Making Talent Development Stick In Hospitality

the worst thing that your manager can do is he sits you down and he tells you you know what just do the things the way we've always done it and then that's already done so welcome to room 4 talent a series within the future of hospitality where we look at how the industry attracts develops and keeps great people my name is alonso kouri and today i'm joined by marcel petsot director of talent development and hr shared services at merit international fiji marcel has spent his career close to the operation across regions and cultures shaping how people experience work and hospitality and not just how roles get filled so marcel really nice to have you as you know i was really looking forward to this one so so great to have you here thanks so much alan i think both of us were really looking forward to that one so very excited to make it happen today yeah cool cool so before we start can you maybe tell us a bit more about your experience in hospitality and how you landed in fiji like how how does somebody land there great question so i'm originally from germany right and i always wanted to go into hospitality because it was kind of my thing i never wanted to do anything else it wasn't really something that my parents had in mind for me you know as a young boy they wanted me to go a different path but i always wanted to go and try out and of course you knew the traditional way you go to study so i went on studying hospitality in germany and at the end of it you always think you know you got your degree and you send out tons of applications across the world and do you expect tons of replies coming back and everybody wants you right with the amazing job titles and actually out of all the hundred of applications that i've sent i've received one positive reply so i pretty much only had one choice to either take it or say you know what let me do something else and i think my parents maybe were right let's follow whatever they had in mind i then took on that role it was actually a sheraton hotel back then in egypt and it was a role in front office so i said you know what front office is nice and fun you know egypt has a lot of german guests would be kind of you know walk in the park very easy just speak to germans make their stay happy and nice and easy would be very fun so when there and you know on your first day you signed a lot of documents and stuff and you know all your typical hr forms and then at one point you go to the uniform room and pick up a uniform and actually the uniform that i handed was that i was handed wasn't really what i had in mind for front office person so so i was like you know what mohammed do you think that is really the uniform that i need to and he said yeah yeah yeah yeah no problem it's a uniform and he was like mohammed well it's my first day but i don't think it looks like front of his uniform and he was like front office no no you're in housekeeping you're in housekeeping holy moly so i took the uniform i went to the locker room i sat down and actually cried you know i was like my god you went all the way from germany to egypt to take that housekeeping uniform and go clean rooms so at the end of the day you had two choices then okay let me continue it or admit to your parents and friends i did the wrong decision and let's continue and do something else so i went on state in egypt and took that decision and spent actually four years there so pretty long time and from there it actually kick started that i wanted to go and try other countries companies different roles so i moved around quite a bit in the middle east africa maldives as well at one point and different roles in different operational roles as well as non operational roles global companies independent hotels so very different kind of work style operation and then at one point fiji came into the game and said you know what why not never been to that part of the world let's give it a try right i always love beach island vibes it's always my thing so that definitely ticked the box and the role itself was very interesting as well and yeah yeah i am now in fiji cool that's a great intro but did you for four years do i did housekeeping or i can't imagine you did it for four years so i was actually terrible in housekeeping right because you know in the resort when people go on vacation they always love those fancy bed decorations i know the rose petals your towel art and all that stuff and i was terrible at it you know instead of those honeymoon swans my animals looked like i don't know kind of a snake or whatever it was so instead of helping the team over there they always had to send people to me to my room to get the room done so that was terrible so then one day my manager called me in and said you know what marcel i don't think housekeeping is your thing and i said well i told you that before and that's why i applied your front overs right and he said you know what we'll take you out of the rooms and we give you public area so i went from one nightmare to the other nightmare because you have to clean you know your public walkways your public washrooms and then the resort is plenty of walkways and you know flower petals that are on the path that you have to clean off and stuff so yeah i stayed there for a couple weeks until then one moment where i cleaned actually one of the female washrooms there and the assistant to the general manager actually came and asked me what i was doing so i was like well i'm cleaning your washroom right and she was like no way you've got to go out we have a group of germans checking in at the desk we want you to talk to them and here was in my uniform i was like you want me to go like that to the to the desk and he said yeah yeah no problem just go just go so that was actually the last day that i spent in housekeeping and from that day onwards i moved to front office and that's actually where i wanted to be and yeah there was a there was a change as well wow saved by the germans that's what it was cool and then you went from i saw your linkedin from front