I am learning that to successfully build any business, it is best to nurture your own people, instil your own systems and develop your own culture.

Inheriting corporate cultures which practice other management styles is occasionally unavoidable, but first prize for us at BON Hotels is to grow our own people. So, instead of spending money on recruitment, we have decided to rise up our gems of BON staff into management and department heads.

International hotel management companies have had their fair share of the South African hotel management contract pie for more than a decade. The major players stepped in to our arena more than a decade ago as many operators were keen on the South African market. Asian, European and American hotel management companies have joined the ‘Scramble for Africa’, resulting in an urgency to get deals signed and share of the market secured. Major hotel groups jumped on the bandwagon, culminating in the Marriott purchase of the Protea Group last year.