Exclusive Interview | Kumar Roushan, General Manager – Pre-opening & Development, Lords Hotels & Resorts
/“With every new day we have new challenges and the property with different level have different requirement as per classification, market, ownership, brands. The taste of the guests have also changed in past decade and which is a vicious cycle always but the tech feature has forced the industry to accept and convert the strategies accordingly. ”
Tell us about your journey. How did it all start?
I had started my career in 2008 from Zuri hotels, Bangalore and was a pre-opening member of the team from room division. Got an opportunity to see the pre operations setup so closely. You gather so much of confidence in this journey as each and every brick to corners are known to you each process and policy is what you have seen being implemented its altogether a different spirit and from that day by choice and proven track and my willingness I chose to be a part of pre-opening hotels regularly and right after Zuri, it was aloft hotels (Starwood) and then Svenska hotels (Swedish chain) and thereafter Formule1 hotel (Accor) all were flagship brand in India and being the key member of preopening the journey continued to Spree hotels which gave an immense boost to my career.
I had learnt a lot from this short journey specially opening hotels in different city with hospitality exposure and continuing the same at Lords hotels & Resorts. As it is a fastest growing chain in mid segment with 60 hotels all over India and many more to come in next few months which I would be actively involved and increase the band width of learnings hereafter.
What do you think it takes to succeed in this industry?
I would always say that the consistency of your deliveries matters a lot towards your work as per the assigned tasks. The opportunity may change but end of the day all depends on the result and output which has been given. It does not matter the numbers of hours you have put in but with your consistent performance the moral is always high and because of this the output will always be better with the bars raised every time and this would definitely lead to the organisational and individual growth. The industry treats everyone in the same way it’s we as an individual how do we take it and govern in the team for common goal
Launching something new is both an exciting opportunity and a responsibility. Share with us a deep dive into your process for these new launches.
With every new day we have new challenges and the property with different level have different requirement as per classification, market, ownership, brands. The taste of the guests have also changed in past decade and which is a vicious cycle always but the tech feature has forced the industry to accept and convert the strategies accordingly.
Yes the opportunity is available in the market with different quality and the innovation has also lead the market to have several number of choices. Every individual have a set of responsibility to act upon and new launches are always a challenge to have a balance between the ownership, brand and the niece crowd as an end user. We have to do justice to all factors which would lead to a successful launch end of the day.
What does the future look like?
I personally believe post pandemic every individual wants to be more social and hospitality gives an extra leverage to do so. The industry will boom as the travel record in past few months have proved it, yes there are revolution which comes with the time and would push the corporate movement and take a shape soon. The occupancy for industry is in its peak and will keep increasing also the F&B opportunity is on the upper side and in long run guests will keep using the hospitality services and it will go to its next level of personalised services. Never the less we cannot ignore the tech features being added in our day to day livelihood and we have to incorporate this in our service standards and operational movements and keep spinning the wheel of innovations
What is the one app / tech solution you would love to see?
One App which I would love to see would be related to HR-trainings for the staff.
A quick short task on their figure print daily which would make their life easy for daily job and detailed information on the SOP at their finger tips which can be read as and when required for interested candidates this will give access to their thoughts and will groom them more faster and make them prompt and responsible in their career.
