20th Anniversary message from Bernhard Haechler
Dear Colleagues,
It is amazing that Shangri-La Hotel, Dubai is already 20 years old. How quickly time has passed since the official opening in July 2003. It seems like yesterday!
I vividly recall the day, 21 years ago, in early April 2002, that I first arrived in Dubai as the pre-opening GM of Shangri-La Hotel, Dubai. SLDB was to be the first Shangri-La Hotel in the Middle East region. All I had with me were 2 suitcases, a cell phone and a laptop computer. In addition to the SLIM team, the support of the owner, Mr. Obeid Al Jaber, as well as Mr. Ahmed Ramadan and the ROYA team, were crucial and helped me enormously. Without them, it would have been a much more difficult task. I am very grateful for the unwavering help and support they gaveme. The SLDB building was on level six when I arrived, and the building progressed quickly, up to one floor per week at times. Dubai was a completely different city at the time. The Dusit Hotel, on the opposite side of Sheikh Zayed highway, was the last building on that side. The remainder of that area, including the entire current Burj Khalifa and Dubai Mall area, was just plain desert sand as far as the eye could see. At night, there was not even a flicker of light seen in that direction. How things have changed!
\ Getting to know the region, the history, the culture, the thinking, the sensitivities, the dos, and don’ts etc., was fascinating and a most enjoyable learning curve.
The ExCom members were selected and arrived periodically over the next few months. Our recruitment drive was soon in place, and we had the huge benefit of being able to recruit interested individuals from the Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts around the world. Our recruitment teams interviewed every interested individual on the numerous recruitment trips, and shortlisted those who fully met our criteria. Where the interest from Shangri-La colleagues was low and where we needed colleagues from areas, we did not have hotels or resorts, we extensively advertised our recruitment drives and scheduled interview days. From the start of our recruitment process, our focus was to always employ passionate, exuberant, highly service oriented people, and this certainly paid huge dividends as the commitment to customer service from the 43 different nationalities of colleagues we ended up employing was exceptional. It also helped significantly with all our pre-opening training programs, as we had colleagues that truly wanted to learn, make a difference, and grow. One of our early colleague appointments was Shaaban Oraby, as Government Relations Manager, responsible for interacting with local Government for everything to do with Human Resources. Shaaban was instrumental in getting all the employment visas done for the large number of colleagues recruited internationally, and he always delivered. I am so pleased to learn that Shaaban is still atSLDB.
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