We have to learn to run our 'little hotel' with what we have

What if we ran our homes like five-star hotels? The funny part is we already do a lot of it! My mentors Pam and Peggy have made us "home executives" of our hotels. Granted, we tend to get sidetracked occasionally, but that is getting better! So let's look at our homes in comparison to a hotel:

We have bedrooms and bathrooms.

We provide a place for our people to sleep comfortably and get ready for their day.

We have a laundry service.

The dining room is always open.

The concierge is ready to plan any excursion.

The limousine service is at their beck and call.

The lounge has nice reading material and comfortable places to relax.

So as you can plainly see, our hotels already offer the best! You are the chief executive of this hotel; it is your responsibility to keep it running! But how do you do this?

Every business has to know where their money is being spent and how to keep track of its (ugly word here) budget. Do you know what a budget really is? It is a projection of what you have coming in and how much you think it will take to operate your hotel. That doesn't mean you spend everything that comes in, either. When we continually do this, we eventually go bankrupt. You can only rob Peter to pay Paul just so many times.

At this point our hotels are struggling to stay afloat in a sea of problems. As we fix one problem another one rears its ugly head. We are working on the cleaning problems. We have established routines for getting things done on a daily basis. The kitchen is coming together, too. Menus are posted and purchasing lists are ready for the buyer. But this is only part of keeping our hotel running.

When we have financial problems, the stress hurts everyone involved with the operation. We have to learn to find a balance in our hotel and look objectively at how much we have coming in and how much is going out. Some people would automatically say we need to charge more for a room in our hotel! WRONG! Higher rates mean you could run off customers. More is not always the key to having enough to operate.

Last year, in my role as a county commissioner, the commission was facing trying times with its budget. We had to get creative in order to save jobs and not raise taxes. Our income was being cut by forces outside of our control. What we did have control over, we did not want to abuse by raising our rates.