office to kind of hr where you're working now right what makes you do that switch yeah so i spent quite some time in operations because i felt you know i want to really know you know how to check in check out the billing the real guest experience itself then i went to revenue a bit for a bit in a year didn't really like it right it was really just system heavy work on a day to day basis so i really missed that interaction with guest so then moved back into the operation and front office and up to the point of front office manager and i always knew i didn't really want to go the path of going to hotel manager or general manager so i wanted to do something else so i said you know what i have the role of front office manager let me try to find a role where i can give back a bit to my team itself so i started slowly assisting with onboarding of team members in the hotel so i assisted in running some modules in orientation and development programs in the hotel and from there slowly but surely i kind of was attracted to that field and it was actually one email where i was offered a role in learning and development and i openly said i have no clue what that is all about but why not so that was the one moment where i was given that opportunity and yeah since then i kind of stuck with learning and development and from what i know you would suit you the people part you're here for the people part i think oh absolutely but kind of kind of curious to know because you that's kind of a journey you had and of course that trauma in the beginning did it also have like an impact on your current role at looking at how you know people come in they do this and you might think this is what i also felt does that have an impact on you on how you look at development proper proper and that kind of stuff yeah absolutely i think it's always one of the first things that i tell people whether whether they're newly joining our company because there will be definitely moments where you sit down and you question yourself whether you took that right decision to join a certain role to join a certain company country whatsoever but at the end it's your decision whether you want to go through it whether you want to take on that challenge or whether you want to take that easy way out and say you know what let me do something else and i think sometimes it's really that point where you have to push yourself because at one point in your life you have to go through challenges right life is not easy in any situation not just at work so why don't you take on that challenge right from the beginning so that's always one thing that i pass on in any onboardings that we have nice nice then they can feel that you understand them i guess because that's what people want to get understood right that's the first thing in my opinion and i saw also in linkedin that you said like development should be practical human and built into everyday work but what do you mean with the human part did you see like some kind of mistakes that other development programs had that it wasn't that human or something else so when we think of talent development sometimes companies struggle in putting that in the right framework right they either go extremely out and overloaded with frameworks and make it very complicated right true and it's not a one solution that fits everyone right that's the challenge that we have and sometimes in talent development because it can become quite messy it's very personal it's very individual it makes it difficult for companies or for talent development professionals to put that in measurable results right on those fancy slides on those fancy decks yeah so that's why sometimes companies struggle in seeing the value in talent development because it's an ongoing process so you can't really track it the only thing that you of course can track if people have attended certain classes if people have gone through a certain development program but that's just part of the story right because the other part and the real part what's happening is what's happening the moment they leave your classroom right the classroom experience itself is just that initial kickoff right it's that inspiration on a friday afternoon but the problem is what's happening on that monday right does it still feel useful on the monday or is everything forgotten and that's where the managers come into the into the game because they will then continue that and that's sometimes where i feel organizations struggle in bridging that gap yeah that's a nice one because it can feel like kind of a gig you know you come for you come there nice learning get a cup of coffee drink something nice what nice and the monday starts everything is gone so kind of curious like what is the role of the leader of the manager what is the because without it like you say it doesn't hold so what is the role of the manager to make it stick and to develop people even more yeah so the crucial part is really the manager right because they at the end of the day can really make or break that development because when they come to us in classrooms and attend the training right fully inspired very energetic great engagement but then what's happening in the operation right are the managers really using the content and the tools and resources and the language that they received bring that back into the operation as part of project stretch assignments do they sit down with the associates do they have those coaching sessions mentoring session do they walk the talk actually because it's two different things on what we maybe talk about in the classroom versus what's happening on the floor because with with people you know even we go to a classroom let's say you finish it it was great content very engaged audience but then once stressful situation hits or when we're under pressure we don't tend to rise to the level of what we learned in the training but we fall back to the patterns behaviors that we're used to because we're very comfortable in it and that's the problem that we have right so training really then needs to be reinforced and that