Luxury Hospitality Magazine | Gary Rice, new Director of Operations, and Claire Meir, Director of Sales at Cameron House
With over 28 years of experience in the hospitality industry, what key insights and strategies do you plan to implement at Cameron House to enhance its operational efficiency and guest satisfaction?
We really believe in tailored and personalised service. We understand our guest profile and their expectations, then work with a trained team across the board to exceed their expectations. We ensure to increase our team’s effectiveness with skills, training and we cultivate a culture where passion for good Scottish hospitality is key. We want to ensure we operate effectively with working smartly and with a clear vision of our guest experience in all aspects of the resort. For enhancing our guest satisfaction, we want to ensure our whole clan are approaching it through the guest’s own eyes, paying attention to detail to effectively and consistently deliver high standards across the resort. We work as a streamlined and supportive team and are always sharing best practices.
What attracted you to Cameron House on Loch Lomond, and how do you envision contributing to its reputation as one of Scotland’s leading resorts?
The excellent reputation and history of the resort across was a major attraction as well as the great experiences and testimonials that former colleagues have shared as part of their time at Cameron House. A big factor for me was joining so many passionate and engaged colleagues within the existing team.
Can you share some of the operational challenges you’ve encountered in your previous roles and how you’ve successfully overcome them?
The challenge can be attracting people to the industry, so looking for ways to attract new clan members. It’s also important to understand change in workforce to engage more effectively and retain talent too. Support, training and progression is important in order to develop staff’s knowledge and skills through passion but also a consistent and fair approach alongside strong professional leadership and a clear vision and goal. Another example, from a previous role, is changing the culture and ensuring you remain resilient and consistent so the culture change just becomes something you do every day without even needing to discuss it.
Given your extensive background with renowned hospitality brands, what unique perspectives and practices do you plan to bring to the Cameron House team?
I look forward to bringing a strong focus on quality and standards, attention to detail and also reminder of the strong foundations of delivering excellent customer service. With my knowledge, experience and integrity, I believe I will be an asset to the Clan and the role, sharing best practices and introducing innovative new ideas to make us even more effective and efficient.
How do you plan to support and collaborate with the Resort Director, Michael Lavizani, in achieving the hotel’s strategic goals and maintaining high standards?
By developing our overall guest experience and journey, ensuring we provide exceptional service as well as clear direction for the Clan as we continue to grow our success and reputation. A common goal of excellence is something we will all work towards and support the overall Resort Director with.
What are your priorities for the first six months in your new role as Director of Operations at Cameron House?
To drive our quality and standards which will naturally support our continued awareness and reputation building. Supporting and developing our excellent operational team who are one of our greatest assets. Growing our business even further and being hyper-efficient and effective in all aspects of customer and luxury service.
Staff recruitment, training, and retention are critical in the hospitality industry. What specific initiatives do you intend to implement to attract and retain top talent at Cameron House?
We have a lot of great initiatives already in place to nurture talent which includes our Graduate Programme. I want us to develop further partnerships with educational institutions and businesses to grow the reputation of working with us. Developing and coaching our team to be future leaders in our business and my experience of mentoring and identifying rising stars and our top talent is something I look forward to implementing in order to further grow, support and retain our fantastic team.
How do you plan to maintain and improve the high customer service standards for which Cameron House is known?
Live and breathe personal high standards and have clear objectives as a leader to ensure you set the bar at an appropriate level for your team to achieve and exceed. Be consistent in your approach to driving improvements and celebrate and reward excellent feedback across the clan. Another important factor is talking to our guests to identify areas that we can further enhance and improve our guest experience. Always looking for continuous room for improvement and to keep the passion alive for the Clan will translates for all our guests at our resort.
Sustainability is becoming increasingly important in the hospitality sector. How do you plan to incorporate sustainable practices into the operations at Cameron House?
We have excellent initiatives in place and will continue to look for more. We are currently undergoing assessment from Green Tourism Board and we have also grown the level of our recycling with targets to grow further. We have 11 beehives in the resort which supports the pollination of around 1 million plants per day. We are looking at renewable energy and water efficiency. We have increased our availability of EVC (Electrical Vehicle chargers) and the team have planted over 200 trees on the resor this year. As part of an umbrella hire scheme a tree is planted for every umbrella hired and in the first four months over 1,018 trees have already been planted.
With your history of leading teams to win awards, such as the gold medal accreditation at the 2013 Scottish Hotel Awards, what is your approach to motivating and inspiring your team to achieve excellence?
Don’t be afraid to share your knowledge and experience. Encourage the team and celebrate their success but do also be honest and constructive to make them better and thrive in their career. Lead by example but also be present, visible and demonstrate high standards. Push them to be the best that they can be and allow them to flourish. Be passionate about what you are doing and share that with those around you, it can only bring good things.
