CEO Executive AssistantEvents and Catering as a Revenue Driver
Events and catering is one of the most significant revenue streams in full-service hospitality. Weddings, corporate conferences, association meetings, gala dinners, incentive programs, and social events collectively represent a substantial portion of revenue for hotels, resorts, and dedicated event venues. In many properties, group and events business accounts for 30 to 50 percent of total revenue.
Given this significance, it is understandable that hospitality CEOs pay close attention to events and catering. Major events bring high-value clients, significant revenue in a single transaction, and opportunities for repeat business and referrals. They are also highly visible: a successful wedding or conference can generate enormous goodwill, while a poorly executed event can produce the kind of complaints that reach the CEO’s desk directly.
However, the visibility and revenue significance of events is precisely why effective delegation matters so much. A CEO who is personally involved in major event decisions, reviewing menus, attending site visits, and engaging directly with event clients, is spending executive time on work that skilled events professionals can handle better. The CEO’s role is to ensure the events and catering function is led well, resourced appropriately, and accountable for defined performance outcomes.
The Events and Catering Function
Events and catering in a full-service hospitality business involves multiple interconnected roles and activities:
Sales and business development: Prospecting for group business, responding to RFPs, conducting site inspections, and negotiating contracts with event clients.
Event planning and coordination: Detailed event planning with clients, developing event orders, coordinating across departments (catering, AV, setup, security, etc.), and managing client communications throughout the planning process.
Catering and banquet operations: Menu design, food production, banquet service, and beverage management for events.
Audio-visual and technical services: AV equipment management, technical support, lighting and staging, and coordination with external AV vendors.
Setup and logistics: Room configuration, furniture and equipment setup, florals and decor coordination, and post-event breakdown.
Client relationship management: Ongoing relationship management with key accounts, post-event follow-up, and repeat business development.
Each of these activities requires specialist expertise. The CEO’s role is to ensure the right leadership is in place to manage them, not to manage them personally.
Building the Events and Catering Leadership Team
The events and catering function should be led by a Director of Events or Director of Catering and Conference Services with a team that reflects the volume and complexity of the property’s events business.
Director of Catering and Conference Services: This leader owns the events sales pipeline, client relationships, event execution quality, and financial performance of the events business. They are the CEO’s primary delegation partner for all events and catering matters.
Senior Event Managers or Wedding Coordinators: Manage the planning and execution of individual events, serving as the primary client contact from contract signing through post-event follow-up.
Banquet Operations Manager: Owns the operational execution of events, managing banquet staff, kitchen coordination, and day-of logistics.
Events Sales Manager: Focuses on prospecting, RFP response, site inspections, and contract negotiation for new group business.
AV and Technical Services Manager: Manages in-house AV capabilities and coordinates with external technical vendors for events requiring specialized equipment.
With this team in place, the CEO should not be reviewing individual event orders, attending client site inspections, or being involved in specific menu or pricing decisions.
What the CEO Owns in Events and Catering
Events revenue strategy. How much of the property’s revenue mix should come from group and events business, the target client segments, and the positioning of the events program (luxury, corporate, social) are strategic decisions the CEO makes in the context of the overall property strategy.
Events space investment. Decisions about investing in ballroom renovations, AV infrastructure upgrades, outdoor event space development, or event technology platforms require CEO approval as capital allocation decisions.
Major client relationships. For truly significant accounts, a CEO engagement at the relationship level, participating in a site visit or hosting a client dinner, can be a meaningful business development investment. This is different from being operationally involved in event planning.
Performance accountability. The CEO holds the Director of Catering and Conference Services accountable for events revenue targets, booking pace, average revenue per event, and client satisfaction scores.
Pricing philosophy. The strategic decision about how the property prices events relative to competitors, including the approach to minimum spend requirements, AV packages, and catering margins, is a CEO-level decision that the events team executes within.
Governance Structures for Events and Catering
Monthly events business review. The CEO reviews events pipeline status, booking pace versus budget, revenue per event booked, and any significant client relationship developments. This is a strategic briefing, not an operational review.
Quarterly events strategy review. A deeper session examining competitive positioning, market trends in the events industry, capital investment needs, and staffing health. The CEO provides strategic input and approves any significant strategic changes.
