The Lodging Leaders Podcast: Powerful Business Strategies for Hotel Professionals

Tom Conran serves as a Principal of Greenwood Hospitality Group - a Colorado-based company focused on the acquisition, repositioning, and management of upscale, full-service and select-service hotels. Formed in 2009, Greenwood Hospitality Group has grown their portfolio to 15 properties under management in 10 states. Last year, Hotel Business ranked Greenwood Hospitality Group #60 in their Top 100 Management Companies of 2014 report. Tom's role with Greenwood is to grow the group via strategic investments and third-party hotel management assignments. An industry veteran, Tom has more than 30 years of hospitality experience in the management, finance, and real estate sectors. Prior to his current role, Tom served as Vice President of Business Development for Richfield Hospitality. Tom expanded the Richfield management platform to include hospitality investments and acquisitions. During his 25 years with Richfield and its predecessor companies, Tom held several key positions including sales and marketing and property manager assignments. In addition, he was responsible for property management transitions and client relations within the management portfolio. From 1997 to 2000, Tom also served as Vice President of Acquisitions for Regal Hotels International and successfully closed on $300 million of hotel acquisitions, including the Bostonian Hotel, the UN Plaza Hotel New York, the Knickerbocker Chicago, and the Los Angeles Biltmore Hotel. Thereafter, Tom served as Vice President of Acquisitions and Finance for Millennium Hotels, USA with active involvement in the group’s investment strategies and renovation programs for their portfolio of 13 upscale full-service hotels. Tom earned a Bachelor’s Degree from Keene State College in Keene, New Hampshire. Tom was a founding member of Meetings Planner International in Hartford, CT and he currently serves on the Owners’ Advisory Board of Doubletree Hotels. In This Episode, Tom Talks About: Stretching the guest experience to include the unexpected. Creating an experiential environment, from cultural buy-in to heightened guest engagement. Establishing a training regime for his staff, which they refer to as their ambassadors, and providing them with the tools and support to perform at the highest level. Establishing a service recovery protocol, and making it personal. Genuine interaction with the guest - utilizing guest information, history, and leading questions when taking the reservation, at check-in, in the restaurant or meeting space, and throughout their stay. Creating an environment of community, and he shares some actionable ways hotels and restaurants can do that to promote social interaction. Food & Beverage, positioning your restaurants as if they were free standing, how F&B can greatly assist in creating a distinctive and relevant difference, and the importance of making sure it supports the overall positioning statement. Resources & Links Tom Conran Email: tconran[at]greenwoodhospitality.com Tom on LinkedIn Greenwood Hospitality Group Greenwood Hospitality Website Greenwood Hospitality on LinkedIn

Gaurav is Product Marketing Manager for Milestone Internet Marketing - a leading provider of Internet marketing solutions for the lodging industry. Milestone does it all, from Website Design to Search Engine Optimization, Pay-per-Click marketing, Social Media Optimization, Email marketing, you name it. Milestone currently works with nearly 2000 hotels and retail customers, driving over $150M in annual revenue for its clients. In November, I attended the AAHOA Independent Hotelier Conference in Houston, and Milestone's CEO, Anil Aggarwal, was one of the speakers. His presentation on "Why Digital Marketing is Key for Independent Hotels" was so informative, that I reached out to Anil to ask if we could use that as a guide for a podcast interview. Anil not only agreed, he connected me with Guarav to expand on that amazing content for today's episode. And, as an added bonus, Milestone agreed to share their slide deck for FREE with the Lodging Leaders community. The content they provided applies to any hotel, not just independent properties, and you can use the information to improve your business without spending a dime with Milestone. Click here to download Milestone's presentation on "Why Digital Marketing is Key for Independent Hotels." In This Episode, We Talk About: The 4 areas that hoteliers need to think about in terms of digital marketing, including a Website, Reviews, SEO and Pay Per Click. Why a hotel should invest in a Website and Marketing, and why direct website business is so important. The ROI for websites, and the type of returns you can expect. The technology behind the websites, and Gaurav explains some of the technical jargon you hear, like mobile-friendly, responsive adaptive designs, and optimization. Search engines, ideal search placement, and Pay Per Click advertising (PPC). Reviews, social media and effectively managing your online reputation. Resources & Links Why Digital Marketing is Key for Independent Hotels Presentation Gaurav Varma Email: gaurav.v[at]milestoneinternet.com Gaurav on LinkedIn Gaurav on Twitter     Milestone Internet Marketing, Inc. Milestone Website Milestone on Facebook Milestone on Twitter Milestone on Google+ Milestone on Flickr Milestone on YouTube Milestone on LinkedIn Milestone Internet Marketing, Inc. 3001 Oakmead Village Drive Santa Clara, California 95051 Toll Free: 866-615-2516 Phone: 1-408-492-9055 Email: sales[at]milestoneinternet.com Thanks for Listening! Thanks so much for joining us again this week. If you have some feedback you’d like to share, leave a note in the comment section below!If you enjoyed this episode, please share it using the social media buttons at the bottom of the post. Also, please leave an hones...

