HOTEL OPERATIONS ANALYSIS - 2020/1

Module Overview

This module will build on students’ existing knowledge, from their undergraduate studies in this area, of the operational issues facing hotels and the implications for profit performance. It will use a computer based hotel simulation exercise to allow students to experience the dynamics and complex interactions of hotel operation.

Module provider

Hospitality, Tourism & Events Management

Module Leader

ASHTON Mark (Hosp & Tour)

Number of Credits: 15

ECTS Credits: 7.5

Framework: FHEQ Level 7

Module cap (Maximum number of students): N/A

Module Availability

Semester 1

Prerequisites / Co-requisites

None

Module content

Indicative content includes:

• Operations strategy and operations synergy


• Business and operational planning


• Control and performance measurement


• Performance analysis and evaluation


• Understanding group behaviours

Assessment pattern

Alternative Assessment

An individual analysis of a set of hotel accounts covering a twelve month period (1500 word report)

Assessment Strategy

The assessment strategy is designed to draw on the student’s experiences through the exercise to build up a picture of the rationale and principles used to manage the business and explain the results achieved. In addition students are asked to comment critically on the performance of their business as a whole and identify where alternative actions could have been taken. The final element of the individual work requires the student to explore the theoretical frameworks underlying operations analysis and propose an applied operational control measure.

The summative assessment methods include:

 A group report of 2000 words evaluating the performance of the group’s hotel, the competitive position, the actions taken and suggesting alternative solutions (35%)

 An individual assignment of 3000 words taking one aspect of a hotel’s performance and drawing on the appropriate literature identify how the performance of the group’s hotels was in line with or deviated from a theoretical position and suggest reasons for this behaviour.

Alternative Assessment Instrument

Where students fail the group report this will be replaced with the following individual assignment for August resits

Analysis of Results

You will be provided with a set of results for a single hotel business covering a given period of operation. From your analysis of these data, submit a report summarising these results providing an explanation of your understanding of the key operational rationale for the business, identifying and explaining the key factors that you feel have affected the performance of the operation and where you feel the management team were successful and unsuccessful. The report should be 1500 words in length, excluding tables, graphs and references as appropriate.

Formative assessment and feedback

Each week of the semester students will be working in groups during the workshops and will receive details feedback on the performance of their hotel and will be given the opportunity to clarify any areas of misunderstanding and test our strategies for improvement. 

Module aims

• to provide students with the opportunity to apply the skills and knowledge gained at undergraduate level to the analysis of a simulated business operation,
• to take decisions about the future of an operation and
• to evaluate their results.

Learning outcomes

Methods of Teaching / Learning

The learning and teaching strategy is designed to allow students to experience the pressure of managing a business operation using a business simulation exercise and to link these experiences through a series of inputs and exercises to a series of  underlying theories, concepts and models.

The teaching and learning methods include the use of the HotelSim business simulation which is a competitive management exercise approximating a real world environment in which several free-standing organisations are competing for business in a closed, but elastic, economic system. Each exercise runs optimally with eight competing teams and is fully interactive, so that no two years can experience exactly the same results, although the underlying economic model ensures that the key drivers can be identified. The simulation will be run in weekly two hour group based workshops.

In addition to the simulation exercise there will be a series of weekly one hour lectures and seminars to expand on some of the key underlying principles and the issues discovered through the discussion of the simulation exercise. Students will also be provided through SurreyLearn with a series of guided study activities to extend their knowledge of the subject.

Indicated Lecture Hours (which may also include seminars, tutorials, workshops and other contact time) are approximate and may include in-class tests where one or more of these are an assessment on the module. In-class tests are scheduled/organised separately to taught content and will be published on to student personal timetables, where they apply to taken modules, as soon as they are finalised by central administration. This will usually be after the initial publication of the teaching timetable for the relevant semester.

Reading list

https://readinglists.surrey.ac.uk
Upon accessing the reading list, please search for the module using the module code: MANM320

Programmes this module appears in

Please note that the information detailed within this record is accurate at the time of publishing and may be subject to change. This record contains information for the most up to date version of the programme / module for the 2020/1 academic year.