IHG stalwart Michael Koth takes the reins as director of operations in the Northern Gulf and general manager at InterContinental Regency Bahrain after 30 years with the company. He discusses business with James Clarey

Michael Koth was destined to follow a career path into hospitality. His father was the executive chef on the first German cruise liner after World War II, his mother on board as the chief hostess.

“They must have left a virus in me, so the first thing I wanted to do was cook, to the dismay of my father — he thought I should have a normal life,” he explains. “They told me how they went around Jamaica, how beautiful the girls are in Venezuela, what to do in Australia and I guess that, to a young boy, passes over very quickly.”

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However, Koth didn’t travel with his parents as a child, as they didn’t want him to have the kind of “disrupted life” that comes with the industry. “I grew up in a very protected family who had a lot of wonderful experiences from their travels, and I thought I could do the same.

“I wanted a job in the industry because I wanted to explore, learn different languages, meet different people, work in different cultures and, somehow, I’ve done all that.”

Initially he wanted to follow in the footsteps of his father, but decided he wasn’t going to stay behind the stove forever. “I always had this approach that knowing how to cook is one of the main ingredients if you want to be successful in the hotel industry.

That is probably not true for everybody, but it was true for me and I gave every hotel I applied to at the time the option — I wanted two apprenticeships in Germany — one as a hotel management trainee and the other one as a chef.”

Eventually, InterContinental in Hamburg, his hometown, agreed to take on the plucky teenager. “They said I should start in the kitchen. And so, I started with my chef apprenticeship. I was quite good at cooking — I was German chef of the year in a bi-annual competition — and so everyone asked, ‘Why did you stop cooking?’. I said that life is more than being behind the stove and I want to do all the rest.”

Once his two apprenticeships were over, Koth wasn’t prepared to settle down: “I went to the general manager and said ‘Now I want to go to London’”. With that, he was soon working at the InterContinental at Hyde Park, behind reception, “brushing up” on his English. He then moved to sales and marketing, becoming the department director at the “wonderful” InterContinental Vienna.

Move to Middle East
Koth’s first visit to the Middle East came in 1995, under the guise of resident manager at InterContinental Bahrain, to which he has returned.

“My firstborn son was born here, so he is by heart Bahraini. We haven’t got the passport yet — we’re still working on this,” he jokes. “We really are true fans of the country.”
His first stint at the hotel lasted two years, after which he moved back to Europe before becoming general manager at the InterContinental Doha, and three years later he joined the InterContinental Cairo.

“I had the pleasure to be GM pre-revolution, during revolution and post-revolution. It was an interesting period. The Arab spring lasted longer than classically three months,” he asserts. It has now been 30 years since Koth joined InterContinental, and he says he has no qualms about not venturing away from the company.

“Maybe I missed something, but I don’t think I have missed anything,” he explains. “In a way, it’s very, very easy with InterContinental, as with many other international brands.

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