HOTELIER AWARDS 2012: Laundry manager finalists

Gideon Mayabi.

These five finalists will compete for the Laundry Manager of the Year 2012 title in the Hotelier Middle East Awards to be held on October 31 at The Ritz-Carlton DIFC.

Below you will find extracts and testimonials from the shortlisted nominations for each of the five candidates...

Gideon Mayabi, Laundry Manager, Kempinski Hotel Mall of the Emirates

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About Gideon
Gideon started his career with Kempinski in 2006 when he joined Kempinski Hotel Mall of the Emirates as a Drycleaner. He was promoted to Laundry Supervisor in 2008 and was transferred to Tanzania in 2009 to be part of the pre-opening team for the Bilila Lodge Kempinski in the position of Laundry Manager. He came back to Dubai and to Kempinski Hotel Mall of the Emirates in 2010 to take up his current role as Laundry Manager for the hotel where he is responsible for all operations of the Laundry department.

Above and beyond the call of duty…
Through carefully designed training and development led by Gideon, the majority of the employees in the Laundry division are now able to work across all the various roles and functions in the department, whether that is guest laundry, pressing or dry cleaning. This is not just hugely motivational for the team as the work they do is much more varied, but it has also resulted in increased productivity and efficiency through, as an example, optimized scheduling of resources and materials. From a customer service perspective, Gideon has consistently improved efficiency in service delivery to the hotel’s guests, and ensures that all items received are processed and delivered on the same day, which is up to a day less than his set targets for the turnaround time of laundry items. Gideon’s continuous focus on quality, customer service and efficiency has resulted in a perfect 100% score in the most recent Leading Quality Assurance audit for the hotel. Not only is the laundry department the one of the only division in the hotel to achieve this score, it’s the second consecutive time Gideon and his team received this highest possible audit result.Gideon is a prime example of a manager that leads by example. Not only does he go above and beyond his call of duty in serving his internal and external customers in the laundry department, he also assists other Kempinski hotels and the local community in Dubai in a number of different ways. Here are a few examples. In October 2011, whilst employed at Kempinski Hotel Mall of the Emirates, he was asked to join the taskforce for the opening of the Kempinski Seychelles Resort and he served as part of the resort’s Pre-Opening team. During this time Gideon had the responsibility of helping to set up the Laundry function and managed the training of the laundry staff. In 2011 Gideon took the initiative to look for an alternative way to discard linen items that could no longer be used for the hotel guest rooms and partnered with UAE-based Gulf Recycling Company who now take the hotel’s discarded linen items on a monthly basis and give them to charity. Kempinski Hotel Mall of the Emirates has provided a beneficial learning environment to children from the Dubai Centre for Special Needs for many years. Students of the Centre come to the hotel every Thursday to work in the Laundry department as part of their development program. Gideon manages these visits and is personally involved with the students when they come the hotel every week. Lastly, Gideon was elected in 2008 to serve on the hotel’s ‘Staff Consultative Committee’ where he represents the Housekeeping and Laundry departments, and he still serves on this committee today.
 

Testimonials for Gideon
"On behalf of Gulf States recycling I would like to thank you Kempinski Hotel Mall of the Emirates for generous donation of their unwanted linen for the past one year. Your commitment to helping the needy is sincerely appreciated. Many people in developing countries are benefiting through our initiative and contributing a big role in keeping our environment green by saving the clothes from going to landfills, until to date we divert thousand tones of clothes. The goal of the organization is to continue to make a difference in how we recycle and help the needy people. With the help of donations from supporters such as you we will continue to see improvements in clothes recycling.” Birhane, collection manager.

“I joined Kempinski Mall of the Emirates on 1st march 2011 as a tailor. I found Kempinski MOE is a best place to work with. When I joined, I was just a tailor but I have had a passion to improve my career, learning new things and sharing ideas to each other with my team. Mr. Gideon provided me with all of necessary ideas and trainings in friendly and open mind as of my passion to develop my career. He has a better knowledge to create a peaceful environment to work in all kind of business situation. His helpful and friendly behavior, and outstanding managing knowledge helps us to deliver our quality standard to our guest. Mr. Gideon is always interested to train all of us in each section of laundry that's why we all are able to work what is necessary all around our laundry. No matter who is laundry attendant or who is laundry valet or dry-cleaner or press man; we all are helpful to each other on laundry operation. In my laundry team all of my colleagues, my superiors and specially my manager Mr. Gideon help me to grow up my career and knowledge in my work place. Today I am holding a position of 'Uniform and linen room supervisor'. I am pleased to write my opinion for his helpful and friendly behavior for all our laundry team.” Manohar Pariyar, uniform and linen room supervisor.

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