Roles and Responsibilities of the Front office Reception

Discuss about the Development Of An Internship Program Of Punthill Apartment Hotel.

The study is mainly focused on the development of an internship program by the individual for the position of front office reception. The main aim of doing this internship program is to make that individual leading manager for the company Punthill Apartment hotel. The company is providing the opportunities for the individuals to upgrade the skills and the knowledge of the individuals so that the individual could be able to become the leading manager in this hotel. The period of internship is 2 months starting from 19^th Feb and ending on 29^th April. This internship is really important for the individuals to prepare for and operating in high skills environment and empowers the authority of doing the employment in the right place (Sigala Christou and Gretzel 2012). There are basically 12 staffs under the supervision of the individuals. The duties and the responsibilities of the front office reception has laid down which should be linked with the development of the skills and knowledge of the individuals for the post of manager in this hotel.

The Punthill apartment hotel is located in the heart of the capital. It is basically located in Melbourne which is present in the renowned Paris end of the Flinders Lane. This apartment hotel offers range of facilities to the guests which involve the spacious and the stylish one, two and the three bedroom apartments (Yiu and Law 2012). They also provide kitchen, laundry facilities, flat TVs and the high speed internet access as well. They also provide features like the gym facility, spa, resident manager and the daily apartment service as well. The hotel is located in a very good place which has the good transport system. There are many places around this hotel where the tourists are getting attracted due to the bars, theatres, gardens located beside this hotel. The Punthill apartment hotels are located in 13 locations across Melbourne and Brisbane. Punthill hotel should be providing stylish and spacious accommodation in Melbourne and Brisbane for the business travelers from anywhere in Australia or across the globe as well. Punthill also offers long term stays in Brisbane as well they also provide the comfortable and styish Brisbane serviced apartments as well. They have the dedicated staffs in each of their hotels present and operating in the different parts of Australia. They are ensuring that high quality service is to be provided to the clients and they are taken care of very good. They also have the full catering services when they stay in Punthill. The Punthill hotels basically targets the business travelers, business executives as the accommodation for the hotels are quite expensive (Felicen et al. 2014). They also provide discounts to the guests. They do not take any kind of booking fees for the guests as well. They are receiving the email updates on the hotel discounts and promotions to be made as and when required by the Punthill apartment hotel (Zopiatis and Constanti 2012). The company also targets the guests who are coming from the various parts of the country or overseas. The company also target the guest who are from the own Punthill website, the other travel agencies and tours like the booking.com. agoda,  expedia and the walk-ins as well. The guests who are the travel lovers are also targeted by the company.

Learning Goals

The individual is doing an internship for the position of front office reception in Punthill Apartment Hotel. The role of the front office reception is going to be illustrated in this section and the achievements of the individual as the front office reception is also illustrated which is useful for the individual to have the success to be measured for the internship program to be done by the individual (Lee and Chao 2013). It is important to understand the fact that the front office reception is an important position in the hotel industry. The front office reception is the first place inside any hotel premises where there has been the direct interaction with the guests to be taken place as well. The front office reception is one of the most important positions where there is the desired skills and knowledge to be evaluated so that the individual could be able to achieve the goal of becoming the leading manager for this hotel from where the individual is doing the internship as well. There is the explanation of the roles the individual should play as the individual is doing the internship program and the roles are given below

Roles and Responsibilities of the Front office Reception

• The individual should be practicing that how the guests should be checked in and checked out of from the hotel.
• The reservations of the hotel rooms should be checked and implemented along with the walk- ins should be looked by the front office reception as well.
• The guest requirements and the request should be looked on an urgent basis by the individual.
• The individual should also concern about the satisfaction level of the guests and they think that whether they are happy or not all the times.
• The individual should be also be supervising and assisting the housekeepers and should be looking the requirements as well.
• The individual should be keeping all the banking details and the record keeping.
• They should be attending the accounts receivable.
• They also check the floors while on duty.
• They also coordinate and supervise maintenance and contractors site.
• The individual should be attending to any after hours when there is call.
• There should be clear and concise communication to be developed with the property manager all the times.
• Clear and proper communication with the head office as well all the times.
• The individual should ensure that all the activities are completed in a timely manner and effective handover of the notes as and when required.
• The individual should be completing all the activities in accordance with the Punthill policy and procedures.
• The individual should be looking for any other requirements from time to time.

The discussion of all the learning goals which derives that what the individual has learnt from the internship program and the goals which are not yet achieved by the intern after doing the internship program at Punthill Apartment hotel. So the learning goals to be achieved are given in the table format

I have gone through a valuable learning experience when I was having my first job in front office reception in Punthill apartment hotel. From the outset, I have learnt that how I will be able to check ins and check outs of the guests. I have given assistance in the inconveniences of the guest rooms, answered the telephone calls and gave plenty of information to the guests who are coming from overseas. My experience was wonderful as I could be able to meet and communicate with various types of guests. I learnt that I need to have always the smiling faces and maintain the decorum when I was doing the internship on front office reception as this place is the first meeting point for the guests coming to the hotel. I have experienced that greeting the customers is always an art which should be developed only if the hands on experience is implemented rather than how to deal with the customers as specified by the seniors in the internship program. I have learnt that how I should be working and improving the communication skills after meeting and interacting with the guests face to face only. I could be able to understand and realized the actual requirements of the guests and this will be helpful for me to attend the guest carefully and provide them the best service they are looking for. I have also experienced that when I was doing my internship I faced one problem with the guest. The problem I faced was that I could not be able to convince the guests and make the guest understand the additional facilities the company provides to each and every guest and which are completely free. I could not make him understand about the facilities and this is the most influential experience which I have witnessed and accepted in my life.

