Reflection Visualization Samar Mohamed

Challenge

The hotel industry is a fundamental part of tourism in Mexico, and contributes millions of pesos to the national  economy; In addition, the average national salary of a hotel manager is MXN $ 71,616, so it is very important for  a hotel manager to have quality, guarantee, safety, good customer service, a pleasant atmosphere and, above all,  generate a good experience in clients at the time of their stay at the hotel, since this makes them stand out from  the competition and the promotion of a good experience makes the client return to the hotel and can be  recommended.

In this case, I will talk about the Riazor Hotel. A business hotel located less than 5 km. from the CDMX International  Airport, where you can not only stay and rest, but also hold work meetings, sessions or social events. For years  the Hotel Riazor has been a 4.5-star hotel, but in recent months, there have been multiple complaints where  guests claim that the environment is not pleasant because the attention and service provided by the workers is  not adequate, something that directly affects the experience given to guests, in addition to damaging the hotel's  image and decreasing the number of visitors.

Selection, application and approach

For this problem, what I would do is solve the main problem, which is the unpleasant environment due to the  poor attention and service given to the guest, for this I would begin by interviewing customers to find out their  complaints more accurately and accepting suggestions In order to improve our service, I would later brainstorm  the best way to fix the problems, then experiment with all the best ways to solve it using a design tool called  visualization. “Visualization is one of the essential design tools. It's about using imagery to make an abstract idea  more public and more concrete, so that it will be more visible, clear, and understandable to others” (video: The  Good Kitchen Story, Design Thinking Innovation). If this doesn't work, I would decide to completely redesign  customer service and support, using a user-centric design approach.

I would begin by observing and deeply analyzing the experience of the guests in the hotel, this through an  ethnographic approach, using the Travel Mapping tool as a specific tool, this because “the Travel Mapping tool  follows a client or interested party when they receive a product or service. or they go through a process” (video:  The Good Kitchen Story, Design Thinking Innovation) and in order to observe in detail the experience of the guests  from the moment they request a reservation until they leave the hotel, analyzing the attention that is given to the  client through the service and the attitude of the employees at the time of providing it. I would be accompanying  the customers at the reception, I would observe the service provided by the cleaning staff and by the waiters in  the restaurant and bar. Besides that he would speak to all the hotel staff.

As a result of customer service observations, the exact reason for poor customer service and care could be  determined. On several occasions, the workers appeared tired and somewhat irritated when doing their work,  and after talking with the workers it was concluded that they showed this behavior because the rest they had at  work was not enough. Although they had a set break time and meal time, the employees were tired.

I would continue to brainstorm possible options for hotel workers to get enough rest and to be able to perform  at work without diminishing productivity. From this brainstorming two options would come out, the first, where  the rest and the time to eat last a little longer, and the second, where there are two breaks and one time to eat,  where the breaks are interspersed. To test these ideas, I would use a visualization tool, which would be done by

making the first option one week and the second option another week, with the intention of seeing which of the  two options would benefit the hotel and the workers the most. As a final result, employees had two breaks and  one meal time, employee behavior and the atmosphere in the hotel improved, customers stopped complaining,  and the number of hotel visits increased.

Insight

After this course, I was able to learn better ways to solve a problem, since they are more effective and take more  account of the people involved, not only at work but also personally. Before taking the course, I would have  analyzed customer complaints and brainstormed, and then used the solution immediately, without considering  other options to solve the problem or without considering employees.

More generally, while taking this Design Thinking for Innovation course, I realized that innovation is not only used  for commercial products, but also for problems of all kinds and that it all depends on the level of imagination you  have, the level of experience and how willing you are to experiment with the ideas you have, using short, cheap  experiments. I realized that the topics covered in the course go beyond marketing, since it can be related to  different things, including personal ones like the way of thinking.

