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what is meant by Facility Planning?
A1. I am often asked to explain by many people who are new to the hotel industry as to what is meant by Facility Planning and what all does it encompass. I therefore thought of deliberating on this topic, in-order to expose the subject and perhaps to prepare grounds for more food for thought.

This field and the scope available for Facilities Planning is quite vast in India, as there are not enough trained & experienced people in this field. I am sorry to say that not all those who are in the field are well versed or experienced in the field and leave a lot of scope for improvement. Therefore, this subject holds considerable opportunities and future for those who may wish to take it up as a career.

My interpretation is that, facility planning consists of Planning, designing & equipping of all the operational areas in the Back of the House (BOH) areas in Hotels & interfacing them with the Public Areas & Guest Rooms in such a manner that they provide efficient service (promptly) to the desired standards. Hence, we first need to define and understand what these standards are?

Some of the things that immediately come to mind are : What will be the hours of operation of the Restaurants? What cuisine is to be served? What will be the extent of Banquet Business? How sophisticated will be the Menu? What is the level of service to be provided? What is the category of the Hotel to be built? Whether it is a deluxe, 5-star, 4-star, 3-star etc.? How sophisticated is the service to be provided? What will be the staffing pattern & number of staff? Whether the hotel will do its own Baking & Confectionery or buy from out side? What is the budget available for kitchen, laundry & operating equipment? Will there be any evening service by House Keeping? Are the bed-sheets & towels to be changed daily or once every two days? Will room service be 24-hours or shorter from 6 AM to 11 PM? What will be the purchasing cycle & the storage requirements? Will the landscape & gardening be contracted out? etc. etc. are some of the questions that need to be verified along with many others inorder to start the process of planning.

Hotel planning & designing, within the overall framework and control of the Architect can broadly be divided into three groups as follows: -

i) Mechanical, Electrical, Plumbing & hotel related M&E services.

ii) Interiors & furnishings of Public Areas & Guest Rooms.

iii) Operational Area in Back of the House consisting of: -

Administrative Offices
House Keeping & Laundry
Receiving, Stores & Pre-preparation.
Kitchen & Food production
Staff facilities.

In terms of areas, it involves approximately 15-20% of the total area of the hotel, although this is largely dependent on the nos. of F&B outlets and the category of the Hotel. Though the Architect is the prime designer of the Hotel, he needs to be guided by a “Hotel Specialist” in order to make the plans operationally feasible.

The real art of Planning is to provide all the activities in a systematic & orderly manner in the minimum area-to conserve cost-so that functions can be performed in the minimum amount of time & to equip all areas with suitable equipment in order to employ minimum staff.

Hotels are a service industry & rely very heavily on staff, therefore, it is the quality of staff that should matter and not the quantity. Accordingly the staff should be competent, well trained & educated.

Procedures being followed by the hotel such as, systems, methods & controls, influence the time, quality & cost factors & therefore, these are to be evaluated and clearly understood prior to planning. Systems, controls and methods adopted by the hotel influence the sequence of events which in-turn control the movement of goods & staff through out the building.

Through the conscientious process of planning, we can achieve the following objectives: -

a) Economy & convenience of operation
b) Reduce the requirement of spaces to the minimum
c) Reduce personnel & enhance staff morale.
d) Reduce pilferage and wastage
e) Increase productivity & staff satisfaction
f) To have well planned areas suitably equipped
g) To be able to maintain cleanliness, & high level of hygiene & sanitation.

Another important objective is to interface the “Back of the House” areas with “Front of the House” or “Public Areas”. This relates to areas such as Front Office with Lobby - Administrative Areas with Service Areas & Guest access - Restaurants & Bars with Kitchen-Service Lobbies & House Keeping pantries with Guest Rooms. The attempt should be to keep the staff movement to the minimum in public areas and try not to allow any movement of goods or staff through public areas.

Hotels today have become very capital intensive and require a great deal of investments. To make the investments more attractive, the returns have to improve & hence hotels have to try and keep the areas tight and make the layouts more efficient. While developing conceptual plans, all efforts should be made to develop a continuous relationship between guest & service areas and to see that all operational needs are being met.

Most often, a great deal of time & attention is devoted to developing guest areas in hotels, generally more funds are also allocated to make the hotels look very attractive. Unfortunately not enough time, attention or funds are provided to develop the BOH, which go a long way in bringing about efficiency and profitability.

The net result is that the hotel may be a great success & perhaps generate revenues that were anticipated, but there are bound to be increased expenses that are out of proportion with the scale of the hotel. Lack of attention paid to the service areas in the early stages of planning can result in a over staffed, ill equipped and an inefficient operation.

