Interview with Gabriel Morell, COO of Senator Hotels & Resorts

Digitalization with EISI HOTEL has allowed us to unify dispersed actions into a single platform, improving real-time access and eliminating processes that do not add value. It has been particularly transformative for our Housekeeping team, saving almost 2 hours daily.

We took advantage of the Fitur fair to explore the challenges, achievements, and perspectives that outline the direction of the hotel industry in the complex post-COVID recovery scenario. 

Joining us this time is Gabriel Morell Luján-Williams, currently the COO of Senator Hotels & Resorts, who stands out for his more than two decades in hotel leadership. His expertise ranges from operational management and revenue management strategies to improving the customer experience. His journey through prominent hotel chains has given him a broad perspective of the sector, focusing on customer satisfaction and value creation to achieve solid corporate goals. His commitment to excellence and ability to foster growth and efficiency highlight his contribution to the hospitality industry.

In this interview, Gabriel Morell shares his strategic vision and Senator Hotels & Resorts' commitment to innovation and service excellence in a context of transformation and recovery in the tourism sector. He reflects on what 2023 has meant in terms of consolidation and adaptation efforts that characterized Senator Hotels & Resorts and the key points that will mark 2024.

Xavier López, CEO & co-founder of EISI SOFT, and Gabriel Morell, COO of Senator Hotels & Resorts

I'd like to start this interview by asking you how 2023 has been? What have been the objectives of Senator Hotels & Resorts in terms of organization or area?

The year 2023 has generally been a year of consolidation for everyone. We come from years where it seems that COVID is far behind, but it has been complex to reach a normal year. The year started with quite a bit of uncertainty due to inflation, which ultimately penalizes consumption a lot. However, I would summarize it as a year of recovery, consolidation, and stabilization of expense accounts, which is what penalizes us the most. Nevertheless, there has been very good performance in terms of reservations and prices, and it has been a year to stabilize. We hope that in 2024 we can pick up cruising speed. 

We also took advantage of 2023 to recover our proposals in the gastronomic area by launching different gastronomic concepts in some of our hotels. 2023 has been a kick-off within a normality that was already needed.

You talk about the consolidation of expenses, and I believe digitalization plays a crucial role in this aspect. Sometimes it happens with preventive maintenance; there are clients who have preventive maintenance to avoid corrective maintenance, and many times we fall into the mistake of thinking that digitalization can be that preventive maintenance without really knowing the impact it can have on our organization.

It has been a year since you started the project with EISI HOTEL, a project to digitize part of the operation within your organization. I would like you to tell us a bit about it. What has been the impact? Has it really been like preventive maintenance, or has it had a special impact on your organization and operation?

For us, the essential thing is to have a series of actions unified under the same platform that we previously carried out in a much more dispersed way, to have the ability to receive information in real time from the different departments. Another important aspect, in line with what you mentioned about corrective and preventive maintenance, is that digitizing eliminates a large part of the process that does not add value, neither to the operation nor to the final customer. With EISI HOTEL, we have now started the Housekeeping pilot, which is working very well in Barajas. The time the housekeeper saves in planning is remarkable. We are talking about saving almost 2 hours, which can be dedicated to control, training, or other tasks that add value to the customer, which is ultimately the goal because we are a service company. 

You mentioned that digitalization is indeed providing time to dedicate to what truly adds value to the customer. In this regard, what do you think are the key operational processes to ensure a good customer experience?

In the end, all the processes we carry out to provide service to customers must be agile. It is a very Lean mentality, and what needs to be done is for the customer to enjoy the experience almost throughout the entire process. Many times, processes are designed from a technical standpoint, resulting in many waiting times for the customer, ultimately worsening the experience. The goal of digitalization is to continuously provide added value to the customer. 

Many people talk about training and professionalization in the sector. What role do you think this aspect plays within your organization?

It is essential; I believe it is the challenge for 2024. Staff must have a purpose; they need to feel part of something, understand what they do to feel comfortable and fulfilled. Therefore, training is fundamental. If a person does not perform their job well, they are not providing proper service, from making a coffee to cleaning a room or attending to a customer in the right language. Training is essential; otherwise, there is no order and no quality. 

From your position, what challenges do we, the tourism sector, have for 2024?

People, without a doubt. In the end, we are in a sector where we ourselves are making very negative advertising, saying it is a very precarious sector, the salaries are low... which is ultimately not true. If we look at other sectors, salaries in hospitality are not bad. It is true that it is a complex sector in terms of work-life balance because we provide services at times and on dates that are often not complementary to personal life. The fundamental thing is for people to have a purpose, feel they can develop a professional career, as only 9% of hospitality staff do it out of vocation. The rest do it as an impasse or as a way to generate income because they can't find another way. The challenge is to regain all the passion that hospitality has always had.