reinforcement part that is where your manager comes in because the worst thing that your manager can do is he sits you down and he tells you you know what just do the things the way we've always done it and then that's already done right there's no point of setting them back to your classroom because it's not going to work so your manager really can break that deal and that's where also the investing would need to happen when we talk about development because your manager your leadership in the departments plays that vital role nice so is it also then your role to i think teach that manager how to how to how to develop their talent because i think it can be as a manager that you can see some people they do this wrong that wrong this wrong that wrong and you think like ah and then you want to you you kind of kill him with all the overwhelming you did this wrong and so it's also you need i think to develop your managers that's like the that's like that's like you as a development manager they are talking what you say and they you needed to develop them in order to for them to develop the talent right yeah absolutely right so our leadership in the different departments are actually our biggest multipliers of of those skills of those talents because if you have them fully on board in terms of how coaching sessions are done successfully how stretch assignments are implemented properly how projects are run across different departments different divisions different hotels right if you have that set up correctly a lot of things run on themselves right and run on their own because that multiplies automatically the moment you restrict that and you the moment you stop that reinforcement in the department it was a waste of a few days in the classroom to be honest yeah totally true yeah i get it and what are kind of best practices how would you how would you teach those leaders to to give you know feedback or to teach other people so sometimes you know you have those born mentors born coaches they're just amazing at the way they are but sometimes you know people need a bit of development and that's totally fine so making them understand that each person wants to be developed maybe in a different way in the department is very important because sometimes when we come up with new programs with new classroom sessions you know they tend to fall back to the point where they say you know what everybody has to go through that which is okay to a certain extent but then also the leadership needs to understand and the departmental leaders need to understand that their individual needs when it comes to development so important for us is to understand where are our current associates at rather than where we want them to be at this stage so we really need to understand that that level where they're at at the and that comes with understanding your team in general right because it makes it so much easier if you are fully invested in your team if you're interested in your team members development rather than just treating development as a tick box exercise so if you don't understand what's happening outside of their work environment development becomes a bit tricky as well so you need to understand that whole picture before you then tailor how they want to be developed developed because often you also see associates that don't feel that they're being developed or that there's no opportunity for them to grow you also see them leaving faster than other associates for sure yeah that's that's for sure a problem but then i think maybe you can tell a bit more about that like a lot of companies they look at it as how can we scale it how can we for example you know put it online make it for everybody we put the best practice in an online learning development program but what you basically say is that you may you might scale it a little bit but it all starts with the one on one with the human connection because if it's not that's not correct then it's just they will click click click and go through the online course and nothing happens right absolutely right so i think having learning opportunities and different platforms different forms it's great right like nowadays we can find it on an application we can find it still traditional in classroom trainings and the different ways of how our associates can consume those learning components but i think what is important is really what's happening afterwards how's the reinforcement done and sometimes when we talk about development programs sometimes we also tend to fall back to the point where we say you know what development is only restricted to a certain few rather than the overall workforce and so we treat it a bit more as a reward rather than a responsibility of everyone in the hotel or in the organization true true and do you see like there's a kind of a i think there might be a problem that leaders say okay we've spent all this into development but how can they really track because it's kind of kind of a feeling right you say he became better but how can you track that exactly right because that is really the challenge because it becomes difficult when you need to talk about success stories of development because sometimes organization feel the success story is merely numbers of promotions is certain skill that has been achieved by certain associates that's part of it and they are great right but i think what is important when it comes to development and that's what makes me love developing people is that the moment they shift their mindset from thoughts like you know what i'm not really sure how i can do that to you know what i know what to do let me get it done and then multiply that in the department in their teams and that's the tricky part because we cannot really measure it so it impacts different metrics in a hotel it impacts the guest experience it impacts the associate experience it then at one point impacts as well the financial performance of the hotel because the guest experience will trigger down and translate into numbers so talent development really touches based on all those different