Stop the Rush: Why Quiet Speed is Your Real Business Edge

Many tourism leaders think they are 'too busy' for systems during the high season. In this episode, Samantha Smits explains why hiding behind being busy is actually holding your business down. Learn how sustainability logic acts as the 'oil' for your business machine, turning loud chaos into quiet, successful speed.

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Transcript

Speaker 0:00

When you are at 100% occupancy rate or capacity, the pressure really makes people act different. You know they act difference when you're stressed. Everything will show the good, the bad, the ugly. So this high season, it is your radar to have these systems implemented. Hi, I'm Samantha Smits, and welcome back to the Sustainability Edge, Your Tourism Podcast. No jargon, no fluff. We're breaking down sustainability and especially how to turn sustainability in a practical tool that gives you more profit, more time, stuff that's staying, and a business you can be proud of. Let's get started. Hello, hello, and welcome back to the podcast. In the last few episodes so far, we've done quite some detective work. I've even asked you to look into your bins, we've identified some profit leaks, and I've even talked about certifications. But today I'm actually going to talk about something that it's quite a big of a wall that I hit when talking to owners, general managers, of tour operators, accommodations. Most of them, or you, when you're listening, are having this reaction when I talk to you for the first time or the first two times. It's this mindset wall. It's the excuse of Sam, I love these ideas, but I don't really have the time. We're in the middle of busy season right now, the high season, and we're moving really fast, we have to act fast, and we don't have the time to stop to do these things like filling our checklist or track some data. We have some priorities right now. And yes, obviously you have priorities, but I do have to tell you why hiding behind this, being busy, moving too fast during the high season to be able to implement things or continue some systems, why that actually is kind of something holding you down, and how such a lack of sustainability logic is one of the things that are keeping you slow, tired, and stuck into that mode. In tourism, everything it happens so fast. Of course you have to react fast to matters. Let's think about if a pipe is bursting at your accommodation or a flight has been cancelled for your arrivals, and you're just so used to the rush of solving all these matters during the especially high season all the time. You solve a problem, you get the adrenaline rush when it works out, and you move on. But if you fix such problems and without creating a system or having a system that can help it from stopping happening again, and of course it's not you cannot really stop a flight from being cancelled if it's on the airline, but this, for example, that burst pipe, it might have been maintenance that have should that should be happening before. There are quite some problems in tourism that can be prevented by having a sound system behind it. When you don't have such a system, when you don't want to test such a system during your first high season, when those problems occur because they don't occur in the low season, then you're actually taking shortcuts. And of course, that sounds sweet. I mean, who doesn't love a proper shortcut that is rewarding? But in these cases, these shortcuts are not as rewarding, they actually come with a price, some kind of operational depth where you borrow the time by skipping some of the work to prevent these issues from happening, but then you're going to have to pay it back because the same issue that you're it's just gonna come back over and over again. And yes, you'll get quicker at solving the issue. I just thought about this pipe, so if that pipe happens at some point every month, you'll be very quick to solve it at some point, but wouldn't it be quicker if it doesn't happen every month? And the same is with the driver taking the clients to the wrong lodge or not knowing where they're supposed to stay. Such kind of things can all be easily prevented by having a proper system set up and actually taking the time to implement such a thing in the high season. It is an investment that will pay you back a lot of times. And yes, this is related to sustainability when we talk about measuring resources. I've mentioned previously how you identify a hidden profit leak with that, but also with that example of the pipe that can cost you some water, but also with the fuel that the cars use or the electricity. Think about if you are in a destination where you're depending on the generator. Again, you cannot prevent blackouts, probably. But again, a maintenance thing where when you have a proper maintenance schedule, where this not is only done before the high season starts, but also during the high season, you will really prevent that your generators failing you. This is the same with the cars, right? That you use your vehicles, you usually service them before they go and afterwards, and this servicing even continues during the high season. You're not only servicing your vehicles in the low season, just hope they survive the high season and service them afterwards, right? That whole principle applies to anything in your business, and it can just prevent