Mövenpick Hotels & Resorts strolled away with top honours at last week’s Worldwide Hospitality Awards when the company’s integrated training programme was awarded ‘Best Initiative in People and Talent Management’.
The award follows a detailed submission by the upscale hospitality company, who competed with five other international hotel group finalists. Each candidate’s submitted Human Resources initiative was studied against criteria which included originality and measurable efficiency.
‘Natural Enjoyment’ successfully engaged all Mövenpick Hotels & Resorts’ 16,000 employees worldwide. A need for consistency in service delivery, though fluid and not identical from property to property, was the inspiration for the initiative.
Identified in 2011 as the new brand promise for customers and a key differentiator of Mövenpick Hotels & Resorts, ‘Natural Enjoyment’ is about delivering a personalised, relaxed and uncomplicated experience that makes guests happy. It amalgamated the current needs and perceptions of guests at the company’s hotels, with the unique heritage of the brand, yet allowing for cultural diversity and adaption at the same time.
Development of the new brand promise was initiated by Jean Gabriel Pérès, president and chief executive officer of Mövenpick Hotels & Resorts. “Providing a fantastic quality of service and creating great stories for our guests to take away with them, is what is most important for the company. ‘Natural Enjoyment’ has now embedded this ideal within our culture and it has been wonderful to see our exceptional employees striving to make a difference and continuously increasing quality benchmarks,” said Pérès.
One of the objectives of ‘Natural Enjoyment’ was to train all employees of Mövenpick Hotels & Resorts on practical ways to consistently deliver the company’s brand promise. Three ‘Service Ingredients’ were created and supported with practical ways in which to make each of these come to life. The interactive programme was rolled out in 2012 with “Discovery” sessions and followed up with progress sessions in 2013. Results are measured through guest feedback, employee surveys and mystery guest audits.
Alex Rawson, vice president learning and talent development for Mövenpick Hotels & Resorts, managed the research, design and ultimate creation of the training programme ‘Discovery’: “Phase one of the programme zeroed in several hands-on possibilities our employees could take ownership of, while phase two made sure this new approach was also reflected in actual day-to-day behaviour. We are now shaping phase three with the objective to inspire employees through storytelling and sharing hero stories,” said Rawson.
The Worldwide Hospitality Awards is an international competition established in 2000 by Paris-based MKG Group. It represents an opportunity for hotels to highlight their teams’ exemplary achievements in communication, marketing, innovation, human resources, customer loyalty programmes, social and environmental responsibility. Winners are chosen by an international jury composed of around 40 renowned figures of the business world, tourism industry and marketing sector.
For more information please visit moevenpick-hotels.com.
