Bossie's hotel whims--help!

[dettu]

My boss is a VP who travels, usually weekly, between this office and one in another city three hours away. He looked into joining a club and/or having a corporate apartment, but for whatever reason has elected to continue staying in hotels on these trips. He's also taking MBA courses in the same city. Sometimes the trip is a combination of the two purposes (education and business) and other times it's one purpose only, but the firm pays regardless.

The university where he's taking courses offers a standard discount rate at some nice nearby hotels. Our company gets a discount at some of the same hotels and some others. He usually wants me to compare the rates and get him the best one, but he has STRONG preferences for hotels, and those preferences change at least monthly, so a lot of changing and shuffling of reservations goes on.

Several times now he has had me make a series of reservations for Hotel X, then decided he's ticked off at them and he wants reservations at Hotels Y, Z, and so on for those weeks, so I cancel Hotel X and make all of those new ones. Then Hotel X's management apolgizes, talks to him, or whatever, and he agrees that he'd like his reservations back at Hotel X, and then he informs me that he's done it and he'd like Hotel Y cancelled, Hotel Z cancelled, etc. Sometimes we have 5 or 6 hotels in the mix because he might have also registered at one of the university-rate hotels, and he might have done that himself but he wants me to call and cancel it.

When I cancel a reservation, I leave it in his Outlook calendar (he has a PDA that syncs with it) and include the cancellation number, in case he needs it while he's away and so there will be a record. I also have a PDA and use Outlook for my calendar; I stopped using a paper planner/organizer when I got the PDA and overall I like it much better. However, there's not a convenient way to record what I've done during the day other than the task list--and I was always only partially successful with recording my accomplishments/completed tasks when I had it on paper, too.

The problem: how to keep track of which reservations are "on," which are "off," which are pending, how we made the reservation (me directly, him directly, me via our travel agent), what the rate was and if special discounts (coupons, group rates, corporate rates, university rates) apply, etc. I woke up this morning at 2:30 in an absolute panic attack, thinking I had not cancelled today's Hotel Y when Hotel X's reservation was reinstated by Bossie. I can look at my Outlook from home via the web but it's not set up to let me view his. This is not the first time I've had a midnight panic attack because of the revolving hotel situation. I had to talk myself out of driving in to the office and looking at the calendar, and I arrived at work extremely stressed. Everything was fine; the cancellation was in order and the new reservation was fine.

Nobody else at our firm has an opinion on this other than he should stop capriciously making multiple reservations and having me cancel them. He is not going to change. I'd love some common sense suggestions for keeping track of the hotel mess, and keeping my sanity.

[lioness]

He'll change if the company starts making him pay for last-minute cancellations. Things always look different when the money comes out of your pocket. Other than that, just keep the cancellation information in a notebook so you have a hard copy to go back to if you need it.

Lioness, Queen of the Jungle

[msmarieh]

I see a spreadsheet in Excel, which using Documents To Go can be synched with your Palm Pilot.

Marie

[countrigal]

Can you create a template that is used when either of you make a reservation, and include spots on it for cancellation numbers, etc?  At one time I knew how to go in and make a template in Outlook so that your task (which would post to your inbox) could be formatted to have the information you were requesting.  This might be helpful...  Otherwise, I would suggest creating a word template that is then inserted into a e-mail message or something so that you can access this from home and wherever.  When you have to cancel the reservation, you pull open that e-mail, make the necessary updates on the form in it and forward to bossie.  This way he will still have the cancellation or reservation numbers yet you have access to status on each of them.  Depending on the type of PDA you have, this will either help you or not.  Let me think on it some more and see if I can come up with any other options.

CountriGal
Deskdemon Editorial Board Member

[raindance]

At midnight, you should be in the Land of Nod or enjoying yourself.  

I would give this person a nicely typed contact list for hotels and ask him to make his own reservations. Politely, but firmly.   Then he may choose according to his preferences of the moment and then he will be happy. Or not, as the case may be. I would even go so far as to say that this is a type of bullying and wholly unacceptable.  

Good luck.  

Raindance

[mathwhizchick]

I agree with Raindance.  This IS bullying, and you need to have Gonzo VP the 3 year old make his own reservations.
Give him the list and stand firm, because he WILL throw a hissy-fit.

[dettu]

That's a really swell idea, folks, but it's definitely a my-way-or-the-highway situation. If I want to stay here (or if I need to, heh heh) I must find a way to cope with his whims and a way to sidestep the bullying and still produce good work.

