Hotel pre-opening Gantt chart template: timeline and critical path
An editable hotel pre-opening Gantt chart: general manager, sales office and pre-selling, three hiring waves, systems, operating supplies, construction handover, permits and mock stays, with dependencies and milestones.
What the hotel pre-opening gantt chart template: timeline and critical path process is
A hotel opens on the day the slowest of several long chains finishes, and most of those chains are not run by the hotel team. The contractor finishes back-of-house areas and guest floors on its own schedule, operating supplies are made to order, and in this plan the permits to operate wait for a finished building. Meanwhile a general manager has to be appointed, a sales office has to sell rooms that are still being built, and the staff have to be hired and trained in waves. A timeline shows which chain sets the date before you announce it to guests and group buyers.
This template has five groups: Leadership and sales, Recruitment and training, Systems and supplies, Building handover and Opening. It has two starting tasks that begin on the same day. "Appoint the general manager" (10 working days) starts the operating side, and "Contractor completes back-of-house areas" (50) starts the building side. "Set the pre-opening budget and plan" (10) follows the appointment, and the sales office, the first hiring wave, the system selection and the order for operating supplies and equipment all wait for it. Hotels call that last item OS&E: the linen, tableware, guest-room items and small equipment a hotel needs to run. The first gate is the "Back-of-house handed over" milestone: "Install and test hotel systems" (10) waits for it and for "Select property, sales and point-of-sale systems", so the systems go into finished offices and kitchens while the guest floors are still being built.
With the illustrative numbers, the building sets the date. "Contractor completes guest rooms and public areas" (30) starts 30 days into the back-of-house works, start-to-start, and "Snag and accept rooms floor by floor" (10) ends in the "Building handed over" milestone after 70 working days. Two tasks need that handover: "Receive, unpack and place supplies" (10) and "Obtain occupancy and operating permits" (10). The supplies are ready earlier, since "Supplies manufacture and delivery" (40) ends five days before the handover, so they wait for a building to go into. Hiring runs in three overlapping waves: "Hire heads of department" (20), "Hire supervisors" (20) from 10 days after it starts, and "Hire line staff in waves" (25) from 10 days after the supervisors start. "Train teams on procedures and systems" (12) waits for the line staff, the written procedures and the installed systems and ends three days before the mock stays can begin. "Pre-sell groups, events and corporate accounts" (55) feeds the soft opening with five days to spare. Turn on View > Critical path to see the building chain light up.
The Opening group closes the plan. "Run mock stays and trial service" (5) waits for the supplies in place, the permits and the trained teams, and is where staff or invited guests stay overnight and the team runs service as if the hotel were open. "Soft opening" (5) waits for the mock stays and the pre-selling, and "Hotel opens to guests" is the last milestone, after 90 working days with these numbers. All durations are illustrative. Replace them with the contractor's schedule, supplier lead times and your own hiring numbers, and add public holidays as extra days, since the chart counts Monday to Friday only.
A timeline schedules the work. It does not obtain an occupancy permit, accept a building from a contractor or set an operator's standards. For hiring and training an opening team in waves, see /guides/opening-team-hiring-gantt-chart. For the contractor's side of the handover, see /templates/construction-handover-gantt, and for the training program itself see /templates/training-plan-gantt-chart.
What this flowchart covers
In this template
- Five groups, Leadership and sales, Recruitment and training, Systems and supplies, Building handover and Opening, with 23 tasks and three milestones: "Back-of-house handed over", "Building handed over" and "Hotel opens to guests".
- Two starting tasks: "Appoint the general manager" on the operating side and "Contractor completes back-of-house areas" (50 working days) on the building side, with "Contractor completes guest rooms and public areas" starting 30 days into the back-of-house works.
- Three overlapping hiring waves: "Hire heads of department", then "Hire supervisors" 10 days after it starts and "Hire line staff in waves" 10 days after that, before "Train teams on procedures and systems".
- A building gate: "Receive, unpack and place supplies" waits for both "Supplies manufacture and delivery" (40) and "Building handed over", and "Obtain occupancy and operating permits" waits for the handover.
- A sales stream, "Open the pre-opening sales office" and then "Pre-sell groups, events and corporate accounts" (55), that feeds the soft opening after "Run mock stays and trial service".
When to use this template
- You run pre-opening for a new hotel and need one plan that the owner, the contractor, the general manager and the sales team can all read.
- You want to see whether the building handover, the supplies lead time or the hiring waves sets the opening day.
- The owner wants an opening date and you want to compare the finish date with the date being offered to group buyers.
- You are reopening a hotel after a full refurbishment and want a pre-opening skeleton you can resize.
