sending. Her tense posture, hesitant movements, and avoidance of eye contact revealed her nervousness. It was her first time working a permanent job and the only female joining an all-male front desk team. Despite her signals, Yawa-Attah listened attentively during her sessions with Mr. Aanani as he emphasized the value of discipline, integrity, product knowledge, commitment, and hard work. Leaning forward and nodding in agreement, she quickly began learning the ropes, working diligently and absorbing everything she could. Under his mentorship, Yawa-Attah found herself growing more confident each day, particularly working on administrative tasks at the back office of the front desk.
A typical morning shift at the front desk required arriving at the hotel at 5:45 AM. Although she usually got in a few minutes earlier, she was not expected to clock in until her scheduled time of 6:00 AM. She usually clocked out at 3:30 PM.
During morning shifts, at least two dedicated hotel front desk representatives are assigned to help the hotel guests check in or check out. Their responsibilities include greeting the guests with a smile, welcoming them in accordance with the hotel standard, verifying their booking details, making them aware of the mode of payment, offering them a glimpse of the room if necessary, confirming bookings, and assuring guests a great and pleasant stay. They also handle and control all the challenging problems and arrange real-time solutions for in-house guests. A senior among them acts as the guest relations officer.
Without computerized systems, Yawa-Attah’s first task during the morning shift included checking the status of the hotel, referencing reservation details of expected arrivals, and updating the room rack by assigning rooms to anticipated arrivals.
It was important that she knew the room types: adjacent rooms, adjoining rooms, single rooms, double rooms, or suites. Of the 166 rooms, Yawa-Attah had a mental view of rooms facing the swimming pool, the gardens, and the tennis courts.
In those days, hotels adopted a rack system for just about every facet of their front desk operations. The room rack was only the tip of the iceberg. The reservation racks contained the names of the expected guests and their arrival dates. Typically, there was one rack for every day of the upcoming months and fewer racks for future arrival dates. In larger hotels, racks often covered the whole wall of the reservation office, but at the Continental Hotel, the room rack was on the front desk counter, holding 170 slots standing at a 60-degree angle. A folio bucket had a large number of slots where folios were arranged sequentially according to room number. It was used to store and track the folios of the registered guests of the hotel and also used to maintain the folios safely for future use and reference.
There were the information rack, the key and mail rack, and the sales rack, each serving their specified purposes. It may be hard to imagine what they might have looked like; so, since a picture is worth a thousand words, below is a quick photo gallery to create a visual guide to the past.
On the surface, it seemed like the hotel’s product was simply its rooms and accommodation units. However, Yawa-Attah soon discovered that the hotel product was far more complex. It encompassed the entire range of services offered by the establishment, from dining services, bank services, and casino operations to event planning and concierge services.
Determined to excel in her role, Yawa-Attah decided to develop her own system to quickly learn and master the hotel’s product in a manual operational system environment. She began by creating a detailed notebook, where she meticulously documented services offered by the hotel. She included descriptions, pricing, and other special features or packages associated with each service.
Yawa-Attah was amazing at handling administrative tasks and juggling phone calls. She quickly mastered the art of managing reservations and coordinating with other departments.
Mr. Aanani had been hinting that she would soon spend more time working at the front desk. As a wake-up call, Yawa-Attah had been reflecting on her need to overcome her shyness and the unintentionally anti-social signals she had been sending out, now that her attention had been drawn to the latter. She knew she had been avoiding face-to-face interactions with guests, so she had yet to experience the pressure of the constant stream of visitors at the front desk, where she would not only need to greet guests but also handle complaints and maintain her composure in a high-stress environment. The challenges of interacting with guests, managing their requests, and resolving conflicts were still ahead of her.
She remembered her father’s advice to focus on the nose of individuals while talking to them, as a way to maintain eye contact without feeling too intense. Her occasional attempts to practice this technique left her feeling intimidated, especially since the guests she was handling were largely demanding business travelers.
Whenever she received commendation from Mr. Aanani, Yawa-Attah would be heard saying, “It’s an art.” One day, she confessed to him, “It can be quite a balancing act.” Mr. Aanani, with his soft-spoken demeanor and gentle smile, would occasionally tease her, “Ever feel like you needed an extra pair of hands?” as he watched her expertly multi-tasking.
As Yawa-Attah settled into her role, Mr. Aanani began to slowly introduce her to the frequent hotel guests who had specific preferences for particular guestrooms. Over time, she became familiar with their routines and requests and was gradually moved to the mid- shift schedule after four months under the direct tutelage of Mr. Aanani.
Thank you for reading! Stay tuned for the next installment.
Disclaimer: This story is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