metrics but sometimes organizations want to see you at one number and they determine whether that is a successful talent development or not and that's the tricky part really that's a really tricky part yeah because like you said that a lot of especially the younger generations they want to develop themselves and if they feel they cannot develop themselves they want to go to another company so then the turnover is super high so maybe that's also a metric that the turnover is less high then you know that people you know appreciate the development and their own career path yeah absolutely because when we talk about talent development it's really one of those drivers of retention for us in hospitality or in other organizations as well because the moment an associate comes to you and says you know what i'm not really sure as to what's next for me that's already a warning light right because that means that person has already disconnected at one point and if that conversation only comes up during a exit interview then it's already too late right because disconnection started months ago right and those warning signs were out there months ago and that's where us as leaders come in and need to see those warning signs need to read those but also need to act on them right even if we see those warning signs it's important for us to act on them right it's one thing of noticing warning signs but the other thing is the hard thing do something about it that's for sure you always have to be proactive because otherwise like you say it's too late but then it's also important i think to have like a development path to create it when people start i don't know how you look at this but that they know okay i'll get to this is my role now i can learn this i can become this this but if you don't see a future and a lot of people i think in hospitality they just you know they're looking for maybe a job for now not a career and then you know so you have to kind of how important is the development path and how do you look at it how do you do it i think important is to really have those development path or the typical development path that you would have in mind to keep them fairly broad because even if you look at my path i started in the housekeeping and now i end up in hr right so it's not your traditional career path in hospitality itself which is a great thing nowadays because you see a lot of lateral movements right people moving from department from operational department to non operational vice versa from on property leadership to above property leadership and vice versa i think that has become a long way so far and that's great so whenever we go into conversations it's important for new joiners to understand that there's multiple ways of growth right and not everyone in that onboarding classroom will become a general manager and that's fantastic right there's so many new roles out there in terms of technical skills that are required now more creative skills that are required now in certain roles that are creating job titles that haven't been out there a couple years ago right and that's the beauty of it because we always evolve and change so making them understand that there's a path out there and there's an opportunity for you out there to even change that path halfway through going back going forth turning around up in circle right those squiggly careers as we always say that's the important part that they understand that even if they start as a housekeeper they don't need to end their career as a director of housekeeping i think that's the important part to communicate yeah that's really special about hospitality i have to say that you cannot see that almost in any other industry like in hospitality that that's why i think the the highest level is called the general manager because it's so general you know it's so general it can be that's really nice and another question that really interests me is that you know the turnover is really high in hospitality and what you see a lot is that you you think like okay i trained somebody then he becomes better and then he feels like now i'm too good for this hotel you know now now i'm the big guy and i can get other jobs so it's kind of how do you do that because when you make them better then they also you know want to earn more they can get other jobs they so it's and maybe hotels think like okay i have to invest so much time in this person and then when i did that he goes to another hotel so that's also tricky right yeah and i think that's also the tricky part that caused actually to have talent development become a bit for a selected few in a hotel rather than for the masses right because organizations may be afraid that if you develop everyone everyone is going to walk out but it's actually not the case right because if we develop them once it doesn't mean that we should stop there right it's an ongoing process even if you've gone through let's say a leadership development program post your graduation post your university degree that's not the end of your development right it's one stage of your development so there are great organizations out there that have multiple development programs depending on where you're at in the organization at the point whether you're a fresh graduate whether you finished your apprenticeship whether you're a seasoned leader and i think that's the great thing that there are organizations out there that really work on development program strategies that really fit to where you're at in that particular career path and that's what also associate need to understand is that if you take one program if you attended one class that's great but there's still so much more out there that you need to go through so having that constant feeling of i'm being developed here in that company in that particular hotel really fuels also the yeah the satisfaction of an associate in with that organization and with global organization the beauty is of course your internal mobility right even if you're developed in let's say hotel a and we then get a promotion in hotel b both hotel