Patrick Dixon has been ranked as one of the 20 most influential business thinkers alive today by Thinkers 50. He's often described as a Futurist keynote speaker, and he's authored 16 books (650,000 in print in 40 languages) including Futurewise, SustainAgility, The Genetic Revolution, Building a Better Business, and his latest book, The Future of Almost Everything. Patrick consults to multinationals on wide range of trends / strategic issues, across every industry, and keynotes at conferences on global trends in up to 4 countries a week (53 nations) - from 15 to 4,500 people in each group, for companies such as Google, Microsoft, General Electric, GSK, Siemens, Phillips, AT&T, BP, Prudential, and Barclays Bank. He has contributed (keynotes / lectures) to Executive Education, MBA and many other programmes at London Business School since 1999, as well as to Open Programmes at six other business schools. Patrick is Founder and Chairman of Global Change Ltd (trends and strategy consulting), Chairman of Virttu Biologics Ltd (cancer research biotech), and non-executive director of Acromas Health Care Ltd (Allied Health Care Ltd, Nestor Health Care Ltd and Saga Health Care Ltd). In This Episode, Patrick Talks About: What it means to be a futurist Motivating your staff, and the mistakes that many companies that demotivate their employees. How to amaze your guests by looking at the experience you create at your hotel from their perspective. Understanding how your customer is feeling right now - are they exhausted from a long day of travel, stressed about a business meeting they have tomorrow, hungry, thirsty, tired? Big data, and ways technology can enhance the customer experience. Social media, reviews, and the truth about how Google ranks reviews. Resources & Links Patrick Dixon Email: patrickdixon[at]globalchange.com LinkedIn Facebook Twitter Website Patrick's Books The Future of Almost Everything Futurewise: Six Faces of Global Change Sustainagility: How Innovation and Agility Will Save the World The Genetic Revolution: Today's dream or tomorrow's nightmare Building a Better Business: The key of Future Marketing, Management and Motivation

Jonathan "Jon" Albano is Founder & CEO of LodgingMetrics - a secure, cloud-based platform that enables hoteliers to track all of their critical business metrics across multiple properties from anywhere at any time, using a laptop, tablet or smart phone. He also hosts the popular Lodging Leaders podcast, an interview based show providing powerful business strategies for hotel professionals. For more than 13 years, Jon defined Membership Services for AAHOA, one of the fastest-growing organizations in the hospitality industry, with over 14,000 members owning more than 20,000 hotels that total $128 billion in property value. After effectively executing 13 national conventions, hundreds of regional trade shows, and attending numerous industry events, Jon is recognized by many as a leading hospitality needs expert in bringing owners and vendors together for mutual gain. As Vice President of Membership, he led the Membership, Education & Professional Development, Public Relations & Communications, and Information Technology departments. Jon used his engineering background and passion for efficiencies to improve staff productivity and enhanced members' experience by implementing countless technology solutions, designing custom software, and overseeing the development of multiple websites and mobile applications. After years of working closely with hotel owners, Jon discovered that there are many "pains" hoteliers face on a daily basis, and in February of 2014, he left AAHOA to find ways that technology can cold solve them. About this episode The format for this episode is going to be a little bit different, and I'm really excited about it. Instead of featuring a new guest interview, I decided to create an episode completely dedicated to improving operational profits. In addition, I'm providing a powerful FREE Hotel Action Guide so listeners can begin taking massive action immediately. Download the Hotel Action Guide here So here's how it all came about. If you've listened to any of my previous podcasts, you know that I like to ask my guests for tips on improving hotel performance, whether that be ADR, RevPAR, Occupancy, or overall profitability. I wanted to do a show on profitability, so I transcribed each of the episodes and used relevant content from each of my guests' responses as the framework for the action guide. I then shared the outline with John and Kathleen Hogan of Hospitality Educators for their feedback, and we worked together to create an actionable resource for hoteliers. You may recall I featured John Hogan in episode number 5 ... and that is, by far, my most downloaded episode to date. John's been a hotelier and educator for more than 40 years, including senior management roles with Sheraton, Hilton, and Best Western. He's conducted nearly 5,000 classes and workshops over the course of his career, and In 2012, Hospitality Educators was awarded the contract to revamp and deliver the AAHOA Certified Hotel Owners program. Kathleen is the Chief Financial Officer and Co-Founder of Hospitality Educators, she has an MBA in HR and Finance, she's a speaker, and she works closely with a lot of the AAHOA members enrolled in the CHO program, so working with this team is a dream come true. After a lot of hard work, we developed the Hotel Action Guide: 10 Steps for Improving Operational Profits, and I used that as the framework for this episode. Each of the steps outlined in the guide are reinforced by carefully selected soundbites from industry experts to further expand on each of the concepts we talk about. And this is just the beginning.

