I've worked many years in the hospitality industry and would LOVE to continue to work with them. I am, however, having a problem in that I know the industry in my area VERY well, and I know how they pay. If I were to tell them that I want $20 an hour, they'd want to hire me for 2 hours as an employee, not a contractor or consultant. And it would be worse if I said that I wanted $40 an hour. They want someone on site to do the work, not someone working from home.
A big part of the industry is being "the face". The person that others talk to directly and look in their eyes.
Just as a reference, Hyatt Place started a few years back. The idea that they had was for the front desk to become much more modern with the actual removal of the real front desk itself. They installed kiosks for the guests to check in, and there were people standing in line at the front door to direct them to the kiosks and take the bags. It didn't work. It made guests and staff feel very uncomfortable. Half of the guests felt ignored because they would be directed to the kiosks to check themselves in while the agents moved on to the next person, and the other half felt like their personal space was violated. They went back to the old form.
Guests want to see your face, and talk to you personally. The tall desk between the guest and the agents keep the distance between them while still allowing personal service and a small added level of security for the staff Its unlikely a guest will try to jump the desk at any agent if there's a problem to hit them in the face, but much more likely this will happen with no desk between them if the agent says something the guest doesn't like.
For other departments such as Sales, HR, and Food and Beverage, part of what is being sold is the personal interaction which you are unable to do if you aren't on site.
Hospitality is a very heavily influenced area by face to face customer service. Most people feel uncomfortable not being able to give proper customer service. Its already bad enough when there are owners telling you that you can't do things to make the guests happy like giving them gift certificates they can use for food if there's a problem for example or even install phones in the rooms (you would be surprised at the number of hotel owners I've had say that phones aren't needed due to cell phones). Customer service is beginning to fall by the way side in the industry and that's a big problem when the whole industry is built on it.
I've been trying for years to convince people in my area it would be a great idea to try a VA for hotels, restaurants and the like but they just aren't buying it. Then again, approximately 75%-80% (it changes depending on the report you read) of my city runs on hospitality because we are a destination market rather than a transient or corporate market.
If you'd like to work with hospitality, you will need to find something they need other than the typical things they need like face to face interaction. Things like web site design (though most hire professionals so you will likely need to find an independent hotel to work with and trust me they are very hard to work for. Its hard to explain why without going into intense detail but they expect very very much for very very little and won't pay as much), and graphic design might be much more likely to peak their interest than answering phones and doing paperwork.
I have to say that while I was working as an AGM, if anyone called, emailed or faxed for online marketing and SEO, I just deleted the email, fax, or hung up. Our owner was an independent one and wasn't willing to spend ANY money on anything like that and was actually quite rude about it if asked.
Restaurants and bars are much more likely to pay for this kind of thing than any form of lodging.