will benefit at the end of it because it's an exchange right especially with global players that's the beauty of it that you can transfer internally without leaving the company true that's a big benefit yeah the talent stays in house correct and then that's my next question maybe that i know for example from people that work in the industry that for example let's say somebody in the front desk and he wants to go to revenue management and then for example a hotel comes up with a new vacancy revenue management and they put it online and then the guy from the front desk they feel like why did they put it you know why do they search you know first outside in before inside out because you you could tell to me that there's a vacancy and first i i think that's my personal opinion before you push it online check with your people internally if somebody can fill that role and then you make them also feel you know special because if you put it out there then they feel then it's already too late in my opinion when you when you do that how do you look at it inside out stuff so i think internal mobility is very very important and in line with that is really those regular check ins between the leadership and the associate itself because you may have that associate that you mentioned in front office that really is trained now to drive more into revenue but there hasn't really been a conversation between his or her manager and the associate so sometimes leaders may not be fully aware of where do their associates actually want to grow right because we're really lacking those simple conversations we're so busy in the operation every day right every day is busy we all want our hotels to be full and busy and bustling every day so there's never going to be that perfect time where you can sit down and take hours and hours of conversation i think we need to go away from those traditional sit downs where you sit one hour in your manager's office and really talk about life and your future important is that you have those very meaningful conversations and that meaningful conversation can be a 20 minutes catch up over coffee in a park right it doesn't need to be a one hour conversation in your manager's office the importance is here that us as leaders really need to go into those conversations with intention that we want to get something out of those conversations and not just taking the box of yes we had a conversation true there was really no outcome right so it's this lack of bond the lack of authentic communication and conversations that we may sometimes have with our associates that already stops that internal mobility because we're not aware right we're not aware of where do our associates actually want to grow then the other side is of course how from an external or from a talent development team perspective do we identify those talents right so that's where internal talent planning is very important regular meetings and conversations with hotel leadership with department heads to understand who do we actually have in the pipeline who can we build up to grow into the next level whether it's the next general manager next revenue manager so it's a mix of very different components there right it's number a it's definitely what's happening in the department but number b also what's happening from other departments from an hr point of view how do we drive how are we that business partner in the organization that identifies and then helps push those talents into their next role and look into internal mobility then yeah nice nice so basically what you say that we have to kind of think outside of the box not just those quarterly meetings i have them planned in my you know you have to make it more authentic and just you know pitch yourself that you have to really have interest in your people because when that happens you don't have to think about it anymore just you're interested in the person and then it's not a checkbox it just comes natural right it's really that genuine connection right that authentic leadership that is required and one of the easiest examples that i always give is and it happens so many times all over the world right is that whenever you meet an associate in the hallway right back of the house right you're on the way to cafeteria whatever it is the moment you meet that person the first question in most cases would be how are you now in most cases that answer is i'm fine all is good but the problem is are we ready to hear a different answer sometimes we're not ready to hear you know what it's the worst day of my life or you know what it's the most amazing day today we're not ready to hear a different answer so us as leaders we need to be ready to hear things maybe we didn't plan on hearing right what do we do if the associate tells me you know what it's the worst day of my life then it comes back to us as a leader right you've got to sit down with your associate you've got to have that conversation right you just can't continue walking the hallway and pretend as if nothing happens so those are the small examples that we always tell that can make or break that relationship between the leader and the associate and associates among each other because it's not just from leadership to associate that conversation right those happen on any level so those are small simple things where we really need to ask ourselves are we ready to hear a different answer because sometimes the person talks we're already at the end of the hallway and we're out of that conversation truly that's a really good one i also like the how are you because what is a good question to ask because how are you is kind of a bad question because you always know the answer so what do you propose what should you ask exactly see i would say how are you is not a bad question but the problem is that the moment we ask how are you we're not ready to hear a different answer apart from i'm fine yeah but that's also what 99% of people say even if they're not fine exactly correct because they know the other person is not ready to listen and we just want to get done with