The Power of Recognition, Awards & What I've Learned From The Hospitality Hero - Steven Hesketh

Josiah: Today is Labor Day and National Hotel Employee Day in the U.S., but our story is global. A hospitality owner and operator from the U.K. who started his career in Australia is going to teach us about the power of recognition. Steven Hesketh is not only the CEO of Savvy Hotel Group, which owns and operates hotels, but he also runs the Hospitality Hero, which has a really cool approach to recognizing and celebrating the best of hospitality, which you're going to hear about in this episode. Let's get into it. 

Steven: It's always been about the people I've worked with. If I look at my circle of friends, they're all from my career in hospitality. If I go back to my very first boss, I was a 15-year-old window cleaner in a resort in Australia. For her to recognize that in a short period of time, I didn't mind having a chat to customers and I was quite outgoing. For her to see that, nurture that, grow it, encourage it. She put me up for an award. I was a high achiever award winner at the Queensland timeshare manager awards at the time. Gosh, I'm talking 30 years ago now. God, did that spark something in me that I didn't even know was there. It gave me the energy, the effort, the belief, the love of the industry I've now lived my life in. So I actually put my love of hospitality down to those that I worked with. My auntie actually got me that job and my auntie now still to this day forms part of my conversations of why did I get into hospitality? Because actually my auntie gave me a leg up and actually I'm forever grateful for it. She introduced me to my life's work and I'll forever be grateful to her.

Josiah: Well, it shows the power of relationships. I think not only how you entered the industry, what you have found to be most meaningful in it, what you shared there about being put up for nomination for an award is interesting to me. I wonder if you could share with our listeners a little bit about how it sounds like that sense of recognition and celebration of people working in hospitality has been a part of your life throughout your career, but to the present day, I wonder if you could share with our listeners a little bit about Hospitality Hero. What is it? I think what you've created there is pretty special and would love to hear it in your words.

Steven: Yeah, brilliant. I mean, again, just to touch on that moment at 15, I may have even been 16 at the time, to win that award was so life-changing for me in the sense that I wasn't very good at school. I was terrible at maths, terrible at English, and it wasn't that I was uneducated or anything like that. I just didn't enjoy school. It just wasn't for me. I didn't enjoy being in a classroom, stood doing books and it's not that I was bad at school, it just wasn't for me. So I didn't give it the attention it deserved. So I did very average and back poor in some instances. Strangely enough the few things I did enjoy, drama, business studies, I did okay in. I wasn't brilliant, but I did okay. So to get recognition for something that you enjoyed really inspired me. So fast forward 30 years and here I am, I am very fortunate for the last decade nearly, I have run the Liverpool Hospitality People Awards. In the last three years, we introduced that to Chester. We're just about to introduce it to Cheshire East this year for the first time. So the recognition of a kitchen porter, of a housekeeper, of a receptionist, of a chef, whatever the position, to be recognized for the day in, day out job that you do. And some of the stories you hear over those years. I've listened to some of the most heartfelt stories of just sheer kindness that have seen many, many people that have literally been in tears because they've thought they would never win an award or never thought they were appreciated for what they did. And actually to do that in a very small way and be a part of that has been warming to my heart. So Hospitality Hero came out of the fact that, again, going back to COVID, it was how do we really start pushing hospitality in people's mindsets? How do we, in a very noisy world, how do we get people to understand you can be a hotel manager, you can be a sales manager, you can be an accountant in hospitality, you can be a gardener, you can be whatever you want to be in hospitality and really grow and have a rewarding career and job. Yet we're being drowned out by, oh, be an influencer and be an actor and be a sports star and be a techie and be an AI genius. All this industry that is, I totally understand, needs to happen and our world doesn't exist without all that type of stuff. But you forever saw us falling off the path of career opportunities. So Hospitality Hero was born from my personal view that we really needed to get hospitality back into elementary and secondary schools' mindset and show them that they can travel the world. All three of my children have gone and traveled Asia and all that type of stuff and had a ball and that education piece is second to none. I mean, what they learn culturally, mentally is absolutely fantastic. And every time you talk to them about that, what do they refer back to? The beautiful hospitality experiences that happened throughout that whole time, the relationships and friends they've now made. And their life is so much more enjoyable and fruitful for those relationships and that amazing travel experience. But I relate it all back to hospitality.

Josiah: Yeah, it all comes back to hospitality and the people behind hospitality. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about the awards process, because there's a lot of words out there. I think recognition in general is good. You mentioned stories, and the stories part is interesting because my understanding is you take a different approach because there's actually conversations behind this. This isn't just nominations, put someone's names forward. Tell us a little bit about the story process and why story plays such an important role in the recognition you provide.

