Title: Business Analyst, Technology Solutions Group
Location: EUROPE_UK%26I-England-STS-Burton On Trent
Do you see yourself as a Business Analyst, Technology Solutions Group ?
What's your passion? Whether you're into tennis, shopping or karaoke, at IHG we're interested in YOU. At IHG we employ people who apply the same amount of care and passion to their jobs as they do their hobbies - people who put our guests at the heart of everything they do. And we're looking for more people like this to join our friendly and professional team.
Location
Branston
-140 staff onsite
-Conveniently situated near the A38 trunk road
-30 minutes from Derby
-40 minutes from Birmingham City Centre
-On site restaurant & free on site parking
Job Summary
The Technology Solutions Group (TSG) is responsible for all aspects of technology design, innovation, business analysis and localisation within our region's hotels, offices and data centres. As part of Global Technology Europe our three teams of specialists have a wide range of skills and experience from both hospitality and technology backgrounds, bringing together operational, technical and competitor insights to support our brands and corporate colleagues.
The Technology Design & Architecture team collaborates closely with regional and global stakeholders to define technology standards for the region's hotel and corporate offices, ensuring that innovative new solutions are introduced into our business to support the brand propositions and our brand plans to win.
The Technical Services and Business Services teams provide customisation & design, certification and business analysis for our central and hotel based technologies, taking their strategic and architectural lead from the Technology Design & Architecture team.
A Business Analyst will work closely with our business sponsors and act as a bridge between global technology, our brand, function and operational teams in the European region. They will drive our technology vendors to understand what is important to our brands and influence their product roadmaps accordingly. They will provide independent advice relating to both heart-of-house and guest facing technology to our owned, managed, franchised and leased hotels and ensure that systems are deployed and used effectively, and are optimised to deliver maximum benefit in our hotels using best practise and current recommendations available. They will be able to provide consultancy services to internal functions, key vendors and owner/franchisee groups to support the integration of key technologies.
Essential Duties and Responsibilities
* Manage the development lifecycle for existing hotel applications and communicate the development roadmap to internal stakeholders and key business sponsors.
* Serve as the conduit between the customer community (Internal and External) and the vendor's application development team through which requirements flow.
* A thorough understanding of how to interpret customer business needs and translate them into application and operational requirements.
* Elicit requirements using a range of techniques: interviews, document analysis, requirements workshops, surveys, hotel visits, business process descriptions, scenarios and business analysis.
* Critically evaluate information gathered from multiple sources, reconcile conflicts, decompose high-level information into details, abstract up from low-level information to a general understanding and distinguish user requests from the underlying true needs.
* Proactively communicate and collaborate with external and internal customers to analysis information needs and functional requirements and deliver the following documents as needed: Functional Requirements and Business Requirements Documents.
* Have excellent verbal and written communication skills and the ability to interact professionally with a diverse group of people from all levels of the organisation: Managers, Owners and Investors, Functional and Business Sponsors and Subject Matter Experts.
* Demonstrate a high understanding of the IHG Brands and interpret how TSG is able to assist in the Unique Guest Experience for each brand. Share this information with the wider Global Technology Europe team assisting in creating a Brand hearted culture in the department.
* Responsible for developing design, best practice programs, documentation, processes and training to support the implementation of hotel technologies, collaborating with other members of the technology solutions team where appropriate.
* Be the Subject Matter Expert (SME) in the following:
* Europe's preferred PMS systems interfacing to our proprietary Reservation System and Revenue Management System.
* Third Party Interface to PMS systems such a Credit Card, Mini Bar, Reporting, Financial Systems.
* Mobile and Web Technologies including kiosk.
* Provide consultancy services for Franchised and Managed hotels IT and Operational teams in adapting a best practice.
* Responsible for creating the installation and upgrade path for all hotels as they open or migrate to a new PMS, ensuring that they understand how to plan their installation / migration / configuration for optimal system performance and revenue enhancements.
* Responsible for training key personnel from the Program Management and Service Management teams as enhancements are developed.
Required Qualifications
* Demonstrate excellent knowledge of hospitality IT technology and hotel operational practices as well as specialist skills in at least three of the following areas:
* Heart-of-house systems
* PMS
* S&C
* POS (Food and Beverage)
* Financial Systems
* Third Party Interfaces (Mini Bar, HSIA, Key , Telephone, Call Accounting etc)
* Central System
* Central Reservations
* Revenue Management Systems
Desirable Skill Capabilities
* Understanding of IHG Global Technology standards and operational procedures in the following systems:
* OPERA PMS
* HOLIDEX® Plus CRS
* PERFORM RMS
* Magic
Non-Technical (including Managerial Capabilities)
* Demonstrate strong analytical and product management skills and strategic capability
* Contribute to the development and delivery of IHG's vision Great Hotels Guest Love
* Ability to communicate effectively with all levels in the organisation
* Self motivated and focused on results, successfully engage in multiple initiatives simultaneously
* Strong inter-personal skills, and customer focus as well as cultural awareness required
* Good written and oral communication skills
* Ability to deliver training material to individual and small groups
* Impact and Influence skills
* Vendor Management experience
Qualifications
* MBA in Business Management would be an advantage
Specific Experience
* Likely to have at least 5 years practical experience of hotel operations
* Business Analysis experience
* Experience in a installation of a new hotel system installation or upgrade of existing system
* A good working knowledge of IT and hospitality technology
Essential Languages: Fluency in English
You must meet the legal requirements to work in this country
Hotel discounts worldwide are available as well as access to a wide variety of discount schemes and the chance to work with a great team of people. Most importantly, we'll give you the room to be yourself.
So what's your passion? Please get in touch and tell us how you could bring your individual skills to IHG.
Job: Information Technology