Ramesh Gokal is a 39-year veteran of the hospitality industry, with a recognized reputation in the areas of entrepreneurship, franchise leadership and mediation expertise. His diverse industry experience includes being an entrepreneur, owning developing and managing a diverse hotel portfolio, working as a brand president for the world's largest hotel franchise company, Cendant, and selling commercial real estate as a licensed real estate broker in the southeast. Mr. Gokal is certified as a mediator and listed on the franchising Panel of Neutrals of the International Institute for Conflict Prevention and Resolution. Most recently he currently served as the Senior Vice President, Lodging & Franchising, for Kapoor and Kapoor Hospitality Consultants, Inc. and provided expertise in corporate and association transformation through strategic planning and supportive governance. Mr. Gokal also owns Plan B Solutions, a company offering mediation services to the lodging and franchising industry. He currently serves as President of PeachState Hospitality, LLC, a rapidly growing hotel management company. Let’s start out with you sharing a little bit about your background so listeners can get to know you. Not many people know this, but I was actually born and grew up in South Africa during the Apartheid era, so those were kind of tough and, at the same time, interesting times. You know, when you're young and when your children, you’re kinda impervious to what's around you; You just make the best of what you've got. So, it was interesting times though, and what that created for me was, I had to leave South Africa to get higher education. So, I actually ended up in England where I did my senior high school and also went to college and I graduated as a mechanical engineer of all things. I had a lifelong interest to be in the medical field, so after I left the mechanical engineering, I entered a Masters course in biomedical engineering. Those were very early days for biomedical engineering; only to colleges in England offered that course. In any case, sadly, I had to leave that course about three quarters of the way because my dad was not doing well and I had to go back to South Africa. Having got my education, again the Apartheid era, it took me about nine months to find a job in South Africa as an engineer, albeit that there was a shortage of engineers in South Africa. But, I did enter the engineering field and, long story short, along the way I got married, started my own business in a tourism field and tried to establish a tour company for our nonwhites in South Africa. Unfortunately, I could not get licenses because I was not prepared to bribe the people that needed to be bribed. I've always felt that if you go down the wrong crossroads, it is very difficult, if not impossible, to come back to the straight road. So, I stayed away from that, and I decided I needed to move out of South Africa because that's not where my future was. And, coincidentally, my brother asked me if I would come with him to America because he had little money saved up and he wanted to leave it here in case we had to flee from South Africa. So, I came here on the paid leave for my work, basically on my vacation, and never left the country. My brother and I visited with a friend in California who said, “You know, you folks from overseas come here, you bring your money, put in the bank, and you go away and you never come back. Nobody in America leaves money in the bank that way. You invest it.” ‘Course, you know, being visitors, my brother and I said, “Well, yeah, we’ll think about that. That’s good advice, and we’ll come back.” And he said, “No, no, no. All of you say you come back, and you never come back. If you’re serious, you stay.” So, my brother looked at me and said, “You have a job. I have a business to run. Guess what,

Gillian Morris is the co-founder and CEO of TripCommon and Hitlist, building technology to bring online travel search and booking into the 21st century. TripCommon was born out of cofounders Gillian and Timo de Winter's years of struggling with outdated, buggy travel search and booking tools. The company's first product, Hitlist, helps users travel more by leveraging data in their social graph to present them with relevant destinations and deals. The app's intelligent filters help users to find trips that suit their time, destination preferences and budget. With over 350,000 users in 83 countries (as of 8/18/2015), Hitlist is disrupting the status quo for the travel industry. In July, Craig of Craigslist named TripCommon and Hitlist two of the 4 Women-led Startups Disrupting Travel. Before entering the start-up world, Gillian worked as a consultant, journalist, and educator in Turkey, China, the Gulf states, and Syria. She is currently based in New York and Boston, where she leads a series of Travel Tech Talks. She earned her BA from Harvard and was the first entrepreneur in residence at TechStars Boston. Gillian's work in emerging markets has made her a passionate advocate for entrepreneurship and private sector investment in the developing world. She is a proud mentor with the School of Leadership Afghanistan. Background I come from a very non-technical background. My jobs post college, I was a journalist, I briefly worked for CNN, freelanced a bit, and then I worked in business intelligence throughout the Middle East, so I was a market analyst. I worked a fair amount on the airlines - the Middle East is the fastest-growing airline market in the world. And so, Qatar Airways, Etihad, Emirates. I was doing some projects on where airports should be built, where terminals should be built, and what the capacity was, so that’s where I really started to learn about the distribution side of the travel industry and the tech behind it, and I was just totally shocked to find how unbelievably outdated it was. I mean, most of the stuff was built in the 70s and it's just kind of been patched on ever since. It’s total like Frankenstein, if you get down into the code of it. And then like on a bit more of a sort of personal note, I also have always loved to travel. I kind of took off when I was 18 with some money that I saved up from my childhood business of selling parakeets to pet stores, which was totally bizarre, and I took off for Paris and I lived there for a while and it was a really transformative experience. I believe so fully in the power of travel to change - you know, you as an individual, and also to impact communities positively. So, there is a social mission behind wanting to build Hit List and that's to essentially make travel more affordable and accessible, make people want to spend their money on travel versus all the other things they could do with their time and money. My wife and I did that with the kids. You know, we traveled to Europe, and we thought it would be a better thing to invest in experiences and memories over things. You know, the gadget you buy this year, you forget about next year, but that trip to Europe that you took a couple years ago, you might remember for a lifetime. Absolutely. I think there's a lot of actual scientific research behind this that says exactly that – the value of an experience tends to grow over time, and the value of an object fades. So, I think it's a great way to spend at time, and it’s very educational as well. Lucky kids. So let's talk about Hit List. I did some research.

