15 Years in Hotels

So everyone knows me as more of a reader than a writer. But, today marks the fifteenth year I've been working in hotels and hospitality, and I suppose I feel such an occasion should be marked by something special, like a silver-plated pen or lucite plaque. I'd settle for a cupcake. But instead, I think I will mark it by blogging. Seemingly self-serving? Perhaps. But Facebook isn't?

In what seems to have been an eternity in countless hotels, add an infinity of hotel rooms, I've have learned over the past decade and a half that not much has changed. Today is October 4, 2009, and it has been fifteen years since I was hired as a Reservation Agent at a full-service Marriott hotel while going to school. (If you are wondering, yes, I started in this business when I was 14, and of course I will be turning 29 again this year. For the fourth time. Er, fifth.) Now I am in hotel management, and happily life couldn't have turned out less predictable.

Truly, it’s a unique business and if you find yourself bitten by the hospitality bug, well, you’re hooked for life. I certainly am.

Two years ago, before the popularity of blogs (blog good) and social media websites (questionable, in my book), I wrote about thirteen things things that I’ve come to learn over the course of 13 years working in hotels. Some of you may remember that.

Should I attempt to conjure up fifteen things this time, despite my fear I am neither creative or nor intelligent enough to invent them? Bungling through, I will try. Everyday for the next 15 days, I will share one thing I've learned during all these years in hotels. Call it false, or dogma, or rubbish, these are now tenants that I believe in, based on my experience in hospitality. But, first a disclaimer:  I am not perfect.  And while I believe in these things, sometimes I forget my own advise, so please don't judge too harshly.

Are you ready? Here's numero uno:

1. There's a very good chance you might be right. But then again, I might be too. Sometimes we will be right, and sometimes wrong. It doesn't really matter, and I'm not going to fight with you about it. Here's why. I would like to find a solution, and I don't need to be right 100% of the time. (I will settle for 80%.) You have the same goal. So if I give you the benefit of the doubt, even if I don’t agree with you, and say, ‘Yes, you might be right,’ then with that simple statement maybe we can respect one another enough to be open-minded and find a solution together, even if it turns out to be a compromise. Compromise.... that’s still a win-win situation these days, right? See, you're right already. Wasn't that easy!?

Number two of the fifteen will be posted tomorrow. Feel free to stay tuned. Or not. I won't mind. Afterall, as we say in the biz, checkout is at noon.