When I spoke with Luc Delafosse, he was managing director of Waldorf Astoria Beverly Hills in the United States. The book notes that he has since become Managing Director of The Peninsula Paris.
Delafosse speaks to two of the book’s central ideas, and he gave one of them its definition. The first is the senior leader’s daily presence on the floor. He described his routine to me without embellishment: walking the property every day, speaking with colleagues in every position, eating lunch in the employee restaurant, spending two hours each evening in the lobby, and sitting in on the morning line ups before shifts begin. His conviction is that a general manager belongs on the front lines with the team and that visibility is the only real way to build trust and open communication. The team can be brilliant; the leader’s eye remains the final layer of inspection. The second is anticipation. When I asked him what hospitality is, his answer became the operating definition of my chapter on knowing the guest. Hospitality is the craft of knowing in advance, before the guest has thought to ask, and the relationship that makes this possible has to be nurtured before, during and after every visit.
“Hospitality is the craft of knowing in advance what guests need and want.” Luc Delafosse, then Managing Director, Waldorf Astoria Beverly Hills
In the book, Luc Delafosse appears in Chapter 7, In Pursuit of Perfection, where his daily walk of the floor is set beside Goossens’s insistence on giving 300 percent as the two postures that make the chapter’s argument, and in Chapter 9, Knowing Your Guest, where his definition of hospitality opens the discussion and returns at its close.
“I walk the floor daily and speak to colleagues across the property in all positions. I always eat lunch at the employee restaurant, and spend two hours every evening in the lobby.” Luc Delafosse, then Managing Director, Waldorf Astoria Beverly Hills