Les brings 30+ years of experience as a Fortune 200 IT executive, an entrepreneur, and a creator of several of the travel and entertainment industries’ most game-changing technologies. He’s been lauded by top executives at many of the world’s most respected technology companies including HP, Microsoft, Google, Dell, and Cisco as the best CIO they have ever seen and he’s earned the distinction of a top 50 CIO by CIO Magazine. After earning his MBA in Internet, Information Technology Strategy from Emory University's Goizueta Business School, Les joined Holiday Inn Worldwide as their Director of Emerging Technologies where he planned, developed and implemented the hotel industry’s first web-based, Internet travel reservation system for the company in 1994. Les then joined Carlson Wagonlit Travel in 1996 as their Chief Technology Officer where he built the industry’s first Internet-based system for the travel industry. In 1999, Les Co-Founded AgentWare where he designed and developed the first and most comprehensive Meta-Search Engine for the travel industry, and he then licensed it to Kayak. Over the next 10 years, Les founded and grew two more tech companies - INTENT MediaWorks, a file-sharing content Management & Distribution platform in the entertainment industry, and PLAT4M, where he built highly scalable SaaS applications for the Web 2.0, Media and Travel Industries. Most recently, in 2013, Les returned to the corporate world as Global CIO & Chief Innovation Officer for the Las Vegas Sands. I just interviewed Mike Leven, and during our conversation, he specifically named you as the person with the vision and the skills to build the industry’s first web-based, Internet travel reservation system for Holiday Inn Worldwide. After hearing an industry icon like Mike Leven talk so highly of you, I just had to have you on the show. The context for what Mike was referring to was is going back before the Internet existed and thinking forward as to what is going to be the best approach for a business that is online. And specifically, a hospitality business – a hotel company who is trying to achieve greater scale - that is more reservations, more customers, etc., but maintain cost, and then position themselves in a way that leaves them strategically ahead of their competitors. And so the thinking that went back into the idea for going online before anybody else did and putting the first travel reservation system, much less hospitality reservation system online, was just that. What kind of advantage can be gained, how much more money could be made, and what cost could be saved. I got online in 1996 and, as I understand it, you had launched this for Holiday Inn back in 1994? Yes, so this was 1994. This is literally the first days of the Internet, and actually, the thinking was prior to the commercial opportunity of the Internet. So, when we did this, or when I guess I did this, there was one other person in the company who understood what the Internet was. We actually had to approach what was Netscape at that time, and I approached Marc Andreessen and became the fourth customer of Netscape and Marc Andreessen and actually became friends with him, flew him out to Atlanta, where we were headquartered with Holiday Inn, and he physically sat there with me and we installed the server software that became the basis of the first reservation platform that would attach itself to the Internet. So, when you say 1996, that’s when I think most people got involved with the Internet in some form or fashion as a consumer. But, as a business, we approached in June of 1994 and went online later that year, approximately October. But, it was very early days, it was considered to be something that,

Harris Rosen is president and COO of Rosen Hotels & Resorts and is Florida’s largest independent hotelier. Founded in 1974, Rosen Hotels & Resorts currently features a collection of seven Central Florida hotels offering a total of more than 6,300 guest rooms, approximately six percent of the Central Florida inventory. Rosen Hotels has several subsidiaries that work with the parent company to create a synergy that maximizes operational efficiencies. Founded in 1997 as an internal solution for Rosen Hotels & Resorts, Millennium Technology Group in Orlando is a leading provider of quality IT products and telecommunications services for the hospitality industry. Founded in 1995, Provinsure is Rosen’s insurance agency and risk management consulting company and assists companies in setting up self-insured healthcare programs and primary care medical centers similar to Rosen Hotels’ in-house programs. Rosen Hotels & Resorts has been nationally recognized for its innovative, trend-setting associate wellness and preventative care programs as well as the company’s low-cost insurance and on-site, full-service medical clinic. Early Career Born and raised on New York City’s lower eastside, Rosen received a bachelor’s of science degree in 1961 from the School of Hotel Administration at Cornell University. He served for three years in the United States Army as an officer in Germany and South Korea, and then completed the Advanced Management course at the University of Virginia’s Graduate School of Business on a Hilton Corp. Scholarship. Rosen began his career at the Waldorf Astoria in New York City as a convention salesman. He continued with the Hilton Hotel Corporation occupying various management positions in some of the larger Hilton hotels. He worked as the Director of Food and Beverage Operations at the Pittsburgh Hilton; the Assistant General Manager at the Buffalo Statler/Hilton; the Assistant General Manager at the Dallas Hilton; the Assistant General Manager at the New Yorker Hotel and the General Manager of the Cape Kennedy Hilton. Rosen then joined the Post Company of Dallas as Director of Hotel Operations and while there was involved in the development and management of one of the finest resort properties in Acapulco. He left the Post Company after several years to join the Disney Company in California as Director of Hotel Planning. He was intimately involved in the design and development of the Contemporary Resort Hotel and the Polynesian Village Hotel both of which opened at Walt Disney World in Orlando in October of 1971. You mentioned that you attended Cornell right out of high school. Had you worked at a hotel in high school? What drew you to the hotel industry? That’s really interesting. My dad worked at the Waldorf Astoria [in Manhattan, New York] – We, I must confess, referred to it as the Waldorf Hysteria – and dad was a sign painter. And so, there are all kinds of signs required, and he was a busy guy. He worked out the risk management department, I guess they called it the safety department. So if they needed a sign called “caution wet” or “slippery when wet” or “please bend your knees” or whatever it was, dad was the guy that did the poster. He didn’t do very well financially doing posters, so he had an idea one day and he shared it with me. He said, ‘Harris, I’m going to try to expand what I do and earn a little bit of extra money. I do have nice handwriting, and I’m going to share with the banquet department the fact that I would be happy to do the little place cards at fancy banquets and charge maybe $1 for each little card, and I will handwrite the cards,

