A fascinating read it is… this article in the distinguished New York Times. An article asking “when did hospitality become so hostile… with both customers and servers aggrieved”…

There definitely was a shift at the return after Covid where many who were desperate for being seen and being valued as a customer came to realise that the person looking after them maybe couldn’t do it to the extend they wanted due to the disparity between numbers of staff versus numbers of guests… or due to the disparity to the delivered experience versus the wanted experience… or due to the not being able to give or versus the want to receive… It certainly was tricky in those early days and for some reason it just seems to have grown momentum and grown bigger and grown uglier! And that was at the very top end of the luxury experience!

I love creating experiences and memories. These are often in the little things. A gesture, a word, a nod or a little something just to confirm that they have been seen, they have been heard, they are valued… Coming out of covid, the little things were not enough. We wanted bigger, we wanted better, we wanted faster and we just wanted… more, more, more.

At the same time we, the industry, was haemorrhaging people. After all, covid thought us a few things… the value of time, the value of friends and family, the value of ourselves… no wonder that career change was high on the agenda. Either to creat a better balance or to work less for more or work when friends and family is working so the off time is synchronised… or maybe change career so they could move home to be closer to friends and family back in the old country…

So here I am… having left the country where I created a career that took me to the very top. Gone back to my home country where I in many ways have to restart my career. My new career is not in 5-star hotels or resorts, but in a non profit organisation, creating experiences and memories in some fairly down to earth facilities, but all located in some of the best and most awesome locations in this beautiful country of mine… because hospitality is so very, very simple! We give with our heart and we want to please to create that little moment of a sharp intake of breath where the world stop and we go “wow”… If we give genuinely without thinking about the return, we will succeed. And the giving are all about the little things!