The plan, task by task
Every task in the chart with its length in working days and what it waits for. A dependency is a step number; SS is start-to-start, FF is finish-to-finish, and +n is a lag in working days.
| # | Task | Group | Working days | Depends on |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Appoint the general manager | Leadership and sales | 10 | |
| 2 | Set the pre-opening budget and plan | Leadership and sales | 10 | 1 |
| 3 | Open the pre-opening sales office | Leadership and sales | 5 | 2 |
| 4 | Pre-sell groups, events and corporate accounts | Leadership and sales | 55 | 3 |
| 5 | Hire heads of department | Recruitment and training | 20 | 2 |
| 6 | Hire supervisors | Recruitment and training | 20 | 5SS+10 |
| 7 | Hire line staff in waves | Recruitment and training | 25 | 6SS+10 |
| 8 | Write department procedures and standards | Recruitment and training | 15 | 5 |
| 9 | Train teams on procedures and systems | Recruitment and training | 12 | 7, 8, 13 |
| 10 | Select property, sales and point-of-sale systems | Systems and supplies | 10 | 2 |
| 11 | Order operating supplies and equipment | Systems and supplies | 5 | 2 |
| 12 | Supplies manufacture and delivery | Systems and supplies | 40 | 11 |
| 13 | Install and test hotel systems | Systems and supplies | 10 | 10, 16 |
| 14 | Receive, unpack and place supplies | Systems and supplies | 10 | 12, 19 |
| 15 | Contractor completes back-of-house areas | Building handover | 50 | |
| 16 | Back-of-house handed over | Building handover | Milestone | 15 |
| 17 | Contractor completes guest rooms and public areas | Building handover | 30 | 15SS+30 |
| 18 | Snag and accept rooms floor by floor | Building handover | 10 | 17 |
| 19 | Building handed over | Building handover | Milestone | 18 |
| 20 | Obtain occupancy and operating permits | Building handover | 10 | 19 |
| 21 | Run mock stays and trial service | Opening | 5 | 9, 14, 20 |
| 22 | Soft opening | Opening | 5 | 4, 21 |
| 23 | Hotel opens to guests | Opening | Milestone | 22 |
How it works
Set the two starting tasks
Keep "Appoint the general manager" and "Contractor completes back-of-house areas" as the starting tasks. Replace the 50-day back-of-house duration with the contractor's schedule. If the general manager is already in post, set that task's duration to 0.
Match the room works to the contractor
"Contractor completes guest rooms and public areas" is linked start-to-start with a lag of 30 days to the back-of-house works, written 15SS+30 in Depends on. Change the lag and the duration to the contractor's sequence, and add a snagging task per floor if you accept floors one at a time.
Size the hiring waves
Set "Hire heads of department", "Hire supervisors" and "Hire line staff in waves" from your recruitment plan. The SS+10 links start each wave 10 days after the one above it starts, so the waves overlap instead of queueing.
Replace the supplies lead time
Set "Supplies manufacture and delivery" from your suppliers' quotes. With the illustrative numbers it ends five days before "Building handed over", so a lead time more than five days longer moves the opening day.
Check the opening date
Turn on View > Critical path to see the chain that sets the finish date, then compare the date of "Hotel opens to guests" with the date you need. Add public holidays as extra days before you rely on it.
Add owners, share and export
Put the responsible person in People for each task, share the chart with the owner, the contractor and the heads of department, and export a PDF or CSV for the pre-opening meeting.
Frequently asked questions
What is the critical path of a hotel pre-opening?
It is the chain of tasks that sets the opening day: delay any task on it and the opening moves. In this template, with the illustrative numbers, it runs through the contractor's works, "Snag and accept rooms floor by floor", "Building handed over", placing the supplies and obtaining the permits, which end on the same day, and then the mock stays and the soft opening. Turn it on in the View menu. For the method, see /guides/gantt-chart-critical-path.
How long does a hotel pre-opening take?
It depends on the size of the hotel, the contractor's schedule and how long supplies, hiring and permits take where you are. The template uses illustrative working days and reaches "Hotel opens to guests" after 90 of them. Replace them with your own numbers and read the finish date from the chart.
Our opening date is already announced. Can the chart work to it?
Give "Appoint the general manager" a fixed Start on the day work begins and "Hotel opens to guests" a fixed Start on that date, since the plan starts on the earliest fixed Start. The chart schedules forward from the start of the plan, and if the dependencies cannot meet the fixed date it flags a conflict and names the earliest date they allow. Then shorten or overlap the chain that sets the date, which here is the building handover.
Does the chart track the pre-opening budget or headcount?
No. It schedules the work and what each task waits for. It holds no costs or budgets and does not know how many people your team has, so keep the budget and the staffing plan in your own records. For how a hotel company is organized, from head office down, see /org-templates/hotel-business-organizational-chart and adapt it to your property's departments.
Why do the permits and the supplies wait for the building handover?
Because the plan assumes the authority needs to see a finished building and that supplies go into rooms the contractor has handed over. If you can apply earlier or take over floors one at a time, change the dependency. For drawing permits and inspections as waiting time and gates, see /guides/opening-permits-and-inspections-gantt-chart.