Steven: So all of our awards that we do are done via nominations initially. So there is a nomination process where you have to fill out a nomination form. So it's pushed out to hotel managers and heads of department to nominate their chosen superstars in their venue. So they write a 500 words sort of essay for a better word that explains why they are due to win that award. Then process part two, and what's lovely is as time's gone on, the awards got bigger and bigger, so we have to shortlist now. You can have 25 nominations for one award, and we try and narrow that down to about six. Then those six are put forward to a judging panel and we invite industry experts. I'm going to say industry experts, people that stay in hotels regularly, people that may do training, people that are suppliers, people that are other hotel managers. And we asked them to give up their time to interview those six individuals that have been shortlisted. And then, I mean, very difficult to do, but try narrow down a winner and ultimately there has to be a winner in one way, shape or form. That's what it's all about. But the written article tells you a lovely story, but then when they're being interviewed and you can explore and ask questions, those stories just come to life and can bring a tear to your eye quite literally.

Josiah: I'm curious, Steven, what you listen for, because I'm interested in this specific process. But I'm also interested for our listeners. Our listeners are leaders across every domain of hospitality around the world. And I think this skill of listening for stories, and then ultimately celebrating them is really key part of leadership, right? And you have exposure not only as an owner and operator yourself, but as the person behind this. I'm curious when you're listening to these stories, what are you listening for? And the question behind the question is, how do you listen to celebrate excellence and hospitality?

Steven: Again, we live in a world where we buy people, don't we? And I think you can see in somebody's eyes and somebody's passion, it oozes through. And often nowadays we're actually even doing interviews on Zoom as opposed to face-to-face. But you can still see the love for their job. You can still see the passion or the excitement of what they've delivered. And as I said, some of these stories are just all around kindness and kindness at its best and what that kindness has actually had a knock-on effect to that end customer. And whether or not you're going above and beyond what is anticipated from you in your role to actually what isn't a job orientated task. It is a human act of kindness. That's what warms my heart. And you see it time and time again. Every time we do it, we think we can't do better next year than the year before. And yet another story comes along and literally brings a tear to your eye because yeah, I mean, people love to show kindness. And you forget that globally, and I mean this globally, humans want kindness. So it doesn't matter whether you've stepped off a plane from America to the UK, from Uganda to the UK, wherever. Actually, you're still going to end up with gum on your shoe because you walked into gum. You're still going to be late if traffic's bad. We all have the same problems in life. And actually for somebody to understand that, care and listen to that, and then do something to help you overcome it or ease it is just a beautiful act that we all do every day without even knowing it sometimes.

Josiah: Is there a story you can share of kindness at work? I want to help our listeners understand, I'm sure they've seen this among their workplaces and things like this, but let's cut your attention. What stayed with you? Is there a story that comes to mind?

Steven: I mean, a story that comes to mind in relation to actually something that we do as part of our training in Hospitality Hero. So we work with SEN schools, as they're called here in the UK, which are basically kids with special needs. And recently, well actually it happens almost every time, they come into our hotel, we do some really great exercise with them, eight or nine kids at a time. We might get them icing cookies or we'll get them folding napkins into swans and goodness knows what. We do bed making competitions, lots of stuff like that. And still the one thing that gets to me, and actually I've had it on three separate occasions now, where part of the bed making competition, and these are children that have got all sorts of different issues, ADHD, autism, whatever type of scenario. And I always feel that we badge people too much. So I'm not a lover of that, but nevertheless. We treat them all the same when they come into their property. And some of them have done fantastic. And we got a phone call off the head teacher to say, Johnny did your bed making competition yesterday. And his mom has rang me this morning in tears because Johnny's made his bed for the first time ever. And it's a story I tell time and time again, because I'm so proud of that story. And as I said to you, I've now heard it several times from others that have come because we get different cohorts every time. And how magical is that? And this is going back to almost the book and the reason for doing it, that I believe every hotelier, every business has a moral obligation to inspire this next generation. And you can do that in so many small ways. And something as silly as a bed making competition, who can make that bed the quickest and the smartest and the tidiest is such a good, fun exercise for someone who's 13, 14 and has inspired them to go, wow, I quite enjoyed making that bed. And yet how much of it as a task for every one of us to get out of bed every morning and make that bed, it seems like such a task to us. I have been so disciplined. I don't get out of bed without making my bed every morning. It's like inbuilt to me, but that's because I've done hospitality for 30 years that I actually can't stand to get into an unmade bed. But for some kids that just get out of bed and mum will make it for them or it doesn't get made and they just get back into it. To inspire something as small as that, it's just so lovely. It's just, that's why I do what I do really. I love it.

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