Viewpoints

One of the most impactful immersive experiences has been creating opportunities for guests to move beyond being observers and become active participants in the destination. Rather than simply providing a service, we focus on creating meaningful moments that engage the senses, tell a story, and encourage genuine interaction.A particularly memorable example is our locally inspired culinary experiences, where guests can discover regional ingredients, learn about cultural traditions, interact with our culinary team, and participate in elements of the preparation and tasting.

When I became General Manager at Hard Rock Hotel New York, I wanted our arrival experience to reflect the soul of the property and the people who power it. With more than 35 years across five hotel brands, I’ve learned that the most memorable moments in hospitality come from teams who believe in a shared purpose.

Upon joining my latest property, I wanted to make the destination part of the guest experience rather than simply something guests could see from the hotel.I identified a number of exceptional local organic producers within 45 minutes of the property and developed direct partnerships with them, working closely with our Chef to integrate their products into our menus and create dishes that could only truly belong to this destination.We worked with a local goat cheese producer, a grower cultivating more than 120 varieties of citrus, an olive oil producer whose oil reaches 584 mg/kg of polyphenols, and Morocco’s only truffle producer.The objective was not simply to source better ingredients, but to give our guests a story behind what they were eating: where it came from, who produced it, and why it was unique to the region.The experience became a way of discovering the destination through taste, conversations and local craftsmanship.

A fully automated hotel is not the future of hospitality. It is a different product category entirely and comparing the two does a disservice to both. The self checkout analogy is bit construed in my opinion. Self-checkout did not evolve retail.

As a hotel General Manager, I see the human-free hotel as an evolution in efficiency, but not a replacement for hospitality. Automation can significantly improve the guest journey by streamlining check-in, room access, payments, and routine service requests.

I have no problem with hotels using more technology. Guest apps, keyless entry and digital check-in can make things easier for guests and save my team a lot of repetitive work.But a hotel with no people involved in the guest journey is different.

After more than 35 years in hotel leadership, I've seen our industry evolve through major technological shifts. I began my career as one of the youngest leaders in the hotel, and today I'm often the person with the deepest institutional knowledge and operational experience.

My first honest lesson with AI was this: the technology was never the hard part. The people were. Our earliest AI applications were practical — sentiment analysis and review response support, demand forecasting tools, and pre-arrival personalization.

As a General Manager, my biggest learning has been that AI is not a replacement for hospitality—it is an enabler of better hospitality.Our first steps with AI focused on improving productivity rather than replacing people. We have used AI to support content creation, communication, brainstorming, data analysis, guest feedback summarisation and operational planning.

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.

The Hard Rock Hotel New York is clearly adapting to Gen Z’s modern view of luxury, shifting away from traditional extravagance and toward immersive experiences, personalization, creativity, and visually compelling spaces. The hotel delivers this through music‑infused amenities, rooftop social environments, bold design, and cultural programming that make the stay feel expressive and memorable.

I think we mustn't confuse luxury with lifestyle. Gen Z's are currently in the 14-29 yr old range and there will be an extremely small percentage of them with the financial clout to enter into the luxury segment. Either way, hotels need to be tech-savvy, from their marketing approach to their services & facilities on offer.

Gen Z is reframing luxury. True luxury evolves to intention, cultural relevance, and emotional resonance, not by traditional symbols of status. They look for brands that know who they are, operate with purpose, and deliver experiences that feel crafted rather than standardized.The hotels that connect with this generation are those capable of offering high‑touch personalization with seamless, low‑friction operations, while staying authentic to their heritage.

In the Middle East, balancing cultural intelligence with strong local identity is not theoretical—it is an everyday operational reality. Our hotels welcome guests from Europe, Asia, the Americas, and the region itself, often under the same roof and at the same moment.

Cultural intelligence and local identity are not competing ideals, they are two expressions of the same promise of hospitality. The balance lies in protecting the essence of place while refining how service is expressed. Cultural intelligence begins with listening.

One of the brand traits that sets Four Seasons apart is the adaptation and embracing of local culture. This will be particularly reflected here in Saudi Arabia where the Kingdom is rooted in deep traditions with incredible heritage while at the same time being the pace-setter in many aspects of modern life.

As we say goodbye to 2025, I am optimistic for the future of the hospitality industry in 2026 and beyond, it is truly a resilient business. Travelers continue to seek a memorable experience and the corporate sector is back doing events that fuel our economic growth!

