Unit 15 Operations on Resort Management Assignment

Introduction

Unit 15 operations on resort management assignment has been divided into 3 major tasks. The discussion would be carried out on the operations of resort management. This would be basically on the functions of the resort operations, health and safety issues, structure of the resort management, importance of the effective quality management system and the range of incidents that are happening or taking place in a resort. The travel and tour operator that is being selected for UK is Thompson Holidays. I am working as a Travel and tour executive with this operator and this assignment is the report that I would submit to my management on the findings of the resort operations and processes that happen in them. Task 1 would lay down the importance of the various functions and structure that exist in the resort. Task 2 would analyze the different quality systems and their adherence to the resort operations management and processes. The output that could be generated from the resort operations or the management would also be discussed. Task 3 would concentrate on the various incidents and the management and attending of the incidents that are taking place in the premises of the resorts.

Task 1

This task would discuss on the various functions that exist or are performed in the resort operations. This would also discuss on the handling of the various suppliers, customers and meeting the legal and laws. The structure of the resort management would also be analyzed in this task as well. As a travel and tourism executive, I would prepare a management report for the selling and packaging of the resorts to the various customers based on the topics and subjects that would be analyzed here.

A Using a couple of resorts you have chosen to focus from your company portfolio, investigate and analyze the various functions of resort operations, including the coordination and handling of various suppliers and customer service function as well as managing the legal requirements, e.g. health and safety issues, contracts, meeting local laws etc. 

Profile of Thompson Holidays: It was started in the year 1965 and has been into travel and tourism business from 1965 onwards. The company is involved in providing all kinds of packages like leisure, family and business holidays. It deals with the corporate as well as the individuals to make their holidays the wonderful and best event that they could plan for. The company ties up with various hotels and resorts so that the guests as well as the corporate clients could be accommodated as per their budgets (Chambers & Johnston, 2009).

The functions within the Resort Operations could be divided into three major categories: Management of the front of House, House Heart Management I and House Heart Management II. Front of the house will deal with the reception, vendor coordination and various other kinds of the admin & support functions and services. The Heart of the House will comprise of the Resort Operations, purchasing function, accounting and other revenue and profitability related operations for the resorts.

These above mentioned categories could be discussed in detail. The various functions that are included in the resort operations are discussed as under:

• Coordination and Handling of various suppliers, customers and clients & Improving Customer Level for Services – Resort has to make sure that the suppliers, vendors are meeting their requirements in terms of the turn around time to provide the inventory. It has to make sure that the customers and clients that get the promised services and benefits that have been negotiated with them. The basic amenities as per the class have to be available to the customers. It has to make sure that the feedback and evaluation of the services are being taken from the various corporate clients so that the services and their quality could be improved to increase the sales and foot fall.
• Management of the Legal and statutory compliances – The Resort has to make sure that it follows the various standards of quality and the basic amenities.  There is requirement that all the legal and statutory compliances pertaining to food and safety are being followed and evaluated.
• Ensuring that health and safety issues are resolved – It has to abide by the health and safety act 1974 so that the food, sanitation and the living conditions at the resort are being maintained and followed. These issues would be resolved only when the act is clearly specified and declared to all the employees working for the resort as well as the travel and tourism company (Slack et al, 2010).
• Fulfilment of the various contracts – The Resort legal team has to make sure that they keep agreement and contract terms and conditions clear and concise as per the policies of the various contractors and vendors. They need to keep the low management fees and the best services in tact. The labour working for the Resort is given the wages as per the UK Labour law and even the statutory compliances are being met. Above all the new and standard compliances should be followed without any fail in the system and processes.
• Enhancement of the efficiency in terms of the operations – Resort has to make sure that the operations in terms of various departments in the company are taken professionally with quality.
• Improvement of the productivity of the labour – The employees working for the resort have to be trained and equipped with the skills of technical, customer and client handling. They have to be trained on the evacuation and fire procedures.

B critically examine and analyse the resort management structure for the various types of tour operators and their guest-related activities, including specialist programmes such as driving or seasonally varied events such as winter sports.

The structure that is associated with various tour and travel operators and the guest service activities including the specialists activities are:

• A formal agreement is being signed on the basis of the negotiated cost or the rates of the various services that the resort would provide to the client or the tour operators. This agreement will be kept as a record for the internal as well as external audits.
• Tour Operator would in turn provide the brochures, education and training study trips and programs.
• Deployment of extra manpower by resort during the events or the seasons when the tour operators convince and give the number of guests or the corporate clients that they would be getting.
• There is signing of the pricing and the business that the tour operator will get for the resort in the seasons and the various events. This will help in clarifying the various acts and the laws that have to be abided by within the resort.