Michael Allen Leven, also known as Mike, has served the hospitality industry for more than 50 years. Throughout his career, Mike has garnered nearly every award and recognition one can receive in the hotel industry, and he’s recognized by many as an industry icon and an innovative pioneer. In 2014, AH&LA presented Leven with a lifetime achievement award at the annual Americas Lodging Investment Conference. Mike grew up in a modest 3-family home in Boston, and attended a tough, inner-city high school. He went on to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree in political science from Tufts University, and a Master of Science degree in public relations and communications from Boston University. In 1961, Mike landed his first position in the industry as the sales promotion manager of the Roosevelt Hotel in New York City, where he earned $495 per month, free lunch, and the promise of a $40 per month retirement pension after 40 years of service. After the Roosevelt, Mike moved into the operations side of hotel management with the Dunphy Company. After 23 years in various marketing and operations positions, Mike landed his first presidency with Americana Hotels & Realty in 1984, a position that didn’t last that long because the company sold out the assets shortly after he arrived. In 1985, Mike was recruited to serve as President of Days Inn Corporation, his first long term presidency, and he led the company through a reorganization resulting in significant growth from a regional chain to one of the largest brands in the world. From 1990 to 1995, Mike served as President and Chief Operating Officer of Holiday Inns Worldwide, and oversaw the launch and significant growth of the new Holiday Inn Express brand. In 1995, Mike founded U.S. Franchise Systems Inc. (USFS), which franchises the Microtel, Hawthorn and Best Inns & Suites hotel brands, and served as its Chief Executive Officer and President from October 1995 to December 2006. Mike then served as Vice Chairman of the Marcus Foundation, Inc. from January 2006 to September 2008, and Chief Executive Officer of the Georgia Aquarium, Inc. from September 2008 to 2009. From there, Mike moved on to serve as the President and Chief Operating Officer of Las Vegas Sands, leading their expansion into the Asia market, where it is a dominant player in China. One of Mike’s prouder career accomplishments was providing Days Inn funds and resources to co-found the Asian American Hotel Owners Association (AAHOA) in 1989. In 2010, he created the Michael and Andrea Leven Family Foundation, which concentrates on three areas: free enterprise, the Jewish community, and oil independence. What do you think makes an effective leader? I think the most import part is the need to feel responsible, and also the need to respect the fact that, when you’re leading, you cannot be successful unless you help other people to be successful. And I think, if you want to lead, you have to lead by example, but you must overall have the sense inside that you can’t be successful by yourself. That the people around you are the ones that actually create the success for you, so you better help them. In any management or leadership job,

Ashwin "Ash" Patel entered the lodging industry in 1992 as a resident-manager and partner of a 54-unit Econo Lodge in Flagstaff, AZ. In 2004, he started Southwest Hospitality Management, LLC, with ownership interest in hotels that have affiliations with a variety of national chains, including Marriott, La Quinta Hotels, Choice Hotels, Wyndham Worldwide Hotels, Hilton Hotels, InterContinental Hotels, and Best Western International. Headquartered in Mesa, AZ, Southwest Hospitality Management provides both third-party and distressed-hotel management services, as well as investment opportunities through syndication. Ash served as the President of the Flagstaff Innkeepers Association from December 1999 to June 2003. In 2003, he also became a member of the Franchise Advisory Committee for Days Inns of America, which represents 2,000 hotels and franchisees within the brand. Ash has also served in various leadership roles within the Asian American Hotel Owners Association (AAHOA). Beginning in 2003, he was elected as the Southwest Regional Director. In 2005, he was elected as an Officer and began a four-year succession to Chairman of the Board, beginning with Treasurer in 2005, Secretary in 2006, Vice Chairman in 2007, and Chairman in 2008/09. He also served as Chairman of the Government Affairs Committee and Chairman of the AAHOA PAC. You're big on service and membership. Why this level of involvement/commitment? What do you get out of it? In the beginning when you’re young, your personal goals are very important and most of your time is given to those personal goals. As you get older and wiser, and you start appreciating mortality and how fragile life is, I think one tends to find a purpose that gives them great personal gratification and also at the end, finding internal peace. And I think in my particular case, every time I got involved and I saw the difference that I would make in my fellow hospitality members or my fellow community members, it gives me an exhilarating feeling. And the more I did it, the more inner peace I achieved, and the more I do it, it still makes me feel better. I think that everybody has a different sense in how they get personal gratification. In my case, I think that participating has always made me feel better. One of the prouder moments of mine was to start the AAHOA PAC and also the Government Affairs Committee. If you look at today’s involvement that AAHOA has in Government affairs, we’ve reached a very, very pivotal point in our participation in politics. The one thing I noticed [about AAHOA] is we were great at providing value and providing education and those kinds of things, but the thing that we lacked the most, and the thing does affect us the most is Government. Government at every instant wants to be in your pocket. If you’re not participatory, Government regulation will always affect you negatively. And so when I joined AAHOA, that was my vision - that we needed greater participation at both grass roots and Federal politics. What do you think makes an effective leader? An effective leader is able to guide a group of people to work together to achieve a common goal as efficiently and cohesively as possible. People will follow and appreciate a leader and a leadership if they also believe the goals. And so I think an effective leader is able to encourage people to achieve these common goals, whether it be in personal life, or whether it be in a business life, or whether it be in an association’s life. You know, I just feel that, if you’re able to guide people, and if people believe in you and follow you, you have effective leadership. Do you think that leaders are born or made? I think half and half. The made part is from life experiences. As a leader goes through life with failures and successes and observations, you gain the knowledge to lead.

