It is the stellar personalities that make Conrad Hong Kong shine.

It all started with a trailblazer in early 20th century in Texas who was at first calculating and pondering which bank to buy up. But he was so frustrated by the lack of the hotel guestrooms that a few days later he decided to purchase a hotel instead of a bank.

The hotel became the seed of one of the world's biggest and most successful hotel chains. And this gentleman, who later referred to the result of his abrupt backpedal as "a cross between a flophouse and a gold mine," is Conrad Hilton, the founder of the globally renowned Hilton Worldwide, which is now managing more than 3,800 hotels of 10 brands around the world - including the luxury Conrad brand.

"The Conrad hotels are carrying a long and rich heritage of hospitality. Our philosophy stems from Conrad Hilton, who had a very warm, very personal, very enigmatic approach to running a hotel company. His vision was to make people feel really good when they're traveling, and create a feel of familiarity, and let the hotel guests build up a connection to the hotels," said Mr Keith Allardice, General Manager of Conrad Hong Kong.

And Conrad Hong Kong, being the first of the Conrad brand to base itself in Asia, also becomes the font of the continuous enrichment of the Conrad standard, not just in terms of building up a set of service standards, and enriching day by day the deeply-ingrained philosophy beneath the brand.

"Conrad was built and is still building with the spirit of individuality," said Mr Allardice.

The General Manager explained the huge significance that the Conrad brand has attached to the personalities of its staff members, who are encouraged to pro-actively and genuinely engage with the hotel guests.

The rationale behind is the goal to create a sense of being recognized for the guests, which is ultimately "what makes a really great experience when customers are staying in a hotel, and what brings customers back."

Nevertheless, when the industry has been developing to such a high standard in Hong Kong in which hotel facilities tend to resemble each other with only minor differences, even the concept of "creating a sense of recognition" for guests is not novel, and has been largely duplicated worldwide.

"In terms of executing that job, we have a very established set of brand standards. These are the fundamentals which form the stage, and then we put people on it to let them perform, and that is where their personality and their ability makes the difference," said Mr Allardice.

The experienced hotelier believes that in contrast to the technical skills which can be taught, personality is something that cannot be taught, though the hotel does conduct a myriad of training programs, practices through role playing, and daily briefings that help employees accumulate precious experience piecemeal.

But it all comes down to talent management as the first and foremost step.

"I would much prefer to hire someone with a fantastic personality and a very interesting and engaging sort of personality than someone who only has fantastic skills," said Mr Allardice.

In his perception, a great personality is shown in the way the candidates make an eye contact, the way they talk, and the confidence they exude, the warmth in their voice, and above all, an authentic genuineness that makes every expression naturally pleasing.

To ensure that the candidates truly reflect their personality, Mr Allardice said, there is a lot of time spent to asking them different questions which mean the same thing.

And then what comes next is the environment that the staff members are in. Mr Allardice has stressed his trick to get every staff member to call him by his first name, which is a way to make the staff connect with him, and also for himself to connect with the team members.

But there is more.

"In a successful hotel like this one, we celebrate success, and we share that. Credit goes to people who do the job. If someone does an outstanding job, we make sure that they look good," said Mr Allardice, who observed that some hoteliers have not been able to say "thank you" to the staff personally, but only write a card with the word "congratulations" on it.

Aside from all the passion and hard work in delivering services, the hotel also commonly holds parties to celebrate success, whether it is big one or small one, holding birthday parties, staff events, and lots of gatherings every month.

"We're not just competing with other hotels for staff, we're also competing with credit card companies, banks, financial institutions and even publications for great talent in the service industry. You've got to fight for good people, you have to give them a reason to join and stay with you," Mr Allardice said.

"The best hotels in the world are in Hong Kong, and the best operators are in Hong Kong. So we always have to be conscious of the fact that we have to be competitive," he said. "We're very lucky to have an environment as dynamic as it is in Hong Kong and its ability to bounce back so quickly."

"Our competition is the best in the world."

China Daily

(HK Edition 03/25/2011 page1)