The 90 hoteliers who were shortlisted for the Hotelier Middle East Awards 2012 are a remarkable bunch, from vastly different backgrounds and spanning the broad spectrum of hotel professions. Still, they share some common traits — namely creativity, loyalty, tenacity and diligence — to which much of their success can be attributed.
Hundreds of hoteliers were nominated for the awards before we whittled it down to the final 90 and with few exception, they entered the industry at a young age and worked their way up, cross-training and travelling the world to further their experience.
There is little mention in these nominations of the fast track courses, management traineeships or rapid promotions so often talked about in the business today. Skills were learned on the job, risks taken to advance careers and lives uprooted in order to climb the ladder.
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It is a similar story when you start looking at the top of the hotel chains, too. Take this month’s cover star Michel Noblet, president, CEO and founding partner of Hospitality Management Holdings, for example.
In an exclusive interview celebrating Noblet’s 50th year as a hotelier, he tells Hotelier Middle East: “To develop yourself in the most efficient way you have to make some sacrifice — to be far from home. You have to develop yourself and challenge yourself on a daily basis.
“Funnily enough, it was the same for my dear colleagues who have the same position as me today — they were not looking for the money, they were looking for the experience. I was hungry for the job, to learn reception; to learn administration; to learn sales and marketing — if you want to manage, you need to know the job yourself.”
During his training, knowing the basics and gaining all-round general knowledge of running each of the different hotel departments was “fundamental”.
“People going into hospitality were enjoying, not counting, their time,” Noblet recalls. “Today a lot of people are there because they have no other option, so for them it is only a task.”
This is a widely-held opinion, at least among the senior hoteliers we often speak with. Today’s general managers — who, passion aside, let’s face it have toiled away for some 30 years to get to where they are today — are unfamiliar with the concept of programmes that can fast-track graduates with potential to senior roles in a matter of years.
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