The other day, I came across yet another LinkedIn post from someone explaining how to build a PMS over a weekend using AI.
Three prompts. Two screenshots. One inspirational GIF.
Revolution accomplished.
All it needed was a Vangelis soundtrack and it would have looked like the director’s cut of Blade Runner for hoteliers.
The problem is that we’ve started confusing the ability to generate software with the ability to manage complexity.
Those are two very different things.
A PMS isn’t just a sleek dashboard with a few reservations scrolling across the screen.
A PMS is a Lovecraftian monster made up of taxes, accounting reconciliations, OTA synchronisation, payment processing, night audits, edge cases, and countless operational disasters that nobody ever mentions during AI webinars.
It’s the difference between assembling an IKEA bookshelf and designing a bridge.
I find this new “build everything yourself” narrative strangely familiar.
It reminds me of the days when every hotel insisted on having its own unique, revolutionary website.
Then the maintenance bills arrived.
Suddenly, WordPress started looking like divine intervention.
The truth is that AI makes writing code inexpensive.
It does not make responsibility inexpensive.
And responsibility has always been the most expensive line item in the budget.
That’s why I suspect the winners won’t be the hoteliers spending their weekends trying to rebuild Mews with Claude.
They’ll be the ones using AI to better understand their business while letting someone else deal with the infrastructure nightmare.
Because running a hotel is already a full-time job.
Becoming a software vendor as well is simply a very expensive hobby.
See you next week,
SIMONE PUORTO