The structure in terms of the accommodation comprises of the following at the resort:

• Full Board – This will not include the services like airport transfers but will comprise of all the activities that are present within the resort. This will range from all kinds of modern amenities and facilities.
• All Inclusive resorts – This resort has all the services that it caters to in terms of the airport transfers, taxes, rooms, meals and all kinds of modern amenities.
• Self Catering Restaurants – These are the small real time restaurants that offer buffet as well as ala-carte menu food to its various clients and customers who have been staying here.
• The structure will comprise of the kind of services, association and the network that takes place among the various people within or outside the resort (Miller et al, 2007).
• Summer & Winter Programs and Events – summer and winter vacations are observed to have the maximum foot of the customers as the customers look forward for Spending time with their families in relaxing mode. Resorts are said to be the best places for these seasons so that the visitors and customers will relax.

It could be said that the resort has got all the essential and significant functions and structure pertaining to them has been kept very simple and approachable. The tour operators are linked with the functions of the resort as they will accordingly define the operations to the customers to whom they would be selling the packages.

Task 2

This task would comprise of the importance of the effective quality systems in resort operations. We will also give an insight on how the implementation of the effective quality management systems helped the resort in producing the desired results and even impacting on the operations of the resort.

C Analyzing how implementing an effective quality systems and procedures by your organization (tour operator) produced results and impacted on the operations of the resort. 

The quality management process of Six Sigma and the Total Quality Management has really helped the resort in improving its services. The services as well as the various packages or the products have been offered which were preferred and liked by the consumers. With the advent of the various checklists and audits to check the quality in products, processes and compliances, it has really improved and altered the services. There have been a lot of benefits of the Quality systems and processes like:

• It has improved the quality of services and the kind of products that exist in the resort. When the systems will run through the various phases the problems of all kinds could be easily avoided and prevented (Schmenner, 1981).  
• All the internal customers are also happy as there are standards and process driven approach that is being followed in the resort. The training or the induction session should take place within the resort every month that will help the new as well as old employees in getting to know on the various processes that exist in the system.
• Each audit or check helps the organization in improving the system quality and process. This audit takes place in a checklist and a specified format that need not be shared across outside the resort.
• The revenue and the sales of the resort have been doubled in the last 1 year after the implementation of this process.
• The satisfaction levels of the various customers have also been increased.
• There has been addition of many new and key players in the corporate sector to which the resort has been providing the services in term of resort operations.

Thompson Holidays has implemented the above mentioned quality management procedures and practices that has made it one of the most admired tour operator and the tourism service provider in the entire world. The impact of the quality systems is that:

• It has become one of the largest and admired tour operators.
• It has many loyal customers that remain with the company in opting for holiday packages.
• It has even helped the resorts in developing their quality and standards to provide best services to their clients and customers.

Task 3

This task will concentrate on the range of incidents that take place in the resort environment and evaluating the procedures that are implemented by a tour operator in these situations. The detailed procedures for dealing with the kind of incidents would also be discussed and carried out.

D Analyze a range of incidents that affect the resort environment and evaluate the procedures to be implemented by a tour operator to deal with different force majeure situations in the resort.

There are various types of incidents that are taking place in the resort:

• Natural Incidents – These are the incidents that are being caused due to natural disasters or the happening or due to forces of nature. For example fire, floods, tidal waves etc (Sousa & Voss, 2008).
• Transport Incidents – These are incidents that happen due to the crashes, hijacks, travelling in vehicles that are unsuitable and the safety issues related with the resort transportation system.
• Medical Incidents – These are the incidents that take place on the medical grounds like: typhoid, cholera, malaria break or the food poisoning etc.
• Political Incidents – On the political front in case some terror or happening takes places then also the business would be affected.
• Accommodation Issues – These would comprise of the staying problems. This may also describe like in case a person has been committed for the stay but the places are unavailable. 

The incidents are the large scale spreading of the diseases and the problems that may lead to further issues and may lead to health and safety issues. Resorts are the places that comprise of a lot of open spaces and even the extra-curricular activities that may involve the areas like grounds and the parks where due to water logging, the diseases and insects may exist and spread the health related illnesses that may again be spread on a larger scale.

