7 Benefits of Having a System Evaluation Team for Your Hotel

The main objective of the system evaluation team is to complete the evaluation and to help select the property management system that will offer the best all round business solution for your hotel.

The Evaluation Team, led by the Project Manager may consist of operational managers, supervisors and front-line staff.  These team members may be representatives from departments such as Front Desk, Reservations, Housekeeping, Sales, Accounting, Concierge and the Information Technology Department.

Benefits of the Evaluation Team include,

1. Confirming existing known needs and uncovering further needs.
2. Reducing the risk of missing any business, staff and guest needs during analysis.
3. Improving communication between departments.
4. Working as a group to cover the bases and ensure objectives are met.
5. The Evaluation Team may be reassembled to become the Implementation Team for next stage. 
6. The Evaluation Team may be reassembled to work together on continual process improvement.
7. The Evaluation Team may be reassembled to create departmental teams to provide staff training programs that will be needed once the property management system in place and staff turnover occurs.

There are extended benefits of an Evaluation Team.  Since this team has worked together and knows each other and the business needs, they can easily transition to assist with phases that follow the purchase of the property management system, such as the implementation and maintenance phases.. 

1. Phase One, selection and purchase of a property management system.
   The property management system evaluation process ends with the selection and purchase of a property management system for the hotel.


2. Phase Two, Implementation of the property management system.
   The system is installed at the hotel, staff training is completed and the system goes live and is in full use at the hotel. The Implementation Team work on improving business processes.


3. Phase Three, Maintenance.
   The maintenance phase is ongoing and managed by the Maintenance Team/Training Teams. It is here that staff training programs address staff turnover and also to work with existing staff that may need re-training.  This training would involve re-visiting areas that staff are familiar with but need work on in order to maintain their knowledge as well as learning new areas in order to build their knowledge.  The objective of ongoing training is to help the staff continue to make the most of the system while being efficient in their roles, as well as using the property management system and processes consistently throughout your organization.

Good luck with the process!


Jeff Sefton