Profitability is what every budget really comes down to. Still, building a budget is more than just organizing or plugging numbers into the excel file (If it´s your go-to tool, still). It's about understanding what is coming in, what's going out, and how your revenue plan ties everything together.

For our 2026 budget, my primary focus will be on sustaining brand awareness and strengthening the property’s positioning. Guests today are increasingly attentive to consistency; they expect the same level of quality and service regardless of market conditions or rate fluctuations.

The decisive skill I feel separates a great GM is "managing the balanced scorecard" - enlivening employee engagement, amplifying the guest experience, and ensuring financial stability. Too often, the General Manager confuses what is truly important and relevant to the hospitality business.

For me, the role of a luxury hotel GM is first and foremost that of a balancing act. Depending on the context, whether corporate or private ownership, the GM must be able to adapt and understand stakeholders' expectations. They must be able to deal with ambiguity and create added value.

Strategic foresight distinguishes outstanding luxury hotel general managers from their peers. Empathy empowers a general manager (GM) to understand and anticipate the diverse needs of guests, staff, owners, and partners. In luxury hospitality, emotional connections are crucial; guests often remember how they felt during their stay far more than the details of their accommodations.

In your organization, which sustainability goal(s) are you excited about? Remington along with our ownership groups have ongoing conversations about opportunities we have across our portfolio. Just the fact that we are having conversations and there is interest by owners is exciting.

Radisson Hotel Group has a long history of being a responsible business and has an ambitious and award-winning program. We believe in conducting business ethically in all we do, and aim to be a thriving, sustainable and responsible business for people, the community, and our planet.

We have always believed that sustainability has to begin locally; you have to give your team in the hotel the power to act and to act in the best interests of its community. Only the people in that community know where you can source the best local products and find the best local suppliers.At Magnuson Hotels we have never focused our business on the long-haul market, but looked more locally, for that business which is sustainable in every sense of the word.

Purpose, Creativity & Inclusion - At Remington Hotels, our culture of innovation is rooted in 3 key principles: purpose, creativity, & inclusion. It all starts with defining the purpose, goal, and strategic plan of the organization.

It is true that innovation requires focus, resources and ultimately funding. At IDeaS we have a multi-pronged approach to innovation: 1) A constant dialog with our clients about their evolving needs and how IDeaS could provide more value to them 2) Continuous research and conversations about evolving end consumer expectations, technology transformation and their implications on hospitality at large and particularly the commercial function.

Transforming company culture is something that must be done genuinely and with respect for the values on which your company was founded. We used the pandemic as an opportunity to assess our current set-up, operations and teams, utilising the time to embark on a journey of innovation and transformation that better caters to the needs of our customers.

At Dream Hotel Group we believe in good talent. Our goal is to hire, train and retain the best in the business. We pride ourselves in supporting growth and opportunities for all gender identifications. We lead from the top: all of our verticals are led by women vice presidents, and one of our five in the c-suite is a woman.

While elevating women to leadership positions is important across the hospitality industry, it is of even greater significance to Sonesta, given our recent and future growth plans. We have an expanded platform and even more opportunity than ever before to include female leadership who can make a difference within our team during this period of rapid growth.

“There is a big difference between equality and equity, and that has been the biggest learning for me in the past years. Last year, as we relooked at our management team's structure, we knew we had to make changes and be more diverse.We started recruiting for the Chief Operations Commerce Officer position, and we knew this person had to be a woman.

Good hospitality is built on successful relationships, and Cycas's focus has always been to make our hotels the best places to work as well as stay. We have always maintained that we have three 'customers': our guests, our owners, and our Cycadettes.

Since the pandemic began, at Benchmark Global Hospitality we have repeated a motivational phrase many times – soon it will be our time to heal the world with hospitality. Well, that time is upon us! While we have no choice but to embrace a digital world, the human-centered enterprise of hospitality will always rely on the hands, hearts, minds and souls of human beings.

Culture, People and Process;If there has ever been an "intangible", possibly "providing service" is the best example.This is the very foundation of providing hospitality and making that true / real contact with our guests.Our industry is fragmented and diverse, covers the entire globe and having a universal measuring stick is impossible.The industry's answer for years has been scripting and measuring against that, resulting in strange and artificial feeling interactions."did you have a nice trip...", "it is so good to have you back...", "how was your stay..." We all know these heart crunching questions that mostly are asked without any true interest or backed up by the emotion they deserve.And then there was the third party online feedback and scoring.

