James Chappell
Global Business Director, Horwath HTL
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Viewpoints from Crowe
“Ironically, many of the aspects of remote working have already been embraced in the hospitality consulting world. So much time is spent travelling that you learn to be adept at working on your own in unusual places. Airports, planes, strange hotel rooms, the back of taxis, cafés – all of these will be well known to consultants. The challenge for hospitality consulting is that the work is typically unique and requires a much greater level of consideration before output is generated. We are by definition the solvers of complex problems, problems that typically have any number of potential solutions with often being no ‘correct’ answer, only a judgement call and choice to be made. As so much of the work is based on experience, learning is often on the job as opposed to tab A going into slot B. Paradoxically, many of the reports are pretty standardised, deliberately so, but the journey to that report is anything but. For this reason, consulting firms have been reluctant to move to a fully remote model as knowledge and expertise transfer is key and so hard to do remotely. Whereas the pandemic has forced remote learning, consulting is one industry that cannot wait to get back into the office. It’s no surprise to learn that communication is absolutely key and needs to be properly scheduled to compensate for proximity learning.”