it right it's just taking the formality we're not open to have a conversation because we don't have that relationship yet to where i can open up and to tell you you know what ellen it's a terrible day today you know i've completely messed up at home i'm not feeling well because we're not ready to have a conversation so you know start a bit broader you know what has made your day amazing today right what was one situation where you felt over the moon today so try to move it around a bit and you know go for a walk together right have that coffee together there's so many different ways those small meaningful conversations that we can have and sometimes we just got to do them true and i think if i can add something that i know that when you want somebody to open up sometimes it starts with yourself opening up to them because if you show yourself vulnerable and that you also have your own store because if a manager most of the time they want to say i'm good i'm fine everything under control but exactly that part is when you share your own problems and that you're not that good and not you also have make mistakes in that part then your stuff also will open up to you exactly right because we're not the person as leaders that know everything we don't have the answers to every question and sometimes we have to admit that whether we want it or not we don't know everything and it's really that what we also need to admit to ourselves sometimes because sometimes we don't want to admit that we don't know things but trust me we don't know things so having those open conversations as you said right or you share your struggles that you had in your career and the lessons that you've learned the mistakes that you've done because when you give a certain project for example to your associate share how you went about your first project i'm sure it didn't go well i'm sure you made mistake i'm sure there was a loss of revenue maybe at one point involved i'm sure you heard one person along the way so be open about it and then have that conversation i don't pretend that your career was amazing picture perfect true true and maybe one of my last questions is what do you do when for example somebody works in front office and they want to develop themselves to the next stage and probably most of the time it will be like i want to be the manager of front office but it's not always the best front office worker is not always the best manager right so how do you how do you explain it to them that like because they see a career path i want to do this this and this but you think it's not for you how do you how do you do that how do you change them yeah so i think the first thing is like even if ourselves we may feel you know what that person may not be the greatest front office manager i think we should hold back with that opinion because we only see a certain side of the picture right because we're not with them 24,7 in the operation because maybe what we see is either we look only purely on numbers when it comes to maybe upselling when it comes to check in checkout scores so we see only numbers but we don't really see what's happening behind the scene because maybe they're the greatest leaders in terms of how they connect with their team members so we need to look at also at their engagement scores for example because maybe they create a great environment but it hasn't yet translated yet to financial figures for example so i think first of all hold back with that opinion saying that they're not ready then also it's important to understand their perspective right because if they feel that they're ready for a front office manager role or ready for a leadership role have the conversation right ask them what they feel makes them ready or how do they feel what qualities what leadership skills do they bring to the table that actually have them ready for that role and sometimes it's a bit of a reality check also because remember when i left university we all feel that we're ready and we get that manager role right we've studied we got the degree everybody wants us yes not the case why it's not the case we got to prove ourselves at one point so sometimes it's also that lack of understanding because for them also when they talk about a front office manager for example that may be a completely different understanding from what is actually happening as a front office manager so that's why where our cross exposures come into place where our projects come into place where connecting with other department comes into place so people actually understand what is happening in different levels in different departments and how do they interact and impact each other so that is important that understanding because then they may reflect as well and say oops i may need a couple more years of experience or a couple more assignments a couple more workshops training skills to actually reach that level itself nice nice they give the answer to themselves that's that's a really nice one and what do you do if for example you upgrade the talent some of your best talents you upgrade them to a manager role but then you feel like after a few months he's not that one it's like it doesn't suit him and now you can kind of kill him if you downgrade him then you kill him right and then it's then he's gone so how do you do that because you see that it's not a fit but how do you do this because it's a great talent and very loyal and that kind of stuff yeah and remember alan what we mentioned is that development is ongoing and development can be messy because it's personal it's very individual so the importance is really that don't just lift someone up to a certain role and then you wave them off and say goodbye and that's it it's ongoing development because they got to prove now and put things into practice because if it's your first leadership role trust me i've had and done multiple mistakes right i had people resigning in my first role and it doesn't feel good so you gotta learn it's also when it comes to your first interview right your first interview is terrible but over time your