Europe - Latest

After more than 35 years in hospitality across Marriott, The Ritz-Carlton, Courtyard, Sheraton, and Hard Rock, I've witnessed a fundamental shift in what defines a successful General Manager.Earlier in my career, the GM's role centered on service excellence, team leadership, culture, and guest satisfaction.

The tension described in this question is not a future concern for luxury GMs. It is the daily reality of the role right now. I oversee two properties within a complex institutional ownership structure with exacting financial standards.

The expectations of a luxury hotel General Manager have changed significantly over the past decade. Today, owners are looking for more than operational excellence, they expect a trusted business partner who understands investment priorities, protects asset value, and can confidently navigate an increasingly complex ownership landscape.From my perspective, however, this evolution should not come at the expense of what defines our industry.

Hospitality’s growing role as a talent pipeline for luxury retail, private healthcare, wealth management and the wider experience economy reflects not a failure to produce people, but the opposite: the industry develops highly transferable capabilities that many other sectors now actively seek.

The hospitality industry and its education arm have been fighting the battle for business credibility for many years. We “hospitality” has typically been seen as offering jobs on the way to something better, a specialty function that anyone can do.

This is proof that human connection - critical to a guest experience in a hotel or resort - is everlasting. Neither AI nor Covid 19 can take down the power of the "emotional human touch" of welcoming people into our establishments.