The hotel financial manager – challenges for the future

Abstract

Recent reports focussing on the future of the global hospitality industry have identified that the key issues for management include the impact of new technology, a lack of availability of capital investment and increasing concern for the future of the environment. The hotel financial manager has emerged as being of major importance in maintaining the profitability of the unit and the company and plays an increasingly influential role as part of the management team. They must now identify the challenges for the future within their own working environment and develop the technological and personal skills necessary to manage in this new age.

A comparison of graduating seniors who receive job offers and those who do not according to hospitality recruiters’ selection criteria

“…Managers in this study believed that certain interpersonal skills, problem solving abilities, and selfmanagement skills are most important for a successful hospitality career. Burgess (2000Burgess ( , 2007 focused the discussion on financial management in hotels and asserted that financial management skills are important to hotel managers.…”

Is there a future for hotel financial controllers?

“…This, as has happened elsewhere, has resulted in controllers becoming far more of a member of the management team and an advisor to the business (Burgess, 1995(Burgess, , 2000(Burgess, , 2003. Technology has improved the processing of accounts and, hence, reduced the importance of this in the controller's role, but there has been a corresponding increase in the importance of analysis and interpretation of the accounts to aid in optimising profitability.…”

“…The trend over recent years has been for hotels to become more 'self-accounting' (meaning that they perform all or most of the accounting function within the unit, Burgess, 2000) rather than centralising at a regional or head office, as was the case in the past. As accounting is not seen as a core function in hotels ARTICLE IN PRESS (Laube, 2002) it is considered 'highly suitable' for outsourcing.…”

Planning for the centralization of accounting in chain hotels

“…When combined with an increasing emphasis on managers taking a more financial perspective (responsibility accounting - Chin et al, 1995), the demand for improved information has increased and the time spent on processing decreased. As a result, the financial controller has become much more of an advisor to the business (see Adams, 2000;Burgess, 2000;Gibson, 2002) to aid in the evolving key responsibilities of planning, interpretation and analysis.…”

“…The use of responsibility accounting (via the Uniform System of Accounts for Lodging, 1996) has enabled managers to take far more control of their departments, but they have always relied on the on-site controller to help them interpret their results and plan future actions (Burgess, 2000). Without on-site help they may have difficulties in achieving their business objectives.…”