interviewing skills will become better right you have that muscle memory and that's the importance right that ongoing development so if you see that person is struggling do something about it don't just set the person up for failure if you keep that person watch and you know he will struggle he will not achieve numbers engagement scores are low people are leaving that team do something about it right if you see that something is wrong we got to do something we can't just let it go so the importance then is to have those genuine conversations and if you've built that connection already with that leader those conversations will be easily accepted by that person but if you've never had genuine connections with that person true he would just walk out he would just say you know what you think i'm not good enough i'll go to the next company so building those relationships will help you throughout the career journey of that associate and that's what's important to understand it's not just connection that we should have with our leadership team it's the connection that we need to have with everyone in the hotel because those connections will stay in the company will stay with you in that individual hotel and you will always fall back to it when there's great situations but then when there are also tough conversations to have that's where you can fall back on and say you know what we had conversations before we have that mutual relationship i know how i can talk to that person and that person becomes more receptive as well to what you have to say because if you've never sit down with that person you've never had genuine authentic conversations that person is not very likely to take on any words that you share true it doesn't even matter what you say it's not about what you say it's about who says it and correct yeah it's important like who says it and how does it been said so that the connection is really important part throughout the whole conversation with you it's all about that one on ones like everything can be great but if the one on one is shit then nothing great will happen eventually so that's a great point and as you know this podcast is called the future of hospitality so you probably know what i'm going to ask like how do you see the future of talent development because you know the younger generation they have a different kind of mindset is it more online is it more i don't know ai pretty curious to see your future part of talent development yeah it's a great question because everybody's talking about ai ai and i and it's important right those technical skills are important but i think what is even more important when it comes to us here in hospitality is really trying to find that balance between humanity and complexity because we're living in a very complex world there's tons of stuff happening every single day good and bad stuff now the fact that our teams are more and more diverse also requires a different type of leadership a very highly inclusive leader is required for our teams and when we talk about diversity it's not just ethnic background gender right there's so many other things that we look into when it comes to diversity can be educational background experience there's so many other elements that would fall into the diversity backup bucket so i really would want a leader that is showing a high level of emotional intelligence adaptability very very important technical skills that will help you right it's an add on it's a bonus i would say but those authentic connections is what really drives experiences for the associates but also for the guests ultimately and that's what we're looking for in hospitality and ai technical skills amazing helps us we cannot replace the genuine connection and conversation yeah cool so also here you say that the connection and the human part becomes the emotional intelligence that's something that that that's that will be even more important in the future when everything is so automated and ish yeah and because we are really not forced but we're really pushed towards really understanding individual team members in our team versus how leaders have done that maybe 50 years ago what there was one solution fits all now it's not right now you've got to know you've got to find 50 different solutions for 50 team members and that's your challenge as a as leader and that's why you are in that role and i think sometimes us as leaders we need to remind ourselves we are in a position for certain reasons and not just because we've done 10 15 years of operational experience no but we have a task to do as a leader more than just delivering numbers it's really looking into the development of team members and it's really building those connections and that's why what's important that's a great closure of this this episode love that one really thanks marcel do you have something else you want to to add at the end of this because we're almost we're out of questions out of time so something you want to add can be anything anything i think what is really important right start to look into your day to day normal interactions that you have because so many times we think too complicated with too many frameworks in mind too many strategy maps that are out there take a step back really look into basic day to day interactions that you have basic day to day interactions that you have with your team members with your leadership with guests and also at home it's not just something that stays in your work environment those are things that you can also showcase on a day to day basis with a cashier in the supermarket with the check in stuff at the airport right there's so many ways where you can actually bring that back to reality to your real life and not just to your work life so think about amazing directions love that love that great point marcel so marcel thank you really much for your time your energy and all those best practices you really inspired me as well so it was a pleasure to have you as our guest here thank you so much alan really enjoyed it and yeah listen to what we talked about today