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Statistically speaking, CIOs don't become CEOs. But it's not because they don't want it. Research shows that nearly half of CIOs aspire to become chief executive, but only four percent actually get there. Much more frequently, CEOs for the world's top companies - about half in fact - come up through C-level financial or operating roles (Vanson Bourne, 2012). Chris Laping, CIO of Red Robin Gourmet Burgers (www.redrobin.com), strongly believes this is because technology executives are too often focused on engineering and IT solutions to embrace their most valuable leadership quality: the ability to manage change. Technology leaders, he believes, possess powerful project management skills that can and should be leveraged across the business for even the most non-IT initiatives, with the particular role of being agents for change. Laping's official role at Red Robin is indicative of that practice: he's the company's senior vice president of business transformation and CIO. In that role, he oversees the company's technology, learning and development, enterprise project management and operations services teams. In this exclusive interview with Hospitality Technology, Laping shares how the technology team has taken on a business transformation role at Red Robin, and describes his overall vision for IT leaders. But it's not something CIOs are handed; they have to drive it, says Laping. Driving this change, perhaps, will also help more CIOs chase down their chief-executive dreams. HT: Let's start with some definitions: "business transformation" and "change agents" are pretty heady buzzwords that get tossed around executive boardrooms. What does business transformation really mean? LAPING: If you look at a classic Wikipedia definition of business transformation, it talks about people, process and technology. So when you push change through people, you usually do that through training. If you want to change business performan

Despite women leading the way in scholarship and culinary education, they are suspiciously vacant at the top of the leadership ladder. According to Bloomberg, only about 7% of executive chefs are woman, and "67% of executive women are in support roles...as opposed to running their own line of business." This doesn't appear to be because of a lack of entrepreneurial spirt, as "405 of restaurants are women-owned businesses or WOB, and startups by women are growing much faster than the industry overall." This made me reflect on my own city, as I do see women in executive positions, such as Stephanie Izard, Sarah Grunenberg, and Mindy Segal, they all got to their positions in very different ways. Probably the most successful, with currently 7-8 restaurants, is Izard, she got her start by winning a reality tv show and then joining forces with two male business owners (BOKA). Grunenberg also started visa vi the reality TV route, and now eventually owns and runs a very successful restaurant downtown. Mindy Segal is the only woman executive in this group that has built her business, her cookbooks, her brand, and now her cannibis retail, mostly by herself. It is interesting to relate these women to this article because while they are all three incredibly successful, only one was able to pull herself there through the three points mentioned in this article. In order for women to break the glass ceiling in restaurants and culinary, they will need to accomplish three main goals: 1. Gain confidence, 2. Increase their aspirations, and 3. Learn and Maintain Financial literacy. The "grim reality (is) that 96% of WOB do not cross the $1 million in revenue...(and) fewer than 8% seek external financing. Women "receive less than 4% of Small Business Administration loan dollars and less than 2% of venture capital dollars. For confidence, this article recommends to women to learn how to advocate for yourself. Use coaches, practices public speaking, and learn how to pitch your business

While we all know now it's the technology era, customers would like prefer new hotel technology which would enhance their experience. When we are geeky enough to love new hotel technology, however, we have got our green side too. For example, in hospitality industry, some hotels control what gets switched on and off using the system that tells them when a guest comes and goes; some also talked about putting solar panels on hotel roofs with government subsidies. Applying new technology in hospitality industry also will have some negative side as everything has two sides. it is just a kind of balance thing. We just need to find the most suitable ones for our hotels and customers.

The article talks about how hotel are getting into more green technology. In New Orleans they had a conference for hotel own and GM that want to get greener with their hotel technology. The new green tech development is focused on reducing energy use. For example the new developed energy efficient system will remember how light are set and if the fireplace is on and will shut down 20 minutes after the guest leave and come back to the same setting. It will be a big saving for the hotel especially when the power bills comes in they will notice a different

I found this article incredibly interesting, as it is an interview with the co-founder of eMenu, Alexandru. He speaks about how he thought up the idea of eMenu, when he was at a restaurant trying to pay the bill, but after five minutes of trying to call the server and being ignored, he got annoyed; and believed there was a way to fix this. Additionally, he makes great points about why the eMenu is so efficient, such as it being technology based, it is very popular amongst Millennials. He also makes the great point of it being on a tech system, it allows restaurants to have the menu in several language options more conveniently. As well as, it being flexible enough to make changes, such as newly added plates, without needing to reprint several new menus. He then goes on to say, he now looks forward to bringing this technology into the hotel industry, where room service menus can now be available from the TV, rather than in a "small wasted paper menu." All in all, I believe Alexandru makes some very valid points as to why the eMenu should be considered in many aspects of the hospitality industry. 

Restaurants have always been an easy target for cyber security hackers, in particular, hackers who are looking for credit card and ID information. Restaurants provide hackers with a "wealth of client data" due to the high "volume of credit card transactions and CRM data available." Once given access, a hacker could simple install malware and duplicate all customer information. Already facing critical financial issues during Covid 19, restaurants large and small need to take a stronger presence in the protection of their data. If discovered to be the start of a breach, customers will tend to avoid that business. "Chipotle, for example...got devalued by about $400 million after they suffered a breach," and many small restaurants "go belly up six months after an attack." Below is a summary of the types of attachs restaurants face: 1. Unprotected Wifi 2. Social engineering and phishing attacks. This is actually the one that stood out to me the most because of how sophisticated these attacks can be. It is a reminder that we are all at risk, both the technologically challenged and gifted. 3. Malware 4. Covid 19 Scams 5. Grub hub scams 6. Supply chain scams *A particular issue for restaurants and commercial businesses right now as companies scramble to find new vendors who can supply them with the products they require. 7. Public Health scams 8. Government Stimulus scams 9. Technical support scams How can we fight against these? Here are the recommendations: 1. PCI compliance 2. Hire and IT security professional to conduct a risk analysis and if possible, keep on as a consultant or full time 3. Keep a secure network and change free passwords daily 4. Use the latest operating systems, force multi-factor authentication, strong passwords, and use encryption services for data storage and transfers 5. Install and use robust web-filters and security software programs 6. Maybe most important!!! Train your employees. 5.

This article tells us about 10 new innovations in the hospitality world. Mostly it is talking about some innovations in the hotel industry such as face recognition at the registrations, voice-controlled rooms, and smart amenities.

ROOMKEY PMS becomes a smart property management system with over 30 years experience and it got cloud computing based for over 10 years. Like other cloud based PMS, it has accounting security, anytime, anywhere reports, GDS seamless connect, etc. Now is a good trend for using cloud based PMS, more convenient and more cost efficiency. 

An effective HRIS could benefit a company a lot. First of all, all the numbers, payrolls, employee information is easy to track and very clarified. It could bring a better administration function like enrollment, status change and some company's document. Especially some of the HRIS could let employees enable themselves to update their information and free HR people for more strategic works. And the most important thing is employees could use data for their knowledge development, job growth and development. From my personal experience when I was doing internship in hotel, for the day they hired me they already got me a lot of information, and later offer me an website, saying that I can see some rules documents in the intranet. That was impressive, I saw some of training information on it and downloaded it. Those materials are very useful that I still keep it in my drive. I believe a lot of people may have the same situation with me.

This article discusses how a self service mobile app called FCS i-Guest has also included OpenWays Mobile Key in its program. Now the guest can use the app to see reservation details, hotel information, checkin, and got straight to the room and unlock their door. Now there is less hassle for the guest, since all their secure information is stored on their phone.

This is a research paper focuses on studies of linear correlation between hotel categorization and number of beds within hotels which use HRIS. Through the case study and data analysis got the conclusion that HRIS contributes to each business subjects, particularly to service industry due to better quality of HRM activities. Furthermore, the whole tourism demand and hotel competitiveness as well can be indirectly influenced by adequate implementation of HRIS.

Even Apple has got a new version of eMenu Pro for Restaurants.

The La Jolla Beach and Tennis Club in California has had many problems with time cards for their employees over the past several years. They used to use swipe cards with bar-codes to tell when people were coming in and out of work but there are a lot of problems with that technology. If people misplaced their cards or knew they were going to be late so gave it to a co-worker to punch them in is not a very smart thing to have in the hotel. After a lot of problems with this system management finally went in a new direction. They decided to move to newer technology and go with Biometrics. The hotel now has a hand reader system that makes every employee get there hand measured to clock in. This technology measured length, width, thickness, and surface area of the hand to store in the system so it knows each persons hand every time they go to clock in any time there after. When going to clock in the system asks for the employee number and then is ready for your hand on the little screen for your scan. The entire process of this takes under 1 minute. This technology of the HandPunch 3000 not only allows the employees to clock in but also allows management to collect data for pay codes, tips collected, and to allow the employees to go back and view their past times in and out. This system is a very green way to go in the hotel industry because there is no paper for records of clock in times, and there are no swipe cards that need to be made for clock in times. Ever since this hotel got the HandPunch 3000 they have not had issues of other employees clocking in other people. The system of course had some glitches to it in the beginning but they were fixed immediately while the staff was there installing it. My only question to this article that is not answered is : since it is a machine that has to be plugged in, what happens if the power goes out? Can employees still clock in to work because the hotel still is functioning?

By using this augmented reality-driven app, hoteliers can clearly see the effect of some decoration products during renovation of rooms. Thus hoteliers can do a better financial control and avoid unnecessary losses since they have got a better idea of what the brand's products will look like before they really put them in the room. This products also remind me of the improper or ugly decorations in some hotels. I guess if they apply this innovation, they can avoid this effect to a large degree so they can express a better outlook to their customers.

The travel industry has evolved over the past years. In the article it talks about how travel was limited in years gone by and you had to physically sit in a travel agent office in order to book your vacation. They were the only one who had all the information about travel. Then came the evolution of the travel industry and now everybody can book their vacation online with or without the help of a travel agent.

The article here explains the evolution of how we used Travel Agents back in the day and how we got to a point where we no longer needed travel agents. Back in the old days if anyone wanted to fly to another country or state, we went thru travel agents so we can get a booked flight and car services etc. Now we do everything ourselves. We find out information on our own and book and print our own tickets. Why? because of the internet. The internet will teach you anything and will give you whatever you are looking for. According to the article , people are overwhelmed in all the information provided by the internet that they cant decided where they want to go or where they want to stay at. So business is coming to travel agents. We feel so busy now and days that we give all the work to someone to do everything for us.

This is a great article about relatively new point-of-sales systems, that are implemented in a number of places worldwide. Have you ever experienced your card being swiped on iPad of a server when you ordered a coffee? No? And how about your iPhone to become a POS? You walk in a mall, scanning stuff, getting your groceries and the devise is offering you recipes with the food you're getting. The other trend is social POS. It post automatically on a facebook whatever you got in a mall in order for you to remember your shopping history in case you lose the track of your purchases.

It is amazing that all the customer transactions can be done through Ipad or Iphone. This technology create new shopping experience and may attract more young customers.

Having a content aggregation would be a great development in any industry specially in Travel business. At first place GDS  was ment to be  designed for airlines but as the time passed other sections of travel business got involved and took their share in this powerful content aggregation. Now one of the most powerful sectors of GDS is Hotel industry and reservations of hotel rooms which are made through this computerized system.  However, this improved system of GDS could not be much of success in rail industry. Because the railing system is much more sophisticated than air transportation system. There are numerous rail stations existing out there which would be hardly controllable and arrangeable to be collected under a single computerized system.  However, if every and each of the major owners of GDS consider the whole chain and don't look for their very own profit this system would not only work out but also improves and reaches higher standards. 

According to the results of "2012 Energy Efficiency IT report", based on 760 IT professionals' view, on cutting energy costs, buy greener gear than to get high-ROI green initiatives. Implementing Energy-star-qualifying equipment got more potential ROI. Server consolidation and virtualization also ranked high among already deployed green-tech projects. And the 8 popular green-technology projects are: server/storage virtualization, consolidating servers, implementing hardware with more efficient processors, implementing energy star-qualifying equipment, deploying more energy-efficient networking equipment, employing energy-efficient ups, employing new cooling approaches,  increased use of hosted services.

I have a key chain full of membership cards, tiny ones. I have Wallgreen Balance rewards card, Salon Centric professional store card, PetSmart PetPerks card, Winn Dixie Grocery store card, my vehical elite member card, and my gym membership card to name a few. I think those business (retails) got me. I can't resist their benefits even though I know they try to get my money. It's nice to get a discount here and there, and it really makes shopping fun and keeps me coming back for more with coupons and stuff. I think having a customer loyalty program within POS systems is a great idea especially when enabled via mobile devices.

I found this article very interesting. It deals with the development of a new website that incorporates all facets of event planning into one central hub. The website was coined "honey book" a conjunction between honeymoon and booking. It's creator Naama Alom, got the idea when she, herself, was planning her own wedding. She realized that there was not one place where she could store all of her event, vendor, and decor information. "Honey book" is also a medium to share your event highlights with family and friends. Naama decided that Facebook was not sufficient enough and when investors expressed interest, Naama and her husband packed up and moved from Israel to the United States. The US housed the billion-dollar target market that "honey book" was developed for.

I found an interesting article about how the big computer companies can recycle the computers. This can solve some of the main problem about the recycling. The article is referring to idea that computers may become bigger size but easier to recycle. In other words we might wanna make a step back in the past, when we was able to just replace one detail from the computer instead of throwing it away.