Exception notification. The CEO is informed of any event-related incident that carries reputational risk: a major event cancellation by a significant client, a significant service failure at a high-profile event, or a client relationship issue that requires executive intervention.
Annual budget approval. Events revenue targets and the events department budget are approved as part of the overall property or portfolio budget process.
The CEO’s Role in Major Event Wins
For truly landmark events, including nationally recognized conferences, high-profile weddings, or major corporate programs from blue-chip accounts, the CEO may play a meaningful role in securing the business. This might involve a personal relationship call, hosting a site visit, or attending a finalist presentation.
This kind of CEO involvement is a legitimate business development investment. The key is that it remains selective, reserved for events where CEO involvement provides a real competitive advantage. When the CEO is involved in routine site inspections or responding to ordinary RFPs, the events sales team is effectively being told their work is not trusted.
Connecting Events to Total Revenue Strategy
Events and catering does not operate in isolation. Group events affect room block revenues, F&B revenues, spa revenues, and ancillary spending across the property. The events team’s work connects directly to the revenue management team’s group displacement analysis and to the marketing team’s lead generation efforts.
The CEO should ensure these connections are managed through strong working relationships at the leadership level, not through CEO mediation. The Director of Catering, Revenue Manager, and Sales Director should have structured joint planning processes without needing the CEO to convene them.
For resort properties where events and catering is particularly complex due to outdoor venues, destination wedding programs, and multi-day conference capabilities, resort CEO delegation addresses cross-functional coordination in complex operating environments.
Catering Quality and Brand Standards
Catering quality at events directly reflects on the property’s brand. A poorly executed conference dinner or a disappointing wedding reception creates negative reviews that affect future event bookings and overall property reputation. The CEO’s interest in events quality is legitimate and appropriate.
However, quality should be governed through standards, training, and accountability rather than through CEO involvement in individual events. The CEO should ensure:
- Clear catering quality standards are documented and trained
- Regular tasting sessions and quality reviews are conducted by the Executive Chef and F&B leadership
- Guest feedback from events is systematically collected and reviewed by the events leadership team
- Quality failures are investigated and addressed through the events and F&B leadership, not the CEO
Seasonal Demand and Staffing
Events and catering operations are often highly seasonal, with significant demand peaks around holiday seasons, wedding seasons, and conference periods. Managing the staffing implications of this seasonality is an operational challenge for the events and banquet operations team.
The CEO’s role is to ensure the staffing model for events is adequate and that the events team has the authority to engage temporary and contract staff during peak periods without requiring CEO approval for each hire. The labor cost budget for events should be approved as part of the annual budget, with operational staffing decisions delegated entirely to the events operations leadership.
See hotel group delegation for guidance on managing events and catering delegation across multi-property portfolios where centralized event sales teams serve multiple properties.
Common Delegation Failures in Events and Catering
The CEO as the events sales closer. When the CEO is regularly involved in closing events bookings, the message to the events sales team is that their closing skills are insufficient. Reserve CEO involvement for a small number of genuinely strategic accounts.
Reviewing individual event orders. Event orders contain hundreds of operational details. CEO review of these documents serves no strategic purpose and consumes significant time that should belong to the events planning team.
Micromanaging catering menus. While the CEO may have preferences about the quality and style of catering, specific menu decisions for events belong with the Executive Chef and Director of Catering. Brand-level standards can be set by the CEO; individual menu selections should not be.
Attending events as a quality check. When the CEO attends events to assess service quality, it signals that the events team is not trusted to deliver without executive supervision. Quality assurance should be managed through systematic feedback and auditing processes.
Conclusion
Events and catering is a high-revenue, high-visibility function that deserves strong leadership and robust operational management. The CEO who builds the right events team, defines clear performance expectations, and delegates operational decisions to skilled professionals will have an events business that consistently wins competitive bids, delivers exceptional client experiences, and contributes meaningfully to the property’s financial performance.
The CEO’s energy is best invested in setting the strategic direction, approving the resources, and holding the leadership team accountable. The planning, coordination, and execution of individual events is exactly the kind of specialist work that dedicated professionals do better when freed from executive oversight.
Related Reading
For further context, explore Hospitality CEO Delegation for Asset Management and Hospitality CEO Delegation for Brand Standards.