all the issues. Especially when considering all that manual work that is being done by your departments when a manual booking wasn't entered properly into the system, or there were typos, and at some point there are vehicles double booked, or the driver is not at the airport, or drives them to the wrong accommodation, or the accommodation doesn't have a booking, or something went wrong or wasn't confirmed. All of this takes a lot of stress, not just for you, but also for the client, and that's even the most harmful because it might end up in a painful review if you don't have the skills to resolve this swiftly. And here again, if there is a system that runs both low and high season, how this is filled in, some parts could be automated, or that there is a standard check, all of this would be way, way less occurring. So at some point there has to be realized that such the shortcuts of not being bothered to welcome improvements or suggestions or to test and implement new things in the high season, such shortcuts are actually breaks on your tourism business. And that is gonna hurt that whole speed that you're talking about. And here, most owners are thinking that fast businesses are the ones where everyone is running, office is loud, everyone is calling, everyone is busy. These are the signs of a very successful business. But I also believe that real speed and real success can be quiet when a machine is running well. Here again, the sustainability logic. Oh, this is a very poor comparison, but the sustainability can be the oil to your system, it can smoothen things up when you have no systems. The your machine is just gonna rub together, it's gonna create a lot of noise, it will work somehow, but it will also break down much sooner. It's gonna get hot, make noise, but break. And the noise that you hear is just it is quite literally also noise in your business being friction, and it's more of a sustainable business. It has flow where things move more quietly from A to B. Things work normally. There is not so much stress how to resolve something or how something works, and things just work out without all the panic. I mean, I'm sure you can imagine when this example says when a driver doesn't show up at the right location, how this always ends up in the client having to call the sales representative that they talked with, the sales representative calling the logistic manager, in the meantime, this client has magically found the number of the owner and has called the owner too. So the owner's also calling around why they are disturbed, and everyone is calling about the same case where probably somewhere in an email or maybe this person was texted, or it has been buried very deep down, and it has just been impossible to track correctly what to do and how. And even for you looking back, you're sure I communicated this to him, but even you cannot find where you actually did so. Oh, that's an absolute logistic nightmare, especially at such a stressful moment where this has to be resolved swiftly. And think about such a situation where you would have a clear overview, a clear table, even a whiteboard in the office. I mean, depending on what works with your size, where it's very clear who is exactly where at what moment, and there's always automatically a clear digital overview shared with the respective guide that they can always check straight from their phone, so that everyone is on the same page at all times. There's a bunch of things you can be doing to have everyone on the same page at all the times, so that when something happens, everyone can locate it very quickly, but that the chances are also much, much smaller. And again, this is also respect for everyone's time involved and the energy in the battery, which is then also big social sustainability. So if this being busy is more friction, how do we more go to this quiet, successful speed, even when you are so fully overbooked with guests everywhere, no matter if you are an accommodation or an operator. And here again, I hear all the time we're gonna fix this when it's low season, we're gonna do this, now we just have to survive. Again, it is a mistake because the logic is that the best time to test a new system and to build a system is when your business is at the busiest. You might think, yeah, but what if it fails? It's the most terrible, terrible time. But the system has to be built for this exact time. So the low season, it will just hide the problems that occur when your business is actually having its performance. When you only have a few guests, it's it is very quick for you to solve issues even without them noticing. But when you have much, much, much more, there has to be something running for you to be on top of these things. When you are at 100% occupancy rate or capacity, the pressure really makes people act different. You know you act different when you're stressed, and all everything will show the good, the bad, the ugly. So this high season, it is your radar to have these systems implemented and really shows where is your team confused, where is the money disappearing, and basically where can now sustainability be the oil to my business? Here, I would first of all really recommend, no matter if you're an accommodation or operator, to focus on maintenance and have maintenance continue, just like you do for the cars, during high season too. Don't only maintain things during the low