What it’s like to work for a Luxury Hotel?
Discover what happens 'behind the scenes', when working for a Luxury Hotel****** part of the Leading Hotels of the World.
What are the ‘Leading Hotels of the World’ ?
On top of the hotel classification chain, you have ‘leading hotels of the world’ — a collection of luxury hotels, more than 400 hotels in over 80 countries.
To be included in this category, a hotel needs to have at least 5* stars, and has to meet the very demanding standards, that are inspected regularly by a ‘mystery guest’. If a hotel fails the standards, it can also drop at any point from the ‘leading hotels’ group, which of course represents a big loss for the hotel and its reputation.
The most famous brands that belong to this category are:
Hilton Hotels & Resorts
Mandarin Oriental Hotel Group
Mariott Hotels
Sheraton Hotels & Resorts
Four Seasons Hotels & Resorts
The Ritz-Carlton
My experience
I worked for 5 months for a ‘leading hotel of the world ’, through an internship with a hotel management school. This experience was very different from any other tourism environment I’ve ever worked for — you will understand soon why.
The Interview
Already by the interview, I understood that this kind of hotel had very ‘special’ requirements. The school trained me for the online meeting, putting a lot of pressure on me. Of course, the first impression was very important, so I had to wear a white shirt with a black suit. So far nothing new.
Now, starts the weirdest part. I was waiting one hour and a half for the HR girl to interview me, and apparently, she was ‘late’ on purpose, to test my patience and to see how I would react under a stressful situation. I thought it was not very considerate because I had a job and I had to skip the whole afternoon, just for this interview.
The meeting lasted 1,5 hours — the longest I’ve ever had. The questions were very personal, with simulations to test my reaction in different circumstances. I thought I was done after the evaluation, but that was just one of the 3 interviews that I had to do, before being accepted for 5 months of internship. The other 2 interviews were made on different days and in different languages. After one month of waiting for the results, I finally got accepted and I started my internship for one of the leading hotels of the world.
First day of work
When I arrived at the hotel, I had to sign a disclosure agreement (a legal contract where I promise not to share information about hotel guests and where I have to respect the privacy of the company).
The first day of work was more about getting oriented in the hotel — it was a massive building and it took 15 minutes to get from one side to another. The staff was always using these underground corridors, for as not to be in the way of hotel guests. It was not allowed to get into an elevator unless you were working as a ‘guest assistant’ — the person that has to carry the luggage from the lobby to the room.
What distinguishes a luxury hotel from others, is the organisation of different departments. For example in a 3-4* stars hotel, the reception covers different positions: they take care of the luggage, they show the room to the guest, and they do the check-in, check-out and bookings.
A luxury hotel is very different — they had 300 employees working, which means that for every duty, there are different job positions.
For the ‘welcome’ they have:
CONCIERGE (welcomes the guests, carry luggages, and shows the hotel)
GUEST ASSISTANT (collaborates with the front desk, and helps the guests for any request. They say one of the toughest positions.)
FRONT DESK (does check-in, check-out, answers emails)
RECEPTION MANAGER (takes care of the front and back office, and collaborated with the general manager)
BOOKING AGENT (takes care of online reservations and collaborates with booking agencies)
In the Hotel they also have:
SECURITY (checks through cameras who comes in the hotel, and what’s happening inside)
SPA RECEPTION (books massages and sells cosmetic products)
SPA MANAGER (collaborates with cosmetic brands and the finance of the Spa Reception)
MASSAGE THERAPISTS (does massages and different cosmetic treatments)
FINANCE (calculates the hotel budgets and takes care of the worker salaries)
MARKETING (takes care of the promotion of the hotel and sales)
HR (does job interviews, takes care of the staff, and shows the hotel for school visits)
HOUSEKEEPING (cleans the rooms and the hotel facilities)
For Food & Beverage:
RESTAURANT WAITER (for lunch and dinner)
BAR WAITER (does cocktails and takes care of the café)
KITCHEN CHEF (for lunch and dinner. The restaurant has 1 MICHELIN Star)
PATISSERIE (makes desserts)
From Front Desk to Spa Receptionist
Working for a luxury hotel chain means that they often switch people in a department where it’s needed, instead of where they initially applied for. I was supposed to work as a front desk receptionist (as I applied through a front office management school), but they didn’t have any available position, so they put me to work as a Spa receptionist instead. My colleagues had a university degree in HR, but they were working in the Spa reception because all the HR spots were taken. They also told me that they were very uncertain about the future because depending on the season, they could have been switched somewhere else, which can be very stressful, because every year you have to adapt to a new job and start from 0 — learning something new, but also things you are maybe not interested in. In this environment, I learned that people apply to work for a Luxury Hotel chain, not for the job position, but for the exclusivity to be part of a renowned Hotel brand.
My expectations Vs Reality
Initially, I was fascinated by the idea to work in a Luxury environment, and for such a renowned Hotel chain. What attracted me the most, was their marketing video — ‘‘what is like to work for our brand?’’ In the video they showed that after one year, you could apply to work (for the same chain) anywhere in the world. Later, I found out that it was not the case — you could apply after 3-4 years of work, and it’s not even sure that you get it, because they have a waiting list with too many applications.
The internship doesn’t last 6 months like my school told me, but it can take even years to get the contract as a regular worker. I met a girl that was promised every year to get the job, but she was an intern for 3 years. This hotel offered free food, but no accommodation, so you can imagine the expenses are really high, especially If you have to pay the rent in a city with the internship salary: €400/month.