Rick Tomljenovic has been in the hospitality industry for more than 35 years. He’s an owner and Chief Operating Officer of Tristar Hotel Management, a midsize company managing between 15-25 properties on average per year, including 5 properties that they own. Rick is also Chief Operating Officer for HMBookstore.com - a cutting edge online hospitality and tourism training company with more than 70 eBooks published. HMBookstore’s eBooks have been adopted by professors at top U.S. hospitality universities, and over 13,000 eBooks have been sold to university students since 2012. After high school, Rick attended Forrest Park College and earned a hospitality degree. He worked for several midscale and largescale management companies, and spent a lot of time working for Holiday Inn managing several of their properties in the Chicago/Midwest region. Early on, Rick had the pleasure of working with the Holiday Inn training program and he was enamored by the experience. Those early examples of great training programs and materials planted the seed of what would later evolve into HMBookstore.com. The Why As a growing hotel management company, Tristar wanted better training materials for their employees, so they began creating their own in 1998. Back then, the materials were CD Rom-based, and they distributed the materials to their employees for training and testing. As the materials and technology evolved, they began to put their content into a Learning Management System (LMS) to improve the overall training process. They found that most of the brands offered training at the management level, and some line-level training, but it was more specific to the brand and less specific to the job. They set out to develop line-level training for employees that was consistent and hit the mark as far as customer service and guest satisfaction. The What More than 70 eBooks are available for purchase on HMBookstore.com and through several universities. The materials can be purchased as individual eBooks, in bundles, or via hotel subscription. Their main markets are: 1) Universities – over 13,000 eBooks have been sold to university students at institutions such as Northern Arizona University, University of Nevada Las Vegas, and Buffalo State. They primarily use them to augment their internship programs. 2) Hotel subscription model – Rather than paying a traditional “per seat” license, hotels can pay a subscription fee for full access and, as new employees are on-boarded, the hotel administrator can easily set up new access for that employee at no additional charge. 3) Online – All of the 70+ eBooks can be purchased individually or in select bundles via the HMBookstore.com website. Each of the books are broken down into modules (chapters), so the employee/student can complete them at their own pace. At the end of each module, employees are given a quiz to measure their proficiency. When the eBook is complete and the student passes, Hospitality Management Online (HMBookstore) issues a certificate of competition. HMBookstore.com is also test piloting an employee suggestion program, iInnovator, that provides a real-time process for employees to become more engaged and provide valuable feedback and suggestions to management. Employees are encouraged to give ideas that will either enhance guest experience or that can help generate revenue for a hotel. “You’d be amazed at what the line level employees are telling us th...

Mayur Dalal has been providing financial advisory products and services for more than 27 years. The CEO of Dalal Capital Advisors, Mayur and his team provide top-quality wealth management, insurance, and tax-advantaged strategies that are designed to help clients realize their financial goals. Mayur is also CEO of The Oxford Group of Lake Success - an intellectual capital company focusing on developing customized solutions for professionals and closely held family businesses. Their services include family wealth coaching, family governance, and business succession planning for high net worth families. Mayur is an expert in values-based life planning, and his goal is to empower, educate and enlighten his clients, by integrating emotional freedom with financial freedom. Mayur grew up in a large family with an abundance of love but a scarcity of facilities and resources. These humble beginnings gave him a phenomenal insight into how to coexist with limited resources and make the most of it. Mayur was a fast learner and his father constantly challenged him to break barriers, including skipping grades in school. By the young age of 28, Mayur became the head of Best Foods in India. Mayur is big on mentoring, and he credits his grandfather (his first mentor) for instilling core values in him at a young age, including his grandfather’s mantra – “Unless and until you do a gentle act of kindness every day, you do not deserve to sleep.” Mayur believes the way in which you lead your life, the way in which you make an impact, and the way in which you coexist with colleagues, peers, friends and community, is something that you have to learn it when you’re young. You can’t learn it when you’re too old because it becomes too difficult for someone to make a mindset change. In 1988, Mayur made the tough decision to leave the successful career he had achieved in India and moved to the United States in hopes of even greater opportunities. He found a company, Equitable, that was willing to sponsor his H1-B Visa, so he committed to going “all in” for 90 days to see if he could be successful in this new career venture. Through family connections, he coordinated and conducted a focus group with 22 medical professionals and learned that they were over prospected and least served. Mayur made 35 cold calls, secured 15 appointments, and the rest is history. Today, Mayur has 75 clients with an average net worth of $25 Million; his highest net worth client is a billionaire. Mentorship I have had 16 mentors in the last 27 years and I am eternally grateful to every one of them for making me who I have become. Every one of them have added fantastic value - making me emotionally free, spiritually free, and financially free. I enjoy my life every single moment, 24/7. Emotional Freedom through Empowerment Emotional freedom is a choice and emotional freedom is a wonderful gift that not only you can benefit from but you can share with others. Mayur teaches his clients to empower their family to stay together, empower their family to work to together, and empower their family to contribute together for the well being of the family, not the well being just for themselves. Advice for hoteliers Do a financial stress test.  If you’re not clear about the impact that illiquidity can create in your life, you will continue to repeat the same "best practices" you feel you have created. Ask yourself, if your RevPAR decreased by 30%, and your occupancy decreased by 20%, how long will you be able to sustain based on your current model?  Most hotels have a break-even point of 30-40% of occupancy. What's your break-even point?  How long will you sustain yourself if you’re just breaking even? If you have multiple properties, find out which property is most profitable for you. If you were to sell that property today and create an emergency fund,

