Patrick Imbardelli is president and chief executive of Pan Pacific Hotels Group, which operates more than 30 hotels in Asia, Australia and North America.
Q. Do you remember the first time you became a manager?
A. My father was a restaurateur in Melbourne, Australia, and when I was about 13 years old he put me in charge of the dishwashing team. I still remember them today: one was an Italian lady who didn’t speak English, there was a Lebanese guy who spoke little English, and two elderly ladies, one from Australia and one from Macedonia. My job was to make sure that dishes were washed clean and not too many got broken. Sounds simple, but it was very challenging because of the nature of the team and the issue of communication. In fact, it may have been my biggest challenge. It sounds simplistic but at that age it did create a big impression.
My “real” first management job was a restaurant manager’s job with Hilton in an all-day restaurant. I was about 21 years old and there were about 45 or 50 staff; again, multicultural and predominantly women.
Q. Is there a different challenge in managing a staff of the opposite sex?
A. First, having an over-representation of a core group in your team is always a challenge, whatever that core group is, because of the certain dynamic it creates. In this case, half of the women were mothers and had families. Their agenda and their issues were different from mine, and I had a hard time relating to their concerns.
The situation taught me two things: First, you can’t and don’t have to solve people’s problems. Sometimes you just listen and they can talk themselves into sorting their own problems. Second, I realized I needed to build a management team that was also representative of the work force and could relate to them. So I reorganized the team to bring two ladies on board as supervisors, and that way there was someone there they could go to with an issue.
Q. Is this a lesson you still use today with a diverse work force around the globe?
A. It taught me that diversity is extremely important, otherwise there are certain issues that never get talked about and you’re not challenged enough. I pay a lot of attention to the management team in every hotel. It’s a balance to be reached between having local and international staff.
Even at the corporate office, you will see that there are never more than two or three people that have come from the same previous company. We have staff who have previously worked at Shangri-La, Banyan Tree, Starwood, etc., but we never have more than two and it’s deliberate, because you don’t want to import these other companies’ cultures. You want to have your own overriding culture.
I definitely wouldn’t go out there to hire a team from someone else. It sends a bad message, and it’s hard for them to integrate.
Q. How do you nurture a strong internal culture?
A. Communication is extremely important, and it’s not about quantity but quality. Too many e-mails is the bane of too many organizations. We have a daily e-mail of announcements that links to our Intranet platform, where the details can be found. The announcements are mostly about our people’s successes and recognizing them. And all our messages about new team members are personalized. No passport photos, but something personal so you get a real feel of who that person is.
Not everybody likes this. Not everybody likes to go fuzzy and warm, and you have to recognize that you can’t push this through in every culture.
Q. For example?
A. In China, we are a little bit more task- and outcome-oriented, because the culture’s like that. But in North America and Australia, where there is this culture of catching up after work, it’s different. In Australia I might recognize the achievement of an employee in public, praising him in front of his peers. I would do that less often in China, because our associates are more likely to feel embarrassed to be singled out.
Q. So how would you praise an employee there?
A. Probably one to one, though I do also praise in public. But while in the U.S. I may praise 90 percent in public, in China it’s more like 50 percent or less.
Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/11/business/global/11iht-manager11.html?partner=rss&emc=rss
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