Operations management in hospitality is partly about securing the right people. The hospitality industry must recognise and nurture talent as Reto Wittwer discusses in this TV show.

Operations management in hospitality

Good people have options. And they exercise their options outside the company if they can’t exercise them inside. So of course if you’re a shrinking company then you by definition lose people. If you are a growing company you can create career opportunities for people. We have a talent programme that I spearhead. I spend about 50% of my time on people. And one very important element is talent, because my job is not to manage the company today. My job is to make sure that the company 10 years is there where I think it should be. And if you’re in manufacturing you have to make sure that your raw materials are secured. But if you are in hospitality you have to make sure your talents are groomed and trained and motivated and see a future. Our general managers have a role that is specific to them to identify talents. And when they identify talents they have to do something and take personal ownership for their talents. We’re the only hospitality group that doesn’t have a corporate HR. I fired a guy five years ago, well I asked him to go I should say, and helped him to get another job. He says, “I think the fundamental problem in talent in our industry is not necessarily shown on the CV.” And HR people look at people through the eyes of a CV. Does the CV tell everything about you? Certainly not, especially in emerging countries where people don’t have the opportunity to have proper schooling, that doesn’t make unfit to make a career in our industry, so the managers have to identify the suitcase hungry bellboy that may become a front office manager or why not a general manager one day? The hustler waiter, who can become a food and beverage manager, it’s not the HR that see this, it’s the manager who has to see this and they have to take ownership of this and communicate that you have a shot with us.   If you found this video about operations management interesting why not watch more TV shows on The Hospitality TV Channel ?