[andream]

I disagree that this is intentional bullying by the employer, however I do see it as dependancy, which let's face it, is sometimes thought of as a good thing in our profession.  We LOVE it when our employers "need" us to make everything all right.  The problem is, we get to a point where "making everything all right"  keeps us up at midnight and we realize that bossie is dependant on us for all the wrong reasons.

I've thought about this one for a couple of days and decided how I would personally handle it, you can take it for what it's worth. ;p

I would talk to bossie and explain the realities of the situation, that you awoke at midnight worried about whether his reservations were intact, correct etc, and ask for his help in creating a system that gets the job done and keeps you BOTH in the loop.  Enlisting his help, does two things.

It gives you the chance to explain that you really do take your job seriously.  (heck Im the President and no one worries about MY Hotel reservations at midnight 'cept me!)

And more important it asks him to come up with a system that works for BOTH of you.

I totally understand the "my way or the highway" scenario, but asking bossie to help you out isn't (shouldn't imperil your job) in fact I'd take the subtle manipulation route on this one, (oh come on we ALL do it from time to time, let the dark side of the force work FOR you once in a while!).

Try this:

"Bossie, I know this hotel thing is a real mess sometimes, and  I also wake up at midnight worrying that you're in timbuktu without a hotel room.  Can you help me create a system that is more efficient than the one we're using now. What would work better for you with all the changes we're forced to make because you get such cruddy service from some of these hotel guys!

A bit simplistic, I know, but in the real world, when you need your job and have a boss who is not always attuned to how much extra work he's creating, it's positive to direct him to look at the problem no matter which way you get him there.

Should you be able to explain that you shouldn't have to do this? Yes, you should.

Do you feel that you can do that with this particular employer and keep that paycheck rolling in all nice and regular? No you don't.  

As much as I'd like to adivse you to come from an empowered perspective on this, I think you won't go there, because your boss doesn't communicte with you as a professional, he communicates with you as though you were his mommy, there to fix all the hurts with nary a thank you.

So using plan B, (the dark side of the force! Aka, The can you help me be more organized scenario) is not going to have a negative impact on your job.

What is the potential outcome of this? Maybe Bossie will help you out.  Feeling big about his ability to save you.  Yeah it's cheap.  No it's not what an empowered professional should do, BUT if you're unable to communicate with your employer at an professional level (because he won't allow it) it's better to communicate with him at SOME level to solve the problem which exists whether bossie is a bully or not!

At the very least, you'll have an exercise in getting your thoughts across, at the most, Bossie will see a problem and want to address it as a team.

[elkiedee]

I don't know how useful/viable this is as an idea but many hotels and especially chains, including a lot used by business and in the US, do online reservations. Won't end your whole headache but you can at least check online. It might be worth exploring the websites for the given city as well. I discovered this stuff when booking my holiday plans in Portland and Seattle this year (great for me because I live in the UK) but they clearly have lots of facilities and features which would be useful for business travel.

Luci

[beaintheuk]

Quite right.  I've been booking and cancelling hotels online and find it a lot better than having to talk to someone or send a fax.  And, you get a confirmation number as well as an emailed confirmation.  Best Western and Holiday Inn do it for instance.  (I'm in the UK but had booked these hotels in Paris and Northern France)
I would also probably create an excel spreadsheet to keep track of the reservations, etc
Good luck
Beatrice

[omar]

Bea - Est ce que tu savais pour tu pouvais amasser des points pour tes resas aux holiday inns - demande une brochure du programme Kudos a ton HI le plus proche - et pourquoi pas t'en mettre un peu dans la poche tant qu'a faire!

[dettu]

I need to phone on most of these because he's using special rates, etc. that aren't on the website. Sigh. I do book online for other people, if I have to do their travel--everyone else in the co. is supposed to go through the travel coordinator, but Bossie refuses.

[bethalize]

How inconsiderate of him!

Bethalize
Peer Moderator

[dettu]

Yes. But this is just the tiniest tip of the bossly iceberg. Mustn't contemplate that now...

[omar]

Hello Dettu - I feel for you. This is not a healthy way to live.
May I suggest to fax the hotels you usually book at and ask them to insert a comment in your company profile - Hotels are very good at keeping guests and companies histories because it helps them better the service at the next visit - the comment could read: "Please call Dettu - by 2pm today to confirm if booking should be kept live or released" and give them a number you are always reachable at.  Thus you wont have to remind your boss that he needs to remind you that you need to remind him of a booking for Mr X booked at hotel Y...The hotel will do that for you.  In some hotels corporate bookers are rewarded with points they can eventually redeem against High Street vouchers.
Dittu, it's easy to turn it around to your advantage by letting the hotel do the work and pocketing a few bobs for your hard work - Happy shopping - Omar:)