Roger Bloss has more than 40 years of experience in the hospitality industry, starting in the business as a teenager. After serving in executive positions with several major hotel franchise companies, Bloss and his partners started the Vantage Hospitality Group in 1996 and acquired their first hotel. Bloss' vision was to develop a national hotel chain based on an innovative membership model. His group was confident that this approach would reinvent the hospitality industry and change the way franchises were operated, and it did. The group continued to build the company's infrastructure, resources, and programs, before launching Americas Best Value Inn as a national hotel chain in 1999, earning many industry accolades over the past decade. Bloss took that vision and created Vantage's innovative Freestyle® Brand Affiliation Model, offering hoteliers A Voice and A Vote℠ in the brand's direction (including setting the fees members pay to the brand); low, flat fees; and flexible contracts. Unheard of in the industry, the successful model earned Bloss Lodging Magazine's "Innovator of the Year" award in 2006 and 2010. Today, Vantage Hospitality is the 8th largest hotel company with nearly 1300 properties worldwide.  Vantage is the only hotel company to be ranked among the Inc. 5000 List of America’s Fastest-Growing Private Companies for eight consecutive years. The beginning Roger landed his first job in the hotel industry at the young age of 13 washing dishes at a Holiday Inn in South Beach, Fla. By the age of 17, Roger's "can do" attitude earned him the opportunity to become a GM for that same property. Roger continued in the industry and worked his way up through the ranks to several executive positions within major hotel franchise companies. In 1996 while on a trip to India organized by the Asian American Hotel Owners Association (AAHOA), Roger listened carefully to successful hoteliers share their likes and dislikes about hotel franchise agreements. After the trip, he drew a line down a piece of paper noting what people disliked on the right, and what they liked on the left. Roger believed that, if he could do away with the things that hoteliers disliked, and deliver what they liked better than anyone else, with a better attitude, and at a lesser cost, he might have a shot at building a great company. The leap Shortly after that life-changing trip to India in 1996, Roger made the courageous decision NOT to renew his contract with HFS (now Wyndham) as President of Knights Inn. His wife was 9 months pregnant at the time, and less than 3 weeks before his daughter was born, Roger found a creative way to lease a property in California. Within a couple days, he had an opportunity to lease yet another property, and combined, those two properties became the beginnings of what Vantage Hospitality is today. Roger is a fearless leader that truly personifies the entrepreneurial spirit. He's not a second generation hotelier, he doesn't have a hospitality degree or an MBA - he's an "all in" business man that finds creative ways to make things happen. "Entrepreneurs are doers, not dreamers" said Roger, and his story is a clear indication that he walks the talk. The vision Going back to that piece of paper he drafted where he outlined the likes and dislikes of franchise agreements, Roger built a brand around a couple simple, yet innovative concepts. The ROI Promise - "Don't pay me unless I send you business.  If I don't send you more business than you pay me in fees, don't pay me." The Freestyle® Brand Affiliation Model, offering hoteliers A Voice and A Vote in the brand's direction - Roger believes that people respond better if you educate and motivate, rather than mandate, so he set out to create a company that educates his members on how to make more money, rather than dictate how they should do business.