I imagined that the salary would be higher than in a 4* stars hotel, as the quality that you give to the guests is more demanding. That was not the case — the salary doesn’t follow the hotel chain requirements, but it depends on the country you are working for. In Italy, the average wage as a receptionist depends on the region you are working in — It’s usually from €1100/month - to €1600/month. For this luxury hotel, the salary as a front desk receptionist was €1000/month — a lot lower than in many other Hotels I worked for! Since life in the city is also quite expensive, I was really concerned about how most of the people were even able to survive.
The benefits to work for a luxury hotel
I also found some benefits to work for a luxury hotel.
The uniform is ironed and washed every day
You never have to worry about it, and trust me it’s a big relief, especially if you are working in a white shirt. (Often, they send you home when the shirt is not well ironed).
The quality of the canteen is better than other hotels
Usually, in hotels you get cheap fried food as an employee. Here, they had a very large healthy food selection, and even vegetarian options. They also brought desserts from the pastry chef, so that was definitely a bonus!
Free massages for me and many luxury cream samples to take home
That was probably the best part of the job. The massage therapists had to train new massages on someone, so I was the ‘guinea pig’. I remember they tested a holistic massage on me for 90 minutes with gold leaves — that guests pay € 450. I got really spoiled!
Looks good on the CV
To work for a renowned hotel, definitely looks good on the CV, especially if you want to work in this industry — it opens ‘new doors’ and prepares you to work for such a demanding clientele.
Behind the scenes
There is a lot of ‘ tea to spill’ about what happens behind the scenes in a luxury hotel.
Here, some of the things that shocked me the most:
The dog menu
They created a menu just for dogs, which includes — dog noodles, fish filet, and beef.
The cheapest plate was for €20
The preparation for VIP guests
Every time there was a VIP guest coming, there was a special preparation and different standards that we had to follow:
Call him by name: Before a VIP guest was coming, we had to be overly prepared — we had to print the guest's picture and put it in the back office, and we had to learn the first and second name so that we would be able to recognize him and call him by name. That was a very important standard that we had to follow! To understand the guest preferences a bit more, we also did some research on the intern before his arrival.
Selling skills: VIP guest — means automatically more money for us! We were supposed to sell as much as possible and practice the sales techniques with specific ‘strategic’ sentences that we had to learn and put into practice.
Never say no: We were literally not allowed to say the word ‘no’ — no matter what the request was. So even if we were not able to satisfy what they required, we had to find an alternative. You can imagine, at times It was stressful! In the Spa Reception, we were lucky, we never got an impossible request. The guest assistant had the hardest position, with the craziest demands!
Working for elite guests & Price range
You really need to be passionate to work for ‘elite guests’ and love the Luxury industry, which I realised was something I didn’t have. I believe that every guest should be treated the same way and with equal respect — no matter how much money they have. Working with my colleagues, I realised that their fascination for this industry was different from mine. They valued ‘elite people’ more than others, thanks to the success that they achieved, and I noticed many workers were idealising their lifestyle — just working for them, made them believe to be part of the ‘elite word’.
Often, we had CEO of world-famous companies, politicians, actors, singers, reality TV stars and sheikhs. The craziest request that I’ve heard, was when a sheikh that came regularly to the Hotel, asked before his arrival to get a golden toilet in his room. And somehow they managed to replace the ‘normal toilet’ with the gold one.
These were the price ranges:
Rooms
from €400/night to €17.000/night
Massages
from €200 to €500
Creams/Cosmetic products
from €100 to €500
The demanding Hotel standards
Image
The image of a worker was very specific for mens and women.
Men are not allowed to have long hair, they have to keep them short without being artificially coloured. Exposed tattoos are not permitted.
Women had to wear make up, collected hairs, neutral colours for nail polisher, no tattoos. We had to wear ‘fancy’ shoes, that were matching our uniform. The first day, we got a picture with hairstyles and makeup examples, that we had to follow.
Feeling like a Robot
We were not allowed to say these specific words, otherwise we would fail the ‘leading hotels of the world’ standards:
no - not - unfortunately - sorry - sadly - but - I don’t know
We had to learn by heart specific sentences, that were different depending if it was an internal or external guest, or If it was a phone call, or a guest at the front desk. If you were missing just a word, or saying a word too much — the bosses were very strict, due to the standards that we had to follow. Which didn’t really allow you to be yourself or show your personality. I really felt like a robot most of the time I was working.
The ‘mystery guest’ paranoia
The reason why they are obsessed with respecting the strict standards, it’s the fear of the ‘mystery guest’ — a person who pretends to be a common guest, but in reality is there to evaluate the quality of the hotel and decide if they are worth to be part of the ‘leading Hotels of the world’.
All the Hotel departments are communicating with each other when they suspect that there could be a mystery guest. The most common sign to recognize an inspector is when a guest tries everything in the Hotel — restaurant, bar, Spa, room service etc. When they suspect someone, they put the best employee to assist the guest. At the end of the stay, the mystery guest always reveals his identity, and one month later also the results.
Conclusion
I want to clarify that I didn't write this post to put in a bad light the hotel industry. I wanted to reveal my experience, to people that are interested to start a career in a luxury hotel.
My internship was supposed to last 7 months, but I left earlier, staying 5 months in total. That’s because I realised, it was not the environment for me, and it was economically very difficult to sustain. I also thought that it would be fairer to leave my spot for people that wanted this job position more than I! When I left, HR told me: ‘‘You are gonna regret your decision, many girls would kill for this job’’. — I felt like Anne Hathaway in the movie ‘The devil wears Prada’!
I don't regret trying this experience, because I learned many things about the luxury industry and about myself. It was interesting to see what really happens behind the scenes in such an idealised lifestyle.