CEBU, Philippines - In this time of great economic upheavals and uncertainty, with the Financial Crisis and the H1N1 Virus scare that has been traumatizing travelers, the Hilton Cebu Resort and Spa remains strong in its belief that the only way to combat this is to continue to provide the best service and experience to guests. This way guests will bring home wonderful memories and would be the best ambassadors for the property.
But keeping your guests happy is only one side of the coin. Hotels and resorts also have to keep their team members happy as well. The challenge to maintain employed team members and maintain the service quality in the property becomes a Herculean task. In these times where word from mega hotels and giant resorts have began firing, retrenching in the guise of streamlining operations or offering early retirement to employees, Hilton Cebu is proud of this fact that no matter what the situation so far, they have not retrenched any regular team member. Hilton Cebu’s Director for Human Resources Joie Eñego shares, “Hilton Cebu will do everything to keep our people. We take care of the team members and we tell them that we will weather these difficult times together.”
So how does Hilton Cebu plan to keep their team together? “We are honest with them; we have frequent communication meeting with them and we tell them that we need everybody’s help to pull through together in difficult times, as a team. We make sales plans and incentive plans where we encourage our team member to help up sell the resort and all its services. We mobilized them by starting our Hilton Up-Selling Bingo and gave them incentives for every up selling success they have. And we have been successful in this internal promotion as we literally empower the team members, that they truly feel a sense of ownership and a sense of accomplishment in helping their place of work,” Ms. Eñego added.
The Hilton Bingo is but one of the many ways the Hilton Cebu boosts the morale and security of it team members. The resort has also started a six month long sports fest with team members from all departments and all levels participating. We have competitive fun game of basketball, volleyball, darts, chess, billiards, and table tennis to name a few. These games help keep team spirit up in these times of crisis as the old adage of “all work and no play make everyone a dull boy or girl”.
The Hilton also offers trainings and career development programs to team members that help them achieve more in their chosen field. The resort also encourages cross training of team members to other departments if the team member is interested to learn other skills within the resort. The Hilton Cebu also supports team members who would want to continue their studies by fixing the work schedule of the team members to allow them the opportunity to further their education.
The Hilton Cebu may not be the biggest of resorts in Cebu but it can be proud of the fact that it has kept its loyal team members happy, optimistic and employed.