Tom Magnuson is Co-Founder and CEO of Magnuson Hotels Worldwide - a top 10 global chain, and the world’s largest independent hotel group. Magnuson markets over 1000 hotels across six countries and three continents, and they're the number one conversion brand in the market, with over 400 Best Westerns, 250 Wyndhams and 200 Choice franchises that have made the switch. Tom began to learn the hotel business at the age of 8 after his father inherited a 44-room Stardust Motel in small mining town Wallace, ID. Tom helped with the family business doing everything from making beds and cleaning toilets to cutting keys. However, this second generation hotelier did not intend to follow in his father’s footsteps, rather his dream was to become a world famous drummer. After nearly 20 years of success pursuing his dream in Boston and Los Angeles, his father asked him if he’d be willing to return to Idaho to help sort out the family businesses so he could retire. By that point, the family’s portfolio had grown from the 44-Room Stardust Motel they began with, to include a 9-room Bed & Breakfast, a 63-room Best Western, and a 160-room University Inn Best Western in Moscow, ID. Over the next several years, Tom continued to hone his skills in operations and served on the Board of Directors for Best Western. This experience allowed him to learn how the back of the house worked from the corporate perspective, including GDS, reservation services, brand support, and brand management. In November of 2000, Tom attended the Best Western International Convention and listened to countless hoteliers share their grievances during an Open Forum session with the leadership and Board.  After hearing the commonalities in their complaints, and the dismissive, canned responses from the leadership, Tom remembers a poignant thought he had ... "Someday some company's going to come along and give these people a serious alternative, and if they do, it's going to be a major shift. I didn't know at that time that it might be us.  It was only 3 years later that we came up with this company." In 2003, Tom co-founded Magnuson Hotels with his wife, Melissa. Back then, Magnuson was run on two iMac computers out of their 5-year old son’s bedroom in Spokane, WA. Tom struck a deal with UNiREZ, a GDS company in Texas, to provide smaller properties like his family-owned Stardust Motel access to the same GDS (Global Distribution System), travel agents, and online distribution channels that the big franchise companies offered their licensees. The modest company started with only 12 hotel clients in the Northwest. “It was like hitting a live wire,” said Tom, and by December of 2003, Magnuson’s customer base had grown to 100 properties using their service. Their philosophy was simple - do what you say you’re going to do. Tom’s approach to prospective hoteliers wasn’t about the technology (e.g., the features of his service), rather he simply focused on the benefit his service would provide - helping the hotels raise their occupancy percentage by selling unsold rooms. He kept it simple, which allowed less technically savvy hoteliers to understand how his services could help them be more profitable. In 2006, Magnuson Hotels introduced three hotel brands to serve three tiers in the market, including: MAGNUSON GRAND HOTELS - upper midscale hotels & resorts MAGNUSON HOTELS - midscale hotels & resorts M STAR HOTELS - upper economy hotels & resorts Tom says the Magnuson model has changed significantly today, but at that time (in 2006), the introduction of the brands was really about listening to our customers. Magnuson Hotels Worldwide is the #1 Hotel Company of Inc. 5000 List of America’s Fastest-Growing Private Companies. Magnuson attributes its simple standards, low fees and owner freedom, to being the number one conversion brand in the market - with over 400 Best Westerns,

Dinesh "Dan" Rama is Co-Founder, Partner/Designated Broker of NewGen Worldwide - a real estate investment advisory company that works with owners and investors in all aspects of the hospitality business. The firm provides services for the sale and acquisition of lodging properties, consulting, hotel asset management, and hotel litigation support. NewGen also owns and operates several hotels in the Southwest with affiliations with Hilton, InterContinental Hotels, Accor, and Choice Hotels. Dan is a second generation hotelier and learned all aspects of the business by helping his family, from cleaning toilets to operations. After college, Dan was the director of operations for a number of hotels for a small private equity firm in memphis. The first property he bought was a 24 room independent in Arizona, and he continued to grow his hotel portfolio and expanded into restaurants - he had a master license agreement with Red Brick Pizza and grew that segment to 13 stores at its peek. Dan continued his journey in the business and obtained his real estate license in 2000 while working with Bob Apostle and Robert Fitzgerald for their firm, Apostle Fitzgerald. Bob and Robert were former senior brand executives that had helped to shape the Travelodge and Ramada brands respectively in the 80's, and that experience was invaluable to Dan's continued growth. In 2007, Dan Co-Founded NewGen Commercial Realty, and in 2008, he Co-Founded NewGen Worldwide. Membership and Service Dan has served as an AAHOA Regional Ambassador for the Southwest region for many years, and in 2011, he was elected to the AAHOA Board of Directors as Southwest Regional Director, a role that he held for 4 years. He is also an active member of the Scottsdale Area Association of Realtors, Arizona Lodging and Tourism Association, IHG Owners Association and Arizona Board of Realtors. Dan believes that, if you are succeeding, you have to help other people to succeed also. Dan says that part of his business is hospitality, that hospitality includes helping people - and one way to help others is to teach them about the hospitality. He attributes his involvement with AAHOA and other industry associations to being an integral part of his growth as a hotelier. Business Partnerships Choose partners that have the same mindset and goals as you. Make sure you are aligned. Set the expectations up front and put it in writing! What makes an effective leader? You must get "buy in" from others. Once you have their buy in, if you truly believe in your goals, your team will believe they are attainable. Don't lead by the whip - Lead by example.  To create buy in, you have to create a sense of purpose and inspire a shared vision. You also have to challenge the process - just because that's the way it's being done, doesn't mean that's the right way to do it. You have to enable other to do their jobs.  As Ronald Reagan said, "Trust but verify." Make it safe for others to speak up. Are leaders are born or made? Dan believes leaders are made through experience. About NewGen Worldwide NewGen has four arms, including: Capital division which has offices in Phoenix, AZ and China Advisory division which sells hotels and also brings in foreign investors to build large, complex developments with American partners Holdings division which is primarily hotels, but also includes shares in tech companies Development division to develop hotels. NewGen is also developing a process to build hotels quicker using a modular concept. Their first hotel built in a factory using a prefab concept is a Motel 6. This innovative concept will create scaleability and reduce development time and cost. Their first property using this concept reduced the build time from the industry average of 9 months down to 5 months. Raising capital through the EB-5 program The USCIS Immigrant Investor Program, also known as “EB-5,” was created by Congress in 1990 to stimulate the U.S.