I should probably start off my first blog post by saying I am new to this....I am not always the best with my words....and my grammar is often a mess! :) But I promise you that it will be entertaining....lets be real I am in the hospitality business....and lets be honest this is a great way for my Mom to keep tabs on me (LOVE YOU MOM!!) Also as I begin this journey not knowing where I am going....it will be fun to show you all what locations I get assigned too!
So the journey of interview for this job started 3 months ago....Marriott called me and so it began. I honestly from the beginning never thought it would ever happen...why would they want a newbie to Marriott (I've only been with Marriott brand for 18 months) and seriously this is a job you work 20 years to get coming up through the GM ranks with no ties to Marriott Corporate...I just happened to be in the right place at the right time.
Now here I sit...T minus 10 days from putting my keys in my GM box one last time....24 hours post telling my staff whom surprisingly took it pretty well...there were tears, frustration and then congratulations as they know this is what I have worked toward for 10+ years. As I sit here I reflect on 10 years of being a General Manager, 6 companies and 14 cities later, I feel like I can honestly say that this is the happiest and most nervous I have ever been to start a new job. From Birmingham AL, my first GM job...it was full of firsts, lots of mistakes, a crew that became my family in my first city away from friends/family and a company that provided me a list of people I still refer to as my lifetime friends. There were a lot of hotels in between and then I landed in Tampa....the MOST fun hotel I have had in my entire career...how could it not when you get to look out your office window to see palm trees and eat lunch on the dock by the ocean. At this hotel we broke all the rules, its how we survived that craziness...than and multiple happy hours a week at the neighboring Bahama Breeze! Tampa taught me a lot about who I was and what I wanted to be, it gave me another crew that laughed together, drank together and truly just enjoyed working together no matter the long hours because we always made it fun and no one could ever replace Cruise Port Sundays with Desiree at the helm and Becky and I driving the vans like crazy people trying to get everyone back and forth in one piece.
Fast forward to Leavenworth KS, where not only did I get the chance to run the hotel on post, but then got a call to open the brand new Fairfield Inn and Suites right outside the gates. The Fairfield brought me a new set of challenges, opening a hotel from the ground up, do you realize these things don't come with anything?!?!?! You have to order everything, 2 days before we opened I realized we didn't have pens!!!! What an incredible opening and first year we had, opening two weeks early, winning a Marriott Spirit to Serve Award for our outstanding above and beyond service, continuously in the top 10 for service out of 760+ Fairfield's across the country, and the list could go on and on. However nothing made me more proud than when I got the call to let me know that our hotel had won the Marriott Opening Hotel of the Year Award, an award that I talked about as folks interviewed with us, as they did their final paperwork and a pledge to win it that they all took on day one of employment with us. I sat in my office and cried...thinking we had arrived....we came we saw we conquered.
Then I got the call that I had been offered a Manager of Training Operations job with Marriott International, to travel 100% of the time to wherever they needed, training and opening hotels, pumping other teams up and encouraging them to dream big and win awards. Reality set in....I have accomplished so much in my GM career with the help of some amazing teams. However this is my last hotel team....the last group of people that will look to me for a pat on the back, for "the look" when they know they did something wrong or a shoulder to cry on when the new baby won't sleep through the night. The last team that I will have the pleasure of leading, the pleasure of calling together for no other purpose to tell them how awesome they are, that we won and how lucky I am to get to work with them and the pleasure of calling mine when people talk about how awesome that new Fairfield crew is doing!
As I pack up my office it is going to be a rough time, as I put those things that I have collected in 10 years into a box...my Romanian flag I stole from Stefana's desk, the picture of my Tampa crew with the miniature horse from the petting zoo we had at the hotel for Rick's sheriff themed birthday party, my awesome painting that Kelsey did for me to show my travels and so many other amazing things I have collected over the years. Its also a trip down memory lane that I have been so blessed and so lucky in 32 years of life to live in some amazing places, loved the people I have worked with and had very few days where I haven't been excited to get up and go to work.
So as the countdown continues...stay tuned for travel updates and stories from the road as I start traveling Jan 5th!
