Harding himself joined the project in August 2014, shortly after relinquishing his role as general manager of Armani Hotel Dubai, as well as area director for the operator. While his intention was to train for an Ironman triathlon competition and work on a charity project in Vietnam, the chance to join one of the most prestigious names in hospitality proved far too tempting.
“These opportunities never come along when you want them and Taj reached out when I was in my notice period and I started to talk to them about this opportunity as well as what was going on in the region.
“Actually when you think about it, it’s difficult to understand why there isn’t more presence for Taj in the region, with its relationship with India; India is Dubai’s oldest trade partner, the amount of Indians that have a relationship with Taj; why haven’t we got more hotels here? Again quite often when you get involved in these projects it’s quite difficult to visualise.
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With this one, you can see it quite clearly: why haven’t we got a project on the Palm already open? Why haven’t we got more hotels across the Taj portfolio whether that be a Vivanta, a gateway property, a Taj luxury hotel?”
Those questions about the operator’s other brands are more than just a hint towards what may be in store. Indeed, Harding openly talks about the company’s fierce ambitions for the Middle East, and Dubai in particular.
While in the years since it took over what became the Taj Palace Hotel in Deira, it did embark on plans for further hotels in the emirate, these were decidedly scuppered by the onset of the global financial crises towards the end of the last decade.
“At the moment we are talking to investors on the Palm. We’ve got an investor in JLT that we’re talking with. We’ve got one on Sheikh Zayed Road we are talking to,” he says. [Since our interview with Harding, Taj has announced a partnership with CG Hospitality Holdings to bring the Vivanta brand to the city in the JLT area].
Harding adds: “Our new managing director Rakesh Sarna has been very specific about the development of the company and he’s identified the Middle East and Asia, and the gateway cities in those regions, that we need to target.
We’ll look to Abu Dhabi; we think that’s a slightly crowded space and perhaps we have to look at the demand coming to that area with the hotels already established. We think there’s opportunity there, in Oman, potential opportunity in somewhere like RAK.
“Qatar, depending on what part of Qatar and when. Obviously with the World Cup, there is a huge attraction and there’s a lot of investment going on there. A lot of these developments are based on the opportunity that you can stimulate for yourself.”
Having previously been area general manager with Armani Hotels, Harding is all too aware of the responsibilities of combining a property and company-wide role, yet he sees the extra responsibility as an opportunity for both himself and his team in Business Bay.
“I had that in the last role, and for me that’s the exciting part of it,” he enthuses. “We’ve brought up a very solid team here, so one of the attractions for team members that joined us, is that we do have growth.
“We have growth for them as individuals and we have growth for the company. And if any of us are looking to join a company, those are the things we are looking for.”
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