Overview 110

Earlier, in Chapter 3, I showed the core exchange, accommodation for money, is in reality a series of interactions between HotelCo and the guests. That is, the experience of accommodation comes into existence in and through HotelCo-guest encounters.

Subsequently, the provision of accommodation, i.e., the business of HotelCo, becomes about the production of performances experienced by the guests. In Chapter 4, using a dramaturgical framework, I illustrated aspects and elements of these performances, such as the stages on which they occur, the artifacts, and the roles involved, as well as the drama that unfolds in the interaction scenes. The focus of this chapter is to show the organizing role of the managers in directing the staged performance (the show or the play). Building on dramaturgy, and set within the above perspective, the aim of this chapter is to examine the role of managers in the production of accommodation at

HotelCo. Specifically, I explore organizing activities such as setting the stage(s) on which HotelCo-guest interactions occur, and arranging the physical spaces and the artifacts (the props). I also explore defining, organizing and directing the interaction roles performed by HotelCo actors. To begin, I outline details of an event at HotelCo (“unexpected visitors”), and use it as the basis on which I exhibit the organizing activities mentioned above.

5.1.1 A stand-up meeting

In one morning “ops meeting” that I attended, the hotel manager informed the Front Desk and Housekeeping directors about an unexpected visit by people from HotelCo

International. “This afternoon, our friends at HQ are coming for a visit to the property and perform a site audit,” said the Hotel Manager. Along with the auditors, the meeting attendees were informed, one “brand person” was coming to take new photos of HotelCo for the website. The upcoming visit by the “friends at HQ,” which incidentally would

correspond with the international high school students’ conference at HotelCo, set a series of actions in motion. Immediately following the ops meeting, in a stand-up ad hoc meeting held in the mezzanine overlooking the lobby, the hotel manager (the second in command after the general manager) ordered a series of changes to the lobby and its layout. He opened the meeting by saying:

“I want the mess these kids made in the lobby gone, now! Find a way to get them out of the lobby and somehow lock them [the conference attendees] in the conference halls. I don’t care where you pull bodies [referring to the

employees] from, make this place look presentable.”

In the same standing meeting, the Front Desk and Housekeeping directors explored options of finding “bodies” to usher the conference attendees away from the lobby and into the conference halls. The decision was to call to work five former Housekeeping

attendants who were on paid disability leave.27 The challenge was then to find the right

uniform sizes for these people, since their Housekeeping uniforms were not deemed appropriate for this new lobby role. The other problem was that, typically, the

Housekeeping employees are not adequately trained to interact with the guests; or worse, they are not trained to be a “voice of authority,” as the Front Desk director put it, in ushering the customers to different areas of the hotel. Nevertheless, the eventual agreement was to proceed with this idea and to call these people “lobby ambassadors” and to “teach them simple phrases to say.” As the Front Desk director told the others:

“Our goal is to [a short pause, then almost a smirk as he stressed the next word] ‘encourage’ the kids to move to the mezzanine level. If they [the new actors] are challenged by one of the guests or the kids, if they are asked why they are

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The terms of paid disability leave allows HotelCo to use the employees in light physical duties. Standing and walking around the lobby for short periods would fall into this category of work.

being moved, they need to respond by saying, ‘Because we created a special conference experience for you on the mezzanine level.’”

The meeting also resulted in the rearrangement of the physical look of HotelCo. Gardeners were rushed to make the outdoor pool area “look neat;” a maintenance crew was radioed in to sweep up the cigarette butts outside the main entrance and in the motor- court. The director of Housekeeping and I paid a visit to a few recently renovated (and vacant) rooms. He inspected the rooms, looked for possible old stains on the furniture and carpets, made sure the windows were streak-free and the beds were made according to “HotelCo standards.”

The lobby was another area that was re-staged in anticipation of the HQ visitors’ arrival. Normally, a contracted florist delivered fresh flower arrangements daily for areas of the lobby. On the day of the visit of the “friends at HQ,” the director of Front Desk services and I walked to a nearby unfamiliar florist to order four new flower arrangements. When we returned to the lobby, the director and I explored several different locations to place the flowers. Multiple scenarios and set-ups were tried out with different arrangements of furniture, flowers, lightings, and signs. After each set-up, the director of Front Desk services left the lobby and immediately re-entered through the main doors, acting out the entrance of the “friends at HQ,” pretending to be one of them entering the lobby for the first time and being “wowed” or impressed by the arrangements. After nearly an hour of testing different set-ups, she decided on a final look. The lobby was then dressed with new flowers, arranged with a new layout of furniture, and maintained by new actors “ushering” the crowd, and hiding the guests in the conference halls.