SPECIAL REPORT
I FIND THAT IN ADDITION TO PRACTICING WELLNESS , SETTING ATTAINABLE GOALS FOR MYSELF , EVEN AS SIMPLE AS CLOSING ALL THREE OF MY APPLE WATCH ACTIVITY RINGS WITHIN A 30-DAY TIME FRAME , PROVIDES ME WITH A SENSE OF BALANCE .
HEATHER MCCRORY
Now , sharing with him what ’ s going on at work and hearing his opinions is just incredible . I see how different they learn , how different they ’ re engaging with their friends , and it is a lesson and something we have to pay very close attention to .
Smith : One of the retailers who really broke the mold is Zappos . First of all , they have a great app , but they think about the customer first . Free returns for a year . Free shipping . All of that . But what ’ s different is they train their colleagues who answer the phones to solve problems . You ’ re not forwarded on to the next person , or on hold for 20 minutes . I ’ m loyal to them because it ’ s so easy . I feel like my needs are first .
H : What have you done to reflect on your processes and take them forward ?
McCrory : I ’ ve been in my role for a year now . The pace just continues to grow , I think , for all of us . It just gets faster and faster and faster . With that , we make decisions faster and faster . But I have found probably in the last four or five months that it is OK to stop making decisions . Park it . Let ’ s think about it . Sleep on it , think about it for a little bit , and then you come up with a much better decisions than when on that treadmill .
It really is a discipline for me almost to say , ‘ OK . I am not going to just answer , go , go , go . Let ’ s do it , let ’ s do it .’ Get some facts and just really slow it down . To me , it ’ s really important today with everything going so fast , to sleep . It is an incredible incubator for thinking .
It ’ s hard to stop yourself from actually getting on that treadmill and to slow it down . That , to me , is a discipline I don ’ t necessarily know if I always practice , but I ’ m trying to .
Silcock : It ’ s very easy when people come up with new ideas to immediately come up with a practical reason why they can ’ t work . It ’ s important to really control myself and not allow my experiences step in the way of ideas , and let the ideas play out … For example , last year we launched a new price structure … My immediate reaction when people wanted to make this change was to think about the 6,100 hotels , the thousands of people and systems that historically have been very hard to change . By stopping myself and allowing , in some cases , new people to follow that path we came up with a new price structure that was valuable for customers and for hotels , and it moved us forward .
H : What are your hacks for getting the most out of your business relationships ? McCrory : The number one skill , and
I think it ’ s really , really important to relationships , is listening . Today , we ’ re all about going so quickly . But to really build a relationship with someone , you actually have to actively listen , participate , and sometimes I think we ’ re just on that treadmill . Even for people you ’ ve known for a really long time , it ’ s easy to lose track … I don ’ t think I ’ m necessarily the best listener all the time . It ’ s something that is key to that relationship .
Smith : Presence is key . I ’ ll go back to the yoga practice again . Getting into your body and thinking about what you ’ re doing — just being mindful of the motion or whatever I ’ m doing allows me to create presence with other aspects of my life . Listening is key , but actually being there and connecting is key , and the people who call me out on it the most are my kids .
Voris : Hand in hand with that is asking questions … There ’ s a famous , historical story about Mr . Marriott having been asked when he was a young man by the U . S . president , ‘ What do you think ?’ That ’ s just baked into everything we do . It ’ s so valuable at a property when you go and ask somebody , ‘ What do you think ? What would you do here ?’ Not only does it really value them , often you get a much better answer than you would have had .
36 hotelsmag . com September / October 2020