Accor Ibis Eastern Europe

Purpose

After changing a part of the “eco” offer into an ibis, ibis Styles and ibis Budget brand family; the AccorHotels group wants to improve the guest experience for each brand. For this to be a success, the managerial factor needs to be taken into consideration.

Made to provide quality emotion and experience to the guests, the service culture needs to rely on a suitable managerial culture. In other words it has to be in a “correlations of their needs”.

There is a need for this culture to be transformed and a need for all the parties involved in this transformation to be valued while endorsing this management style based on two pillars: empowerment and coaching.

While escorting AccorHotels in this new global action, Imfusio also has to help transform the Eastern Europe division, which includes the regional managers, the subregion managers and the hotel executives in Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Romania and Baltic states.

#Vision #Purpose #Posture #Intercultural #International

Actions

IBIS’ global transformation action includes the support provided. Therefore each country has its own management methods. That is why Imfusio had to take the cultural differences into consideration to be able to adapt to the environment and to the specific local practices.

1) To promote the regional transformation processus

A two-day workshop in Prague has been planed to mobilize:

• All the regional hotel executives along with an ambassador (either the executive’s assistant or any chosen employee; receptionist, cook, etc.),
• As well as support functions representatives (HR, Marketing/Sales, Finance, Development) and regional managers.

Imfusio has supported Ibis Eastern Europe with three clearly identified aims:

• Share the processus purpose,
• Experiment the empowerment and coaching principles,
• And build together the next steps to enable the transformation.

2) Build together a unique customer experience

Two clusters’ Two-day “hotel vision” workshops had been organized in Poland, Baltic states, Czech Republic, Hungary and Romania to do some fieldwork.

By involving all its collaborators, each hotel sets its “hotel vision” in conjunction with the guest experience.

Our promise : Enter as guest, leave as a friend

- Ibis Bratislava Centrum

3) Experiment to apply and embody the new postures

The workshop days are based on a collaborative mode: built together with local teams and based on collective intelligence methods. The goal is to progress individually and collectively and to experiment different ways of thinking, feeling and organizing. That way participants can apply in their hotels what they’ve learned.

My main insights after nearly 1 year of collaboration with Imfusio are tremendous, the way you, as a company are working, influence us a lot on the way we are leading our team based on a collaborative approach, you are systematically questioning the status quo, you embark us in your vision on a positive leadership style based on recognition, empowerment, creativity and of course entrepreneurship !

You have been able to transform with us words (empowerment, coaching, enabling…) in actions. One of the most valuable action we have implemented in EE was to create eco-system around gardening including team, guests and local community. You opened our eyes on the emerging collaborative society !

- Jean-Marc Vendioux, former VP Economy and mid-scale AccorHotels Eastern Europe

#Collaborativeapproach #Positiveleadership #ecosystem #Openoureyes #Questionthestatusquo

Impacts

1) A rewarded dynamic

The Eastern Europe division stands out at the IBIS STARS AWARD in 2016: the division puts forward numbers of new innovative projects and receives a lot of prices, notably in the CSR and service culture categories.

2) A state of mind evolution

The workshop’s collaborative mode increases the service culture awareness and pulls some managerial triggers.

I had good and bad experiences in the past„ sometimes losing the fun of my job. Right now, I feel valued by the people I work with, they question me, don’t give me order but rather challenge me.

- Csaba Palotai, Général Manager Budapest (Hungary)

3) New practices

Employees within the hotels are more willing to take initiatives thanks to their skills (baking, welcoming guests with a song, etc.). By doing authentic actions, they seek daily customer service improvement and to discontinue the standardized Ibis brand image.