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Consulting · Hospitality audit & mystery guest

Hospitality audit and mystery guest

And you, how do you welcome your guests?

Your teams know the standards. Your satisfaction surveys show good scores. And yet, between what your establishment promises and what your guests and staff really experience, there is often a gap nobody sees from the inside. The DELPORTE HOSPITALITY audit consists of coming to experience it, alongside you, to reveal it and close it.

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A lived assessment, a tool to help, never an inspection

Experience the place, not grade it

No compliance checklist. A scenario built with management, then the place experienced as a guest experiences it: book, arrive, wait, ask, stay, leave. The audit establishes the real state of the welcome, as it is received.

Look at what works

A hospitality audit first highlights what is already right, often without the teams being aware of it. These strengths are what the debrief reinforces first.

Pass it on to the teams

The debrief shows the teams how they can improve their service, based on what was experienced. It is designed as a moment of collaboration and team spirit: everyone leaves with something, nobody is blamed.

Situations encountered on assignments

Each situation is real and anonymised. The audit was born in luxury hospitality; it now applies to any place that receives people.

Hotel · scenario with management

How to re-energise the service offer of a hotel that already works well?

The situation

A luxury hotel with high satisfaction scores. Nothing is wrong, but management feels the service offer has settled into its habits and wants to give it new momentum, with its teams.

The stakes

Making a service offer that works evolve, without breaking what pleases: rediscovering the attentions that make the difference, renewing the moments of the stay, and giving the teams back the wish to surprise. That is where loyalty is won, and where reviews are decided.

DELPORTE HOSPITALITY's intervention

A scenario written with the general manager, then the journey experienced as a guest, from booking to departure. The resulting assessment is debriefed with the teams: what already touches, what can be enriched, and how to re-energise the service, moment by moment.

The benefit for the client

A team that rediscovers its own strengths, a service offer renewed without disruption, and a debrief experienced as a team moment that makes everyone want to go further.

Shopping centre · assessment

Making a shopping centre welcoming, so that visitors want to come back

The situation

A shopping centre competing with online retail and with other centres. Footfall is measured; what visitors feel, and what makes them come back, is not.

The stakes

Bringing people in, letting every space, and making them live. A centre only lastingly attracts its retailers and visitors if it is perceived as welcoming: a place where people want to come, stay and return.

DELPORTE HOSPITALITY's intervention

Whole days of observation on site: entrances, flows, hesitations, information points, restrooms, waiting times, the gestures of the teams. Interviews with users and the various actors of the place, management, retailers, front-desk and security teams, to take the analysis further. Then an assessment of the hospitality of the centre and recommendations, from the organisation of spaces to the welcoming posture, to define what makes this place welcoming.

The benefit for the client

A clear definition of the hospitality of the centre, ideas and concrete actions to put in place so that every space lives, a vision challenged by an outside strategist's eye, and one more argument to convince retailers and retain visitors.

Headquarters · assessment

The company receives its clients. Does it receive its own teams as well?

The situation

The headquarters of a large services company. The welcome of visitors is polished; that of staff, from arrival in the morning to the meeting room, has never been looked at.

The stakes

These same staff then welcome the clients: the quality of the internal welcome shows up, sooner or later, in that of the external welcome. The stake is also to look at working conditions as a component of hospitality, to create connections, and to make people want to come back to the office, together, when remote work has taken more room than planned.

DELPORTE HOSPITALITY's intervention

Interviews with staff and managers at all levels, observation of the common areas, and a debrief that distinguishes what works, what is missing, and what can improve without investment.

The benefit for the client

An action plan shared by management and teams. And because hospitality cannot be improvised, the creation of an internal hospitality charter, to commit every day to a new state of mind.

What sets this audit apart from a classic mystery guest

A mystery guest measures. A DELPORTE HOSPITALITY audit understands, connects and projects: it is Laurent Delporte's expertise and strategic vision that make the value of the debrief.

A practitioner's expertise, not a checklist

Twenty-five years in the finest hotels in the world, hundreds of hotels visited, an intimate knowledge of luxury service and its back of house. Laurent Delporte experiences the place himself and sees what no checklist anticipates: the missing gesture, the touching detail, the cause behind the symptom. A know-how born in luxury hospitality, which he applies with the same method to airports, shopping centres, headquarters and healthcare establishments.

A strategic vision

The audit does not stop at the finding. It connects what is experienced to the brand, the positioning and the business model of the house, and it projects: what the service offer can become, where to start, what it will bring. A strategist's eye, which challenges management's vision. And depending on your priorities, the audit opens onto the next step: strategic consulting, or a hospitality charter with its action plan.

The teams involved

The debrief is done with the teams, starting from what works, so that they take ownership of the improvements rather than endure them. A moment of team spirit, not an inspection, which can continue with training or a debrief keynote, with the same contact.

The method, in brief

A scenario defined with management. An immersion on site, one day at least depending on the scenario, as a mystery guest or openly. An assessment of what is experienced: communication and body language, the place of the human, reciprocity, the codes of the place, the material details that help or hinder. A written then oral debrief, with the teams. And, depending on needs, training, a debrief keynote, or a hospitality charter with its action plan.

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Frequently asked questions

How do I know whether my guests are well received?

By experiencing it in their place. The hospitality audit establishes the real state of your welcome, as it is received, beyond satisfaction surveys and displayed standards.

Will my teams experience it as an inspection?

No. They will experience it as a moment of collaboration and team spirit: the debrief starts with what works, nobody is singled out, and everyone leaves with ideas to improve their service.

How long does an audit take?

One day of immersion at least, more depending on the scenario and the number of sites, plus preparation and debrief. A first thirty-minute conversation sizes the assignment, on quotation.

What happens after the audit?

Depending on your priorities: team training, a debrief keynote, or a hospitality charter with a precise action plan.

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