New recruit: Starwood's regional director of F&B

WHAT INITIALLY INSPIRED YOU TO ENTER THE HOSPITALITY INDUSTRY?
Ever since my early childhood I have always loved travelling to new places and experiencing different cultures. This feeling of adventure and exploration is one of the main reasons why I chose to work in the hospitality industry as I knew that pursuing this career path would present many opportunities to travel around the world. So far, at the age of 39, I have not regretted my decision in the slightest and have been lucky enough to have lived in eight countries and travelled to more than 50 cities around the world. 

WHAT HAS BEEN YOUR MOST MEMORABLE CAREER EXPERIENCE TO DATE?
I am a hotelier and like many hoteliers I have my share of interesting stories. The one that made a particular impact was when, at the early stage of my career, I had a long chat with one of our in-house guests. We ended up talking for a good hour about life, and other things in general and two months later he came to me and introduced himself as the new general manager of the hotel. Apparently he was in town to meet with the hotel owners and corporate leaders and staying in the hotel incognito. This event taught me that you never know who’s who and you should always treat people equally in our business, without judging them on their nationality, age or appearance.

HOW DOES YOUR NEW POSITION DIFFER FROM YOUR PREVIOUS ROLES?
Well I currently hold two positions, in that I am the hotel manager of The Westin Dubai and Le Meridien Mina Seyahi hotels as well as regional director of food and beverage, and all of these roles have similarities to my previous experiences. For example when I worked in Starwood’s Asia Pacific division, I was one of 10 members of the Starwood Asia Pacific food and beverage council, which had similar responsibilities to what I have now, including setting up new concepts, operating procedures and managing all the new pipeline projects.

WHAT ASPECT OF YOUR NEW POSITION ARE YOU MOST EXCITED ABOUT?
I think the most exciting aspect of the role is managing our new openings and renovations. It gives me the opportunity to work with the executive team and owners to create the right concepts for each new hotel.

WHAT NEW INITIATIVES OR PROGRAMmeS HAVE YOU INTRODUCED?
My first goal was to form a regional team of F&B experts within Starwood, for which we selected 10 of the most vibrant and dynamic culinary and service leaders to participate in our F&B council, which meets periodically to design the road map to greater F&B for the 277 bars and restaurants across nearly 50 hotels in the Middle East. This will take time, but our aim is to always be one step ahead of the competition, with new innovations and ideas to offer the best experience for our guests.