• RESILIENCE
Duncan O’Rourke , CEO, Middle East, Africa & Asia Pacific, Accor, explains how scale, local agility, owner trust and a resilient business model are powering growth across one of hospitality’s most dynamic regions Q: Across such a diverse region, what leadership philosophy enables you to set a clear direction while responding to very different markets and conditions? When you are managing a footprint of 1,260 hotels that stretches from Cape Town to Tokyo, and Riyadh to Sydney, you quickly realise that a one-size-fits-all approach is a recipe for failure. My leadership philosophy is built on a simple premise: think global but empower local. You cannot run a region this diverse, dynamic, and fast-moving from a remote corporate headquarters. You have to put real decision-making power directly into the hands of the people who are on the ground, living and breathing their local markets every single day. My role is to set a crystal-clear strategic direction, provide our teams with the massive distribution power of the global Accor platform, and empower them so they can execute. I also believe that hospitality is, and always will be, a human-centric business. You don't build trust or understand market nuances through emails or spreadsheets. You build it by being in the hotel lobbies, walking the properties, and sitting face-to-face with our owners and partners. I spend a large amount of my time travelling because you lead from the front, not from behind a desk. By combining this highly decentralised, agile execution with our unmatched global scale, we can pivot instantly when local market conditions change while keeping our eyes firmly fixed on our long-term horizon. Q: How has Accor navigated the Middle East’s 2026 disruption while maintaining owner confidence and its long-term growth plans? Yes, 2026 served up some of the toughest, most complex geopolitical headwinds this region has faced in a generation. With a significant portion of our guests traditionally flying in from long-haul international
Leading at scale
Q: How important has geographic diversification been to Accor’s resilience, and what has 2026 demonstrated about its value? This year has been a textbook demonstration of why our massive geographic diversification is Accor's ultimate secret weapon. Our region operates like a multi-engine aircraft; if one engine experiences turbulence, the others provide the thrust to keep us flying high and fast. While we had to make tactical adjustments in certain parts of the Middle East this year, we saw spectacular, high-yield momentum across Southeast Asia and incredibly robust, consistent performance in the Pacific. Diversification is much more than just a defensive risk-mitigation strategy; it is a highly offensive commercial advantage. It allows us to connect the dots across different markets and capitalise on shifting traveller demographics. For example, we are currently seeing massive outbound travel corridors opening up from India and China into both Southeast Asia and the Gulf. Because we have a powerful, established presence at both ends of these travel corridors, we can capture that demand seamlessly. Spreading our risk and opportunity across such a vast footprint ensures that our business model remains remarkably stable, predictable, and resilient, regardless of localised macroeconomic shocks.
markets, we felt that exposure instantly. But we’ve been in this region a very long time; volatility is a reality we know how to navigate. We didn’t sit on our hands. We reacted instantly with complete clarity, getting highly defensive yet aggressive on costs, safeguarding our owners' bottom lines across the region to secure our commercial floor. Second, we completely rewrote our marketing playbook overnight. We focused less on brand awareness and pivoted to conversion. We activated domestic staycations, put our incredible F&B programmes front and centre, and pumped 10 million ALL loyalty points directly into the MEA-APAC market to drive immediate, loyalty-led bookings. Most importantly, we didn’t pause a single development conversation. Not one. When you have 90 hotels and 25,400 keys in the UAE, and another 48 properties with 21,900 keys in Saudi Arabia, your partners need to know you are in the trenches with them, building for the next 20 years rather than reacting to the next 20 weeks. The big picture hasn't changed. The fundamental drivers that make this region so incredibly dynamic; Saudi Vision 2030, mega-events in the UAE, Egypt’s cultural tourism, and Türkiye’s inbound strength, remain completely intact. By being totally transparent, proactive, and commercially aggressive, we didn't just protect our partners; we kept the pipeline moving.
Duncan O’Rourke, CEO, MEA APAC, Accor
50 | ATM YEARBOOK 2026
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