Quality management system turns gold what it touches

by Lyda Durango
Categorization and certification are two words that resonate in the quality management processes of Colombian hotels. An approach to the process of categorization by stars and quality certification allows you to discover what lies behind the implementation of a quality management program and how to deal with it.

The Abadía Plaza Hotel is an example of this. It is a business hotel located in the heart of Pereira, intermediate city of the Coffee Axis of Colombia, a region with a high emphasis on a holiday tourism product with great reception in the domestic and international market. There, the positioning of rural tourism has placed coffee farms as the first tourist product in the region. City hotels make their effort to compete with them, but competition is uneven.

Work team, in tune

Rural lodging and urban lodging are options that are very distant from each other. While urban hotels seek to capture the business traveler who travels to the area either alone or in a convention group, some make a notorious effort to escape the fierce competition for the vacation traveler. But another story is told by rural lodgings, which have taken advantage of their strengths of location and natural environment to capture corporate conventions.

To make a difference against this segment, quality management systems have become one of the best tools.  Since november 2006 when its general manager Alejandro Mejía took over the management of the hotel, many things have changed. Not only has it increased its infrastructure from 26 rooms to 50, but it has also reinforced services and processes. "From 14 employees we went to 36," recalls Mr. Mejía. "We had to ensure that the service was excellent," he adds.

Once the concern about the number of employees was overcome, the idea was to strengthen its position on the issue of quality. And here the process would encounter its first difficulty. "The misconception that people have about the issue of quality management," explains Carolina Ruíz, representative for the management for the quality processes and categorization by stars.  To counteract this misconception, the hotel management carried out an awareness campaign among employees.

The first thing was to bring the concept of quality management system closer to them and then delve into its internal and external benefits. All this was done by means of a primer that contained the basic concepts of a quality management system. "We also had a general meeting and an individual meeting with them," explains Mr. Mejía. "Once we had the first audit there was more reaction on their part," he recalls.

The touch of Midas

For the Abadía Plaza Hotel, the implementation of the ISO 9000 quality management system version 2000 was a challenge that impacted all areas of the hotel. But there was one that would have the full weight of the new process: the financial one. Fortunately, the touch of the mythological Midas was the source of salvation.

The MIDAS program, More Investment for Sustainable Alternative Development, is a program of the U.S. Agency for International Development, USAID, the primary government agency responsible for the execution and administration of the U.S. government's social, economic, and humanitarian assistance programs worldwide.

And the MIDAS program is an alternative development program financed with resources from the United States government, which generates and strengthens sustainable sources of income and licit jobs in the private sector, and in turn, fosters economic growth and competitiveness of the country's productive sector. "The implementation of the QMS cost 15 million pesos (about 7 thousand dollars). lares), of which 50% were provided by MIDAS, "recalls Alejandro Mejía. This financial aid was a relief to get the process going.
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Stars with their own brightness

As part of the Botero Vélez Business Group, the Abadía Plaza Hotel is the only investment in the hotel sector of this group. But his business acumen encompasses other areas that allow the hotel vertical integration with a positive impact on its day-to-day operation. Even so, for the hotel sector, positioning within an increasingly competitive industry remained a challenge.

Thus, once the quality management system was implemented, another door opened to place the hotel in a higher position: the categorization by stars, a process implemented by the Hotel Association of Colombia, COTELCO. Taking into account the particularities of the market and the importance of the stars, the management of the Hotel Abadía Plaza did not hesitate to seek the five-star categorization and become the first hotel in Pereira to achieve it.

But meeting international standards for this category of hotels was not going to be an easy task although there was already a stretch of the road traveled. "All the service and quality documentation, 98% was covered by the ISO QMS," explains Alejandro Mejía. Currently, the hotel is in the process of achieving certification in the ISO 9000 Quality Management System version 2000, in addition to the  5-star categorization.

A clear vision

For the Abadía Plaza Hotel, achieving the categorization by stars is something particularly special considering the market conditions where a boost to domestic tourism has allowed the number of available rooms to skyrocket, even in hotels and lodgings of an informal category. "If my rate is $10 or $20 above another hotel, it's because I have more stars than that hotel. It's about people knowing more clearly why we have a higher or lower rate than other hotels," explains Alejandro Mejía.

In addition, when it comes to a business trip, more and more companies focus their attention on quality seals and the star category. "Our vision for 2012 is to be recognized as the best hotel in the Eje Cafetero," says Carolina. "This process helps us achieve that vision," he concludes.