Execution is Everything: Turning Hospitality Ideas into Exceptional Guest Experiences - Steven Marais, Noble House Hotels & Resorts

Josiah: Before we started recording, you were talking a little bit about the importance of leadership and people that you've learned from. I'm curious if there's a piece of advice that you heard at some point in your career journey so far that stuck with you and has been sort of a guiding light as you've been building your career.

Steven: I don't know what the quote is, but it is, a strategy without execution is just a dream. And I learned that quite a bit because, you know, ideas are only ideas until they're actually implemented on. And I've seen that, you know, someone told me that a long time ago when I was young, and obviously I brushed it off like, okay, yeah, whatever. But it's true, like execution is everything. Execution in the guest journey, for example, as execution in technology, for example. I was actually talking with the GM here at this hotel about how, little things like reservations failing to integrate into maybe a PMS system is just so rudimentary. Why does that happen? It's like basically sending a text message to the PMS system. That's all it is. Why do these things happen? And again, it goes back to if there's no execution there, then you're having a guest that's having a pretty friction-full check-in that needs to wait for their room, and maybe the room's not available, so then the front office is scrambling, trying to get them into their room, and so execution's everything, and I've seen example again and again and again.

Josiah: I love that. And I feel like what I'm trying to do through these conversations is sort of two things that feel like they're on opposite sides. One is inspiring people, right? So there is a certain amount of big picture what's possible, but none of that matters if you can't execute. And I love that quote. I love that notion. What have you found useful both for yourself and for your teams in kind of creating more of this culture of execution, actually getting stuff done?

Steven: Oh, I think, you know, I think training has been a big portion of things, training and development. And we actually talking about this because we're starting to partner with Forbes. Again, you probably heard this in the industry a lot about how we're going back to the basics of hospitality and how we need to get back to to our roots. And so post pandemic, a lot of a lot of the training and a lot of it was trial by fire, right? And so I think training, 100% training. And the great thing about the hotel industry is that there's a lot of use cases. There's a lot of examples and in real time. And so that sort of real time training is really important to show where execution comes into play. A perfect example is this property. So during, I'm not sure if you've been here during Fleet Week. I know you grew up around here, but Fleet Week is absolutely crazy. But this right next to where the field is, that is where they show the air show. And it just, the city of San Francisco closes all the streets, doesn't really tell all the businesses, it becomes complete mayhem here. And so, unless there is a full-on plan which is executed properly, then every guest that's checking in here is gonna have a less-than-ideal arrival experience, and a less-ideal departure experience.

Josiah: So this is fascinating to me. I wonder, could we talk a little bit behind the scenes? How do you think about preparing for that? It's such a big moment. I feel like everyone in San Francisco, everyone in the surrounding areas here, you're in the epicenter. You're like literally the center of everything. How do you prepare a team for something like that?

Steven: You know, it's funny. So any room operator, I always tell them your biggest asset that you have is time. Because you always know how many check-ins you're going to have ahead of time. You always are able to give a pre-arrival letter and communicate to the guest ahead of time. That is sort of your luxury here. It's not, if something is reactionary, it's, it usually could have been prepared on ahead of time. So you know that Fleet Week is right after Columbus Day every single year. And you can start having those conversations four months in advance about what we're going to do. We're going to reach out to the guests that are booking during that time that have that stay window. We're going to come up with floor maps on where the guest journey is going to change from what time to what time. We're going to prepare the guests. We're going to prepare every single department. So I think a lot of that just preparation ahead of time and using the time that you have to come up with that strategy and then execute is the critical piece.