Voices of the future: Vicky Sanchez Acedo, Les Roches - At the heart of The Peninsula New York
It's exactly there, the mechanism that goes up and down, non-stop, all day. The one we all use without even thinking, the one that keeps moving for us and takes us everywhere we want to go. The one that if stops, everything stops. Welcome to the service elevator of The Peninsula New York.
The doors open and close, we go in and out. The most honest “how are you?” happens inside this small space, real conversations, real deals. Happy faces, tired expressions, smiles and tears. Reality. People who have been working together for 35 years meet there. If you think about it, 400 employees in 24-hour operations would not have to see each other, but we do. Here, in the elevator. At one point of the day, we all need it. The truth is, we need each other, and the elevator is just our tool to make it happen.
Hospitality can be a very high-speed industry, where everything is about the guest experience and how we deliver the service, however we tend to forget who is delivering it. People from all around the world, different backgrounds, native speakers, expats, different ages, experiences, and skills. I would say just 30% of the employees are perceived by the guest, but there is much more. There is a back house in all the hotels that work as hard as it gets to be able to deliver the five-star service that the customers receive. Inside the walls of the hotel, there is a whole ecosystem that keeps moving.
The Peninsula New York, on Fifth Avenue, is an iconic beautiful building full of wheels inside that keep pushing each other to fulfil it with life. All of them bring something different and special. Around 12pm is when the hotel gets busier. Guests ordering food throw in room dining, or the housekeeping service starts, the spa gets crowded, lunch starts, and we all start to run. And we all have something in common at that time, a guest waiting and a slow busy elevator. And it’s then, when I’m waiting in the landing floor when I expect to see Susana, who will make me feel home. I expect to see Mosti, who will always be joking around. I expect to see Edin, from the Spa, who will always have a kind smile for everyone. And my favourite one, Anthony. An outstanding person who, instead of asking how you are today, will ask “Are you balanced today?”, and when he leaves the elevator, he will say to all of us “Y’all, stay balanced”.
It took me a while to understand why, until I saw the real dynamic and pressure of this industry, the one we all love and hate at the same time. I grasped that it’s on us to keep the service alive, it’s on all the employees to make it happen. It doesn’t matter how beautiful the hotel is, but if we are not there, and balanced, this hotel does not exist.
Hospitality is defined as multi-tasking, fast and dynamic, and by people who are able to be everywhere. But we also need to know our limits, our priorities, and where to focus. At the end of the day, we are taking care of the hotel and the guests as we would be taking care of our family and our home. You need to be yourself, find your place in the ecosystem, and make it happen.
The exceptional service this property delivers has hundreds of names, and a safe space where we all see everyone every morning, afternoon, evening, and night. We balance each other with different energies, at different times of the day. It’s an injection of happiness during a exhausting day, it’s a non-expected laugh in a slow day, and always an exchange of cultures. There is always something happening and that is exactly the definition of the hospitality industry.
See you in the elevator
My name is Vicky Sanchez Acedo and I completed my MBA Global Hospitality Management at Les Roches in July 2022. I am currently in New York, working at The Peninsula, as a F&B Manager-In-Training (MIT).