Stop Showing and Start Communicating
In every assignment Carter and I complete, whether it’s a comp set analysis, forecast, or communication coaching workshop, we start by thinking about the audience.
What are they trying to accomplish? What decisions do they need to make? How can we deliver the message in a way that is clear and relevant?
This is one of the key themes we teach in our communication coaching workshops – know your audience. In today’s world, you are overloaded with emails, virtual meetings, and requests from owners and leadership teams. The pressure to respond quickly often leads us to focus on checking the box rather than ensuring the message meets the needs of the audience.
When deciding what to communicate, resist the urge to overload your audience with data and focus on what they need to know – not what’s nice to know. With all the data and dashboards at your fingertips, it’s tempting to include everything. But too much information will dilute your message. Instead, focus on clear outcomes and tell a story that will help your audience make a decision or achieve a goal.
Ensure you are tailoring your message to your audience. Your beautifully designed charts and slides will be meaningless, if your audience doesn’t connect with your message. Consider how familiar they are with the data you are presenting and how much detail you truly need. If you provide too much detail, they will lose interest. Too little detail can create confusion. The goal is to provide the right level of context, while avoiding acronyms and jargon they won’t understand.
Whether you’re preparing quarterly forecasts or presenting financial performance, take the time to design your work with your audience in mind.
A few articles we found worth reading this month:
Hospitality at a Crossroads: Hotel CEOs Discuss AI’s Industry Impact: This recap of the CEO panel at the NYU IHIF Conference highlights a range of perspectives on how AI will change the hospitality industry.
U.S. Hotel Forecast Assumptions – Q2 2026: STR recently revised their 2026 forecast, increasing projected RevPAR growth from 0.6% to 2.8%. This post breaks down the assumptions behind the revised outlook and the factors driving the significant upgrade.
This World Cup will be good for hotels, but also a disappointment: There’s been no shortage of articles debating the impact of this summer’s World Cup. Now that the event is underway, this opinion piece offers a useful reminder that success often depends on perspective.
Each month we feature a quick, practical communication tip designed to help you become a more confident, compelling speaker—whether you're presenting to a room of executives, leading a team meeting, or just trying to make your point clearly over email. These insights come straight from our coaching sessions and live workshops.
Click on the video to watch this month’s tip.
Whether you’re looking for data-driven insights to guide your hospitality strategy, want to explore our communication coaching programs, or have a question about one of our forecast products, we’re here for it. Reach out to see how Larkspur can support your work in hospitality through sharper storytelling and smarter data.