The various procedures that could be adopted for the checking of the incidents are:

• There is a display of the emergency contact details of the senior people in the resort and even the government officials.
• Foreign and Fire Office Certifications and licenses have been taken.
• ABTA rules, regulations and the code of conduct is kept in mind while deciding on the package and the program that the resort has been organizing with the various tour and travel operators.
• There is a fire evacuation and drill that is being organized for all the staff so that they remain aware of what actions have to be taken in a fire.
• The Guidelines from FTO are mentioned on a display for the crisis management and handling.
• The guidelines for the duty office are also displayed and lined up in the various office premises (Zhang et al, 2003).
• Tour Operators keep first aid and other incident control checklist with their representatives so that the same could be handled by tour manager.
• They will hand over the precaution and the checklist that will help the visitors with the contact details of the authorities and people who have to be referred in case there are problems of the incidents during the tours.

These procedures that are implemented by the Tour Operators have to be linked and associated with that of the guidelines that are being given by various kind of trade organizations and the authorities that are laying down the policies and procedures for the tour operators and the resorts operations. There should be a mapping on the policies that resorts and tour operators develop as it will help in adherence to the processes and development of the policies well.

E Discuss how procedures to be implemented in dealing with incidents comply with guidelines of trade associations and government bodies.

The procedures that are implemented so that the various incidents that are happening are complied with the guidelines of the trade associations and government bodies are:

• Regular fire drill and fire evacuation programs that being organized at internal as well as external level. This means that there would be activities pertaining to the internal audits and checks for the fire. The auditors will visit and check the processes that resort has defined.
• The resort has to renew its emergency and incident licenses so that it could be associated with the concerned association that can immediately arrive in case there is any incident in the resort.
• The guidelines for the health and safety of all the employees needs to be displayed and put on the notice board so that it could found out whether the health and safety issues are attended in a specific way and as per the required guidelines.
• There should be internal as well as external audits that should take place so that the processes and practices are kept track of.
• The training has to be organized for the rules, regulations and the standard operating procedures that have to be carried out within the organization. Red Cross Society and the various other associations have to be followed up for the training sessions as they would be professional and encourage the learning and participation.
• The incidents like labour unions and employee oriented incidents and problems are controlled by follow of the UK Department of labour and its compliances.

Incidents are sure to take place in the resort but by taking action against them we can surely prevent their happening. The guidelines as per ABTA have to be fulfilled and even trained to the resort and the travel and tourism sector that join hands with each other in realizing the package or the tourism activity. There is development of a Crisis team management committee that comprises of the Resort Manager, HR Representative, Legal Representative and the operations person working within the resort so that the crisis team could immediately take up the steps to prevent any kind of loss or the mis-happening that is taking place within the resort (Johnston, 1999).

Resort Operations are very tedious in case not attended to in a proper way. It is always important that the processes, rules and regulations are certainly abided by as per the UK labour and employment laws so that the manpower is satisfied. Above all the working conditions and the health and safety processes have to be taken in full swing so that the health and safety of the employees is maintained within the organization. Quality Systems and its maintenance as an attribute within the organization is very important. Quality when maintained will surely attract more and more business and then will surely help the resort in improving services, productivity and even the customer loyalty. The customers will then simply not go in other resorts to spend their time.

Incidents are also bound to happen wither natural or the man-made but when suitable actions are being taken then they could easily be prevented to take place within the organization. There should be a committee that must be set up within the premises of the resort that will include the internal as well as external members and they will make sure that incidents could be avoided and prevented for happening further. This will encourage growth and development in terms of revenue and profitability for the resort. Hence it could be said that resort operations management will surely impact their business, revenues and the kind of profitability that is being generated within the resort.

References

Chambers, S., & Johnston, R. (2009). Operations and process management: principles and practice for strategic impact. Pearson Education.
Johnston, R., & Clark, G. (2005). Service operations management: improving service delivery. Pearson Education.
Johnston, R. (1999). Service operations management: return to roots. International Journal of Operations & Production Management, 19(2), 104-124.
Miller, J. G., Graham, M. B., Freeland, J. R., Hottenstein, M., Maister, D. H., Meredith, J., & Rutherford, D. G., & O'Fallon, M. J. (Eds.). (2007). Hotel management and operations. John Wiley.
Schmenner, R. W. (1981). PRODUCTION/OPERATIONS MANAGEMENT: AGENDA FOR THE'80s*. Decision Sciences, 12(4), 547-571.
Sousa, R., & Voss, C. A. (2008). Contingency research in operations management practices. Journal of Operations Management, 26(6), 697-713.
Slack, N., Chambers, S., & Johnston, R. (2010). Operations management. Pearson Education.
Upchurch, R., & Lashley, C. (2006). Timeshare resort operations. Routledge.
Zhang, J., Chai, K. H., & Tan, K. C. (2003). 40 inventive principles with applications in service operations management. The TRIZ Journal, 1-16.

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