The software
It’s all very well offering modern facilities, an edgy design and one-off art, but if the service standards and atmosphere fall flat, the impact is washed away. Staff empowerment is the solution says Assman.
“We have a great team, with lots of incentives to do things differently, if you talk lifestyle it’s not only the hardware, it’s the software, how we do things [that’s important],” he says.
“Being four weeks old we’re still in the infant shoes but we’re going in the right direction, we gave tools to our colleagues to empower them.”
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The aim is to connect with the guest and learn relevant information about them, he explains.
“We will not ask when you check in ‘how was your flight’ because that’s not relevant to us.
It’s relevant to the airline but not to us. Do we care how you got here, yes we do, but at the end of the day our job is the hotel, our job is to make sure you have a great stay with us.
We will ask ‘I see you’re here for three nights is there anything particular you want to do, do you have a free night, what are you interested in museums, food, art, sports? Why don’t you join us in our cooking school? Or why don’t you join us in the morning, we have a running group doing a 10km run?
“We want to make sure we connect with you, with your style of life,” says Assman. “That to us is lifestyle. How can we overcome all the boundaries, barriers and rules and regulations and how can we bring fun back to the hotel and how can we bring the connection back with our customers. That to us is the key message of how we see the software of lifestyle.”
For this reason, Jumeirah Creekside has overhauled the approach to front office, as director of rooms Nicky Samson explains: “We try not to refer to guest relations or concierge or transportation.
We’re really looking at it as an overall front office and the reason for that is we’re an art and lifestyle hotel and especially lifestyle in trying to adapt to guest needs and not sticking to what’s been done previously.
“I know this is very unlike any other property in the region to kind of merge it all together. It’s kind of a one-stop shop. We do not have to send guests from one colleague to another whether it’s for a restaurant reservation or getting a key made or checking the bill or paying the bill or checking in or getting escorted to the room.
To have the colleagues cross train in all areas so they can assist the guests from a-z — that’s one thing to make it easier for the guests.
What we see as a result of that is guests are much more likely to remember a colleague’s name because we don’t hand them over anymore, it’s not like you spend a minute here or a minute there, it’s really to try and keep as well that memory there for the guest — there’s that one colleague that really took care of them from beginning to end,” says Samson.
The hotel also offers a 24-hour check-in/check-out option for all room categories, but asks for 24-hour notice from the guest to guarantee it, Samson reveals.
“We still have the standard check-in / check-out of 3pm / 12noon if that suits the need of the guest specifically but we are trying to adapt to the guests needs and the modern traveller. Those policies that are in all the hotels worldwide are not something that’s very guest driven.”
She says its about being very adaptable and flexible operationally, reviewing housekeeping processes and typical operating standards to achieve this.
“It’s not been a challenge during the summer due to occupancies but we are making sure that it’s a recipe that works as well once we go into very high occupancy,” adds Samson. Ultimately her goal for front office is that the “service is warm and it’s honest and it’s genuine”.
“It was busy in the first couple of weeks but now it is a little bit slower so we get to go back and retrain the colleagues and retool the areas that need to be retooled and just make them very comfortable with the product, with the facilities, with the service that we offer.
That’s key and part of that is making sure our guest feedback process is also working well, we interact with guests as much as we can, face to face, we record that — positive and constructive,” says Samson.
Offering such personalised service is not an easy task though, admits Assman, especially with a segment that is new to many of the team, 20% of which are from within Jumeirah and 10% of which were working with the Aviation Club.
“It’s very difficult by the way, that’s why we’re bringing a lot of experienced people in because at the end of the day what do you do, reflect back on your college days?
The only thing you now work with is your experiences and your common sense, so in the moment that you come to a segment that is completely new to all [you have to] really occupy yourself with that subject, really investigate and research what does it really mean and then create that intelligence within the team of what we need to do, and then challenge every work aspect,” explains Assman.
“We are Jumeirah, we are proud of being Jumeirah, we are five-star luxury but our ‘stay different’ proposal for this property was the art and lifestyle, and how do you combine that — and that was really the challenge.”
After all, don’t be fooled, he continues: “I’m not delivering the service, Donald’s not delivering the service. Our colleagues are delivering the service. If they are happy my guests are happy. My job is to make my colleagues happy. It’s always a challenge to get there but you know we are aiming to do so.”
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