An Unorthodox Recruitment Philosophy

We bent the rules at the Shangri-La to ensure a happy and productive environment

Shangri-La International was preparing to open its first hotel in the Philippines in 1992.

Among the first executives on board were the pre-opening general manager, resident manager, financial controller and sales & marketing director.

I was hired next as director for human resources.

When the general manager asked me about my philosophy for the recruitment of our 600 staff— I knew I was working with a leader who was asking the right questions. The important thing is whether his lieutenants answered his questions appropriately.

“If you will allow me Mr. Grocock (he was our British GM), I would like to give the underprivileged the first opportunity to work in our rank & file level. There are many poor Filipinos who were not able to go to school because of their living conditions. And many displaced by the recent eruption of Mount Pinatubo. We can train them in our non-guest contact jobs like the gardeners, laundry operators, stewards, busboys, kitchen helpers and valet parkers. As long as they pass my attitude interview, that is what will matter most to me.”

I was not very sure if Mr. Grocock would be pleased with my recruitment philosophy but fortunately for the underprivileged applicants, he welcomed the idea.

I couldn’t be any happier.

We went further. For the supervisory positions, we recruited staff that were never supervisors but exhibited good leadership skills during the interviews. As long as they were skilled in the jobs they would be supervising, experience as a supervisor was not important to us. We had a very good training and development program for these aspiring supervisors. Their managers were part of this development process.

Again, we went further up the organization in the implementation of this philosophy.

I had an excellent candidate for Manager for the Food & Beverage (F&B) Division except that he was only a F&B Coordinator when we wanted to hire him. At the same time the only opening left in F&B was Beverage Manager, which was not his expertise. But this gentleman was so good and with so much potential I was certain he would be a great asset for Shangri-La. I had to convince the F&B Director, the Resident Manager and the General Manager to reserve that last opening for him. They did. We hired him as the hotel’s first Beverage Manager. And because he was really good, he moved up fast and moved out of the property to work in other Shangri-La properties as F&B Manager and Trainer.

One of his best and longest assignments was with the Shangri-La Academy in China where he was Head of the F&B Division. He now travels around the other Shangri-La’s the world over to help open, train and organize F&B outlets as well as F&B departments.

His name is Martin de Castro.

If we maintained our traditional approach to recruitment then, there would have never been a Martin de Castro in Shangri-La.

There was another managerial post that had to be filled — my own requirement for Training Manager, and I had to fill it quickly. After interviewing about 7 candidates for the post, despite the fact that all of them were hotel training managers, none of them seemed to have that sparkle I was looking for.

I hesitantly asked my assistant to call one more applicant although he was not a hotel training manager. He was a teacher of biology in an exclusive school for girls. I was curious because he wrote a very interesting application letter, at the same time, I was desperate for somebody.

After the interview I was convinced I found my Training Manager. However, I was not sure how my GM would allow me to hire someone with zero knowledge about the hotel industry as a Training Manager. I thought he might just tell me ‘not to push my luck’ with this critical position. He was just a biology teacher after all!

I had to literally beg my GM to grant him an interview even for just 5 minutes. Interview with the biology teacher was granted.

After the interview, he calls me into his office and says

You are right Vic, he is the man for the job. However, we have to ask our Vice President for HR in Hong Kong, Mr. Phil Stephenson to confirm that you and I are not crazy. I will ask him to fly to Manila immediately.

Phil was initially reluctant thinking it was a waste of his time. But he flew in and interviewed this biology teacher.

Mr. Grocock and I patiently and nervously waited for the interview to finish, not sure if Mr. Stephenson would fire both of us instead.

Phil enters the office, looks at both of us and says

I don’t know how gentlemen but indeed, he is the man! Hire him.

He is Greg de Garriz. Greg has moved up to HR Director and has worked with the best international chains after Shangri-La, like Banyan Tree, Hyatt, and Intercontinental. He is now with the Marco Polo Ortigas.

During that time, the Philippine Daily Inquirer, a leading publication in the Philippines did an extensive article about all these hires and titled it ‘An Unorthodox Recruitment Philosophy at the Edsa Shangri-La Manila’, thus my title to this piece.

For those who missed my article about the pre-opening of this Shangri-La hotel, here is a quick link: