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Hotel ManagementEmployee Experience (EX)Talent Management

On Talent...

Albert BarraMay 5, 2026 · 2 min read
THE IDEA

Discover why talent matters in your hotel and how to retain it. Learn to identify and develop high-potential employees through training programmes and greater autonomy.

On Talent...
Talent is quite a word. We all know what it is, yet no one is able to define it. Wikipedia says that it is “the potential a person may have to develop a set of skills/competencies”. That is, potential—the capacity for improvement—which, if our employees possess it, has a direct impact on our hotel. Periods of stagnation are bad times for talent, because they tend to downplay it in favour of a kind of pagan god: short-term profitability. When profits fall, the scissors go straight to costs, and these usually affect HR above all else. Yet we become so concerned with pruning that we fail to realise we have cut the roses—that we are destroying talent. We focus solely on costs, so the restructuring undertaken undermines the company’s capabilities and value, although it does improve short-term results. Before taking any action in this respect, the essential thing is to recognise the talent within our organisation and not destroy it. We make quantitative rather than qualitative cuts. We cut ruthlessly and take everyone down with us, whether they add value to the company or not. When stagnation passes—which it eventually does—we find ourselves in such a poor position that the talent we failed to retain now commands a high price in the market, and either we win it back or it will be impossible for us to get back on our feet. Talent exists in our company, in our hotel; we simply need to identify it. And for that, there is nothing better than a good training programme and sufficient freedom for talent to reveal itself. Let our employees make mistakes, let them be able to recognise their errors and learn from them. Talent will emerge if we grant enough freedom.
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