People do business with people they like, and not necessarily with like-minded people. If you break it down to the bare bones, BON Hotels is about relationships. Sure, we are excellent at what we do and we have an exceptional team who continue to hone our craft and strive for excellence, but the bottom line is that we need to forge good relationships with hotel owners – period!
Relationships built on transparency and cultivated with trust are the most successful and can truly be called partnerships. Many companies treat their clients as if they are transactions. Our team at BON hotels are taught that we need to have a strong understanding of our clients and customers. We can do this only if we look at them as people and do not process them as transactions. The old adage of the last time you smile together is when you sign the contract is such a distressing reflection of our industry, and one we intend to erase.
It is always tempting to grab every deal that comes your way, but my experience has taught me to follow my gut response. So often I can tell from the outset whether I am looking at a long-term relationship or one filled with complexities and hardship. Of course, business principles must be applied and we conduct thorough due diligence tests to ascertain whether we can indeed add value but, more importantly, there needs to be chemistry: you need to simply get along. It’s likely that you are going to be in this relationship for as long as 20 years, and it’s not going to be a successful one if the business partners don’t connect.
I am often reminded of an anonymous quote: “People will forget what you said. People will forget what you did. But people will never forget how you made them feel.”