season, because then they are bound to break in the high season, just like that pipe I mentioned earlier, but it could it could go from lights or anything related to electricity. When we talk about maintenance, it is almost always connected to a resource, being water, electricity, fuel, anything flexible you can come up with, which is not into infinity available, but that will quite literally leak your operational bill, and but also leak into issues for your clients. And when talking about the work that your employees are doing, try to standardize as much as possible. And here the power of policies is huge, and this is again a big sustainability link. We talked about certifications in an earlier episode, but even without certifications, policies, it's it sounds scary, but I trust you, they don't have to be Bible-length. A policy can even be a PDF for a very specific department or specific task or specific something, which kind of is a standard operating procedure for how you want to see this go into your business and what your values are, and just make this accessible on an online drive for everyone. I mean, the most predictable one in sustainability, and what every certification will ask for is a sustainability policy, and for offices or back of the house, you see very often that there is a staff handbook. So, what is the code of conduct for staff, even? Of course, clients will have one when they are in the field, how to behave where that they have to ask for pictures, where have to ask permission for a picture, rather than just taking a picture of someone on the street, what to wear when going on safari and so forth. But again, there's also a big code of conduct for the staff, not only the guide on the safari, but also in the office, how to deal with something simple, turning elect turning the switches off when not in use, closing tabs, and it all seems so so little, but everything all together saves you all the stress because especially in high season, these things get heavily ignored because uh what would they matter? And then at the end you see this big operational bill or all these small things together, one plus one plus one plus one and so forth, that gets a much, much, much bigger number. Also think about templates for email, for example, that can be standardized, and like I say, if there's a specific kind of example that is very standard to occur, such like a cancelled flight or something, this can also come with a policy where you just provide the steps of what should be done rather than people are just panicking and calling too many people for one task. All of these things, yeah, I yes you could create them in the low season because you have more time, but they have to be tested in the high season because that's when the problems occur. And here the link again with sustainability, I believe that one of the simplest forms of sustainability is efficiency. Just not wasting anything, and the most obvious ones is of course to not waste any of those resources of water, fuel, but also not time, because time, your time, your staff's time, everyone's energy, it is as valuable, absolutely. And that's the most sustainable businesses are also one of the most efficient ones. So the clue is if you start accepting that systems are something that can bring you the speed, but the quiet one, not the loud one, which is perceived as successful speed, this whole your whole role in running your tourism business is going to change. So here the mind the mindful or the mindset that I talked about earlier that I see when talking to most of you for the first time, don't confuse being busy with being good in your tourism business because everyone is gonna be busy in the high season, but not everyone is having a good time, not everyone is doing well. So speed isn't about how many of these issues that you're solving successfully, speed is about how many of the policies you already have, how many systems you have, how much of preventative maintenance that you do, so that these problems don't even show up. And here this sustainability logic is not something you just do when you have the time. It is going to give you all that time back by already having done all the preparation. Having said that, and nearing the end of the episode, because we've talked enough for quite some minutes already. If you recognize yourself in this, but you feel overwhelmed, but where should I start? What policy should I create? What do I have to put in the policy? And if you're still a little bit confused, but how can this help me? Because you've you your business is super unique, of course, so you might need a little bit more detail. I'm very happy to help you. Please do book matching call with me. Find me on LinkedIn, all of this is in the show notes. Reach out to me, please share what's going on, and I'm I'm confident I can help you forward. Just give it a try. Okay, for today this is it, and I can't wait to help you, to meet you, to find your edge. And see you in the next one. Thank you for listening and congratulations on investing your time today to think strategically about your future, to make sure you never miss a step to understand sustainability better, how to grow your competitive edge. Follow the podcast right now, and if this was helpful, please leave a 5 star rating. It will help other people like you to find these tools. I'm Samantha Smits, and I'll see you in the next episode.