You may well ask as to what does it take to become a “Facility Planner”?

A good understanding of the working of a hotel & its interaction.

Exposure to different categories, sizes types of hotels and their standards.

A good understanding of the systems, controls and procedures generally followed by hotels.

Working knowledge of various tasks to be performed, i.e. time, manpower & space required & the sequence in which the functions are to be performed.

A good knowledge of the equipment & machinery required to perform various tasks together with awareness & knowledge of the different equipments available.

Last & not the least : Experience.

In the competitive market of the 21st century, and with the increase in the competition, hotels built for ego satisfaction & speculation are over. Today, hotels must operate profitably in order to survive & the role of the Facility Planner is becoming more important than ever before. We must look for more innovative ideas and equip the hotels with labour saving equipment so that they are more efficient, cost effective & competitive.

How do we manage our energy conservation?
Kitchen equipment consumes considerable amount of energy. Just think of all the different types of equipment that use gas, steam & electricity for cooking and heating, for operating machines and the lighting load, the electricity consumed by the air conditioning and ventilation systems, cold storage units etc.

Not many hotels provide a separate meter for monitoring energy consumption of their kitchens and do not include this cost in the departmental expenses. By including this expense they will realize the total cost to run the kitchen in addition to the direct cost of food, manpower and other supplies that are considered for calculating departmental profit. By highlighting the energy consumption figures the staff will become more conscientious in saving energy and thus begin to reduce this expense.

Consumption of hot and cold water and steam in a kitchen should not be overlooked when calculating the cost of utilities consumed, as the cost of these can be exorbitant when not controlled properly. Abroad, in the new kitchens, they are today installing either flow valves in the faucets inorder to give a constant flow of water irrespective of the pressure or how much the tap is opened, or foot operated valves or spring activated control valves to reduce wastage and consumption.

In India where we are facing acute shortage of water in most part of the country, it is time that we started to use these fittings which are not expensive and recover their cost by the savings they make.

Energy conservation is an extremely important aspect that is not given the importance that it deserves. In this area one can go a long way in increasing the profits if this expense is reduced. In my opinion energy savings can not only be affected through the use of recent technology developments but more so through training and educating the staff to be more conscientious and not to waste energy. Next time you walk-into your kitchens observe.

How the taps are left on when the water is not being used whether in preparation sinks or in pot wash sinks.

The number of taps that need new washers to prevent leakages.

Or the thermostat in the fryer of the Bain Marie that need to be repaired so that the heat can be cut-off when not required.

How the flame is spreading all around the cooking vessel and the heat is being wasted.

How many ranges, salamanders and fryers are left on waiting for orders to come.

How at many places the steam is leaking.

Quite often the thermostats in the refrigerators are set too low, or are not working at all or the gasket needs changing inorder to reduce the working time of the compressor.

Often the filters in exhaust hood require to be replaced or need more regular cleaning to allow air to follow more freely and to reduce the load on the fan.

One does not realize the amount of fuel wasted by the burner in the oven or the fryer, or by the water boiler etc. not switched off even when the required temperature has been achieved.

Ever think of the amount of energy lost by the use of a pilot flame that continues to work for 24 hours in all the gas equipment. Abroad, they have discontinued the use of the pilot and have introduced pizo-electric ignition system. The pilots should be re-designed to reduce consumption and should be turned off at night.

Abroad, everyone has also switched to using “closed top ranges” since they consume less energy and conserve heat. In India, however everyone prefers open burners and wants to see the flame overshooting the utensils and demand high pressure burners instead of low pressure.

In the new type of ranges that have been developed, the castings for the “closed top range” have been redesigned with new alloys that retain heat longer and allow faster conduction of heat to the cooking vessel.

The heat lamps and the hot cases that are the first to be switched on well before the start of service and the last to be switched-off-till considerably afterwards.

The steam that continues to flow through Bain-Marie, Coffee urns, plate warmers and other steam heated equipment without any one being the wiser. So next time you take a round of the kitchen look around you and observe where and how energy could be saved or reduced. Go around with your Engineer and the Chef. Take them into confidence since it is with their help and support that you can effect the savings and the reductions.

Next time you buy a piece of equipment, do not only look at the capacity and cost but discuss with the supplier the energy savings that the equipment is capable of – does it have thermostat? – Or a timer or is it automatic – what is its energy consumption.

Not always is the equipment which has a higher rated heater, a motor or a better burner, perhaps the one with smaller motor or a burner can do the job just as wall if not better at a cheaper cost.