EDINBURGH’S newest hotel has ensured its guests will enjoy top quality service – by taking staff on an all-expenses paid, month-long trip to a number of German cities to give the very best in on-the-job training.
The lucky nine employees from the Leonardo Royal Hotel Edinburgh were flown to Germany to gain first-hand experience as both an employee and a guest of the Berlin-headquartered company.
Team members – all from Edinburgh – were split into pairs and flown to selected hotels across Germany, including destinations in Munich, Berlin and Cologne. Each employee was given an individual plan which saw their time split across a total of two Leonardo hotels – the first to experience as a guest and the second to join the workforce to learn key skills.
Operations Manager Lucy Basnett spent two weeks at the Leonardo Hotel Munich Olympia Park before moving on to the Leonardo Royal Hotel Munich.
She said: “This was a fantastic experience which allowed us to get a real flavour of what working for Leonardo Hotels is all about.
“It was really interesting to be paired up with our German counterparts for the on the job training and to gain some key skills – we even learned some of the language along the way.
“What we all found incredibly insightful, though, was the opportunity to really experience the unique atmosphere and discover what it’s like to be a guest at a Leonardo Hotel.
“Each hotel is designed to be individual, like our guests, and to reflect the surrounding area using special local touches and features, so it was important for the team to get a feel of this and find out how we could bring this to the capital, before the Leonardo Royal Hotel Edinburgh opened its doors.”
It wasn’t all just work for the group, as they were also treated to a full package of fun excursions during their time in Germany, including a glamorous executive box at a Bayern Munich game to day trips into the mountains.
Leonardo Hotels, one of Europe’s fastest growing hotel groups, invested more than €7m in the refurbishing the former Premier Inn at Haymarket to open Leonardo Royal Hotel Edinburgh – creating its first establishment in Scotland.
Daniel Roger, Managing Director Leonardo Hotels Europe, said: “Our staff are hugely important to us and we want to ensure they receive the very best possible training, so whenever we open a new hotel we send as many team members as we can to one of our existing European properties.
“We are a chain hotel, but we are as far removed from a chain hotel as possible. The satisfaction of our customers is our greatest asset and, in order to achieve this, we work at it daily, investing lots of time and money. Having staff that perform their roles to the very highest standard is a huge part of this.”
The design of the new Leonardo Royal Hotel Edinburgh was created by acclaimed interior designer Andreas Neudahm and continues the Leonardo Hotels’ philosophy of developing hotels that each have their own character with a clear link to their location.
The hotel is aiming to appeal to both leisure guests, given its location near to tram and train stops, as well as Edinburgh’s ever-growing corporate and business tourism market – fuelled by its proximity to the Edinburgh International Conference Centre and the under-construction Haymarket development. The hotel also offers more than 90 parking spaces.