This was certainly the year I wish our industry never had to go through. Though personally, I believe living through September 11 in New York City was a scarier time, the COVID-19 pandemic had a far worse financial impact on our industry.

At The Student Hotel, we have remained open during the pandemic – albeit with fewer guests and restricted facilities. Because of our hybrid model and the flexibility this gives us, we can change the allocation of our rooms and re-designate hotel rooms to student accommodation.

While IDeaS has always had a close relationship with its 15,000+ global clients, the pandemic has forced us to align ourselves even closer with the hotels we support. In the initial stages, as demand evaporated and hotels closed, we needed to make the necessary changes to our revenue management and pricing systems to deal with the constantly evolving situation.

Hotel or business school and academic education in conjunction with skill is a very logical discussion. Hotel and business schools differ some in education but aren't completely foreign or strangers to each other. To a certain extent, the hotel school will always prepare students better in general for the hospitality industry, due to the specialization of courses.It is also a fact that hotel companies are moving away from generalist and focus on specialists.

We no longer focus on recruitment from only hospitality schools. We did years ago, but it has become an open and even field for applicants with all backgrounds. We hire candidates for their cultural fit over the hotel education and experience they may or may not have.

We recruit for roles in both the “hospitality business” and the “business of hospitality” and look to talent pools in both hospitality schools and business schools, accordingly. Candidates are always considered by their credentials, and by their likelihood to be a fit with our brands.

In short, no. The era of the hotel chain is not coming to an end as they certainly bring value to the industry in many ways, but the way hotels do business is unquestionably changing. While in the past a hotelier needed to work with a large chain or brand in order to have world-class distribution, in today's environment this is no longer essential to success.

Consumers are progressively depending on technology to plan and book travel, which is driving an increase in the number of technology companies seeking to incorporate distribution solutions into their business model. As a result, this competitive landscape has propelled innovation, while creating a downward pressure on cost to hotels.

Consumers today are more connected than ever, and that doesn't change when they travel. As such, information technology (IT) has certainly moved up to the forefront in our organization over the last few years. It touches almost every discipline, and elements of technology are part of every new initiative.

At the moment, IT in hospitality is still in its early stages of development. Tech products are increasingly considered to be at the basis of a guest-oriented and modern hotel experience. Due to the high demand of specific tech products for the hospitality industry, a growing number of tech service providers are offering ways to directly increase revenue or create a more seamless experience.

We are entering into a new chapter for all businesses that demand a sense of urgency and the attainment of meaningful results on the sustainability front. Accor has long taken the view that we're stewards of our incredible locales, and mitigating our impact is a key priority for Accor, and a responsibility the Group has fully embraced.

The reach of sustainability in the hospitality industry is appropriately growing in response to changing guest expectations. We have our work cut out for us to make progress toward a carbon-neutral future. There is no single solution, but rather a network of strategies, systems, and efforts to chip away at our energy demands and reduce our material usage.

The hospitality industry is in the midst of what I call a Golden Age of Travel. As middle classes expand around the world, more people are traveling than ever, and they are craving unique, authentic experiences. That's an incredible business opportunity that we are rising to meet.

With all the talk of disruptors in industry today like Airbnb, Uber and Amazon, the hotel industry's biggest disruptor was the introduction of the OTA's over 25 years ago. At that point we needed to learn how to do more with less, wear multiple hats, combine positions and become creative to save our bottom line.With a majority of our hotels based in New York City, we've been operating in a prolonged downturn mindset since the recession of 2008, and fortunately for us, we've brought that efficient approach to our other locations worldwide.

Most hotel companies have focussed on distribution changes and the need for more pricing flexibility and the efficiency in changing business processes through the assistance of technology. There is definitely an increased sophistication in both the distribution and technology, possibly better described as evolution then the needed quantum leap to weather the next downcycle.Asset light hotel companies have the challenge in aligning the owning companies and their own efficiencies and benefits.

There has been a lot of analysis recently regarding the expected health of the economy. Most people believe that the economic indicators are pointing downward comparing it with the economic recession the world witnessed in 2008.