Recommendations for the Internship Program

The recommendations for the course could be that this internship program is quite less and it is just of 2 months. The duration of the internship period needs to be extended so that the proper requirements of the intern could be identified and evaluated at the best possible way. This internship program is not making the adjustments for the leading position for manager which is not justified in this internship program (Kozak and Kozak,  2016). So it is recommended that the internship program needs to be highlighting some of the job duties and responsibilities of the manager itself in order to encourage the intern to fulfill its vision. It is recommended that for doing an internship program it is useful that they should be able to providing the great infrastructure for the interns so as to maintain a safe and secured working environment to show their skills and knowledge (Mok Sparks and Kadampully 2013). It is also recommended that the course needs to be prioritizing the activities so that it should not make the interns bore of doing the internship program as well (Fook 2017).

It is also recommended that the WIL program should be providing the required training materials to be upgraded so that they can be used effectively in this program. It should also be facilitating the link between the innovative ideas and the knowledge of the technical expertise during the WIL program initiated by the company (Taylor 2017). It is recommended that the WIL program need to provide the opportunities to meet with the business executives and get the real time feedback from this program.

The management skills which are basically required by the intern for the desired position of front office reception should be effective communication skills, the multitasking, good inter personal skills, excellent technical expertise, the prioritization skills, the problem solving and decision making skills as well (Legrand Chen and Sloan 2013).

The management qualities which the intern should require for the desired position of the front office reception should be given as follows.

• They should have the ability to communicate in a better way over the phone with the guests.
• They should be able to administer control over the operations of the housekeepers in a proper manner.
• The intern needs to be having proper and full control of the record keeping and the handling of the guest details.
• The intern should develop and maintain healthy relationship with the co workers and the staffs working under the intern.
• The intern should have gathered the technical expertise and they should be expected to work with the other properties of the Punthill Apartment hotel as well.
• The intern should also be able to inspire and motivate the co workers and the staffs with whom the intern is working.

The management theories related with the position of front office reception leading to the post of front office manager are given below

The systems theory of management is basically the theory where there is the development of an open system to be taken place. In this case the intern is doing the internship program in this hotel. The intern is giving its inputs to the hotel and the intern should be hoping for the best output to have it. The front office reception and the other departments of the hotel should be working together to make this internship program to be successful leading to the position of front office manager for the intern in the future (Wijesinghe 2014).

Management Skills and Qualities

The two workplace issues which are faced by the intern while doing the internship program for the post of front office reception should be handling of the inbound calls and the scheduling of the activities to be done by the staffs under the provision. It is a very tough job to handle all the inbound calls with all the energy and greetings for the guest calling for the reservations as well as other queries the guest have it. (Chen and Shen 2012). The phone etiquette is essential in handing and providing answer of all the requirements for the guest and any doubts they have it. So the handling of huge volumes of inbound calls for the intern could be the critical workplace issue which is faced by the intern at the time of doing internship program.

Elton Mayo has developed this theory. This theory entails that for the front office reception to be made successful for the intern, the intern should be able to develop healthy relationship with the team members and increase the levels of commitment for the intern to do the program effectively (Mok Sparks and Kadampully 2013). This helps in making the individual to have the leading position for the front office manager.

The next could be the improper scheduling of the activities for the intern during the internship program. The scheduling of activities is important in the analysis and the evaluation of the day to day activities of the hotel (Nickson 2013). There is the need of the prioritization of the activities to be taken place so that the urgent tasks are done earlier.

According to Abdullah et al. (2015) the recommendations for the handling of the huge volumes of inbound calls should be the sharing of the calls which eases out the pressure of the intern. The intern during the internship program should be trying to be developing the phone etiquettes so that they can be able to handle the calls effectively and efficiently as well. The intern should also have the computer systems in front of the desk where the intern could be able to reply to the queries of the customers online as well (Hsu2017). The next recommendation could be that the activities which are scheduled earlier should be rescheduled. There should also be the cancellation of the appointments and the unnecessary queries given by them. It is important that the intern should be able to introduce the notes where the activities are written done by the intern by which they can be able to prioritize and complete the tasks properly.

Management Theories

Conclusion

It is evident that the WIL program introduced by the company is very good and it should be enhancing the performance of the intern participating in this WIL program. It concludes that the internship program organized by this hotel is basically to improve the skills and knowledge of the intern by which the intern could be able to fulfill the vision of becoming the leading manager of this hotel. It is also evident that the intern had to face certain workplace issues while doing the internship program in this hotel. It concludes that Punthill apartment hotel is very good for doing the internship program as the company provides best of the facilities to the individual so that they can be able to apply the innovative ideas and knowledge in the internship program. It is concluded that the impact of this internship program is huge and positive for the future management of the students. This internship program is providing the platform for the students to start their professional career with a hike.

References

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