Chapter 36Operating Statistics and KPI Governance

Business day five. The owner pack is due at noon and the dashboard looks ready. Anika asks a different question than usual: "Which of these KPIs are approved for use today?"

RevPAR can't be explained until a two-day floor closure's effect on rooms available is confirmed. Average check can't be trusted until a POS update's effect on covers is checked. Housekeeping productivity needs agency hours included. Water cost needs actual meter readings separated from estimated billing. None of the formulas are wrong — that's exactly the problem. A KPI can be mathematically correct and still unsafe to use.

“A calculated KPI is not automatically an approved KPI. Prove the statistic, record the change, and approve the use.”

Questions this chapter helps answer

• How should hotel operating statistics and KPIs be governed before they are released for management or owner decisions?
• What happens when a KPI formula is correct but its source population, definition, or capacity base is incomplete?
• How should continuity breaks be bridged before occupancy, RevPAR, productivity, or benchmark comparisons are approved?

What this chapter gives you

• How to maintain a controlled statistic register that survives PMS updates, closures, and definition changes
• The five-state approval system: approved, approved with caveat, restricted, restated, or withheld
• Why every dashboard, benchmark, and owner decision inherits the quality of the statistics beneath it

Key concepts

• KPI governance
• operating statistics
• source population
• definition control
• capacity base
• continuity break
• RevPAR
• productivity KPI
• permitted use

The right question every release day isn't "is the KPI good or bad" — it's whether this KPI, this month, for this purpose, has actually earned the right to be used.

Hotel Financial Reporting in Practice · Manish Gupta, CA