David uses his career journey to explain the three phases of leadership, progressing from an individual contributor to a team leader and ultimately evolving into a change-making visionary. He passionately discusses the inspiration behind establishing DEI Advisors and articulates his goals for the future. Additionally, David candidly reflects on one of his most significant mistakes, emphasizing the invaluable lessons learned from it. Don't miss out on David's advice for budding professionals, as well as the wisdom he would impart to his 25-year-old self.
David uses his career journey to explain the three phases of leadership, progressing from an individual contributor to a team leader and ultimately evolving into a change-making visionary. He passionately discusses the inspiration behind establishing DEI Advisors and articulates his goals for the future. Additionally, David candidly reflects on one of his most significant mistakes, emphasizing the invaluable lessons learned from it. Don't miss out on David's advice for budding professionals, as well as the wisdom he would impart to his 25-year-old self.
Welcome to the closing keynote session. My name is Kate Kim and I'm a sophomore at NYU studying hospitality. This is our last session for 2024 HSMA intercollegiate conference and we are today joining with Mr. David Kong. Mr. Kong, tell us how you got the CEO position of Best Western.
David Kong:My parents escaped communism and fled to Hong Kong in the 1940s. There they had four children, and their only goal in life was to work hard, save money, and send all their kids abroad to further their education, so their kids could have a better life than them. It's a really admirable thing that they did. And so from a young age, I learned the values of work ethic and unconditional love. When I came to this country to attend the University of Hawaii, I came on a one way ticket. I had no money, no connections, and certainly no friends and no way back. I started as a dishwasher at the Hilton Wine Village and was quickly promoted to be a busboy. I guess I proved myself to the maitre d of the restaurant. He made me a waiter. I was always the one that did a little bit extra than other people. I remember being a busboy, helping out the waiter, opening wine and taking food to the table aside from my duties. So the maitre d really took a liking to me because of that. Fast forward to, I became a food and beverage director at a hotel that later became an Omni Hotel in Dallas, I was sitting there one day and the general manager told me, Hey, David, you've been doing such a great job. We'd like to promote you to be resident manager at a hotel in San Francisco. I love San Francisco. So when I heard the news, I was really excited. I went home and I couldn't wait to tell my wife and my wife who was working at the Hyatt Regency Dallas at that time came home and said, I have exciting news for you. I said, I did too. And she said, they have an opening as an assistant food and beverage director at the Hyatt Regency Dallas, and they really want to interview you. I said but I'm being promoted to be resident manager at this other hotel in San Francisco... Long story short, I took the Hyatt job. I took 2 steps down and took a 30 some percent pay cut to go join Hyatt because in my mind, Hyatt was a innovative leader in the industry and I wanted to join that company to learn as much as I could. I was just starting my career and I wanted to build a solid foundation. Then fast forward to when I became a two times general manager, six years as general manager.. Sitting there one day and got a call from the corporate office, from the president who said, David, we'd like you to come to the corporate office and head up the business process re engineering efforts at Hyatt. I said, what is that? Cause that term was totally foreign to me. And he said, we need to be more profitable for our owners. We want you to head up the effort. So I left the comfort of being a live in general manager and went to a corporate office. To do a job that I didn't know how to do but long story short, I did that for 3 years and Hyatt as a result of a joint effort between me and everybody else involved had the most profitable years up to that point. And then one day I was approached by the sales and marketing senior VP. And he said, David we'd like you to head up the database marketing efforts for us. And at that time it was 1990s and nobody's even heard of that term. I said, okay I'd like to do that, but I don't know how to do it. He said I know you can figure it out. And so I read up on it and I did a lot of research and mind you at that time, there was no internet. I read up on the subject and I hired a bunch of people who are just brilliant in database and I began to work with them to build up the capabilities for Hyatt. I did that successfully. And then they said, okay, David, I would like you to launch the first Hyatt dot com. It's a website and nobody has even heard about that at that time, because Internet was very nascent and some people would even say the Internet was a fat at that time. But regardless, I did that and launch a first hyatt.Com, which won the USA Today best hotel website award. I was very proud of that and then. Hyatt got me involved in the first generation of revenue management system, the new reservation system, and so on and so forth. So quite a lot of great experience working at all these different areas that few people knew how to do at that time. And then I was thinking to myself, what am I going to do next? I don't want to go back to the hotel and manage it again. I want to do something different. So my friend said, why don't you try consulting? And I've never done consulting. And he said it's fun. So I interviewed with 2 companies and both of them were very eager to hire me. You know why? Because I was not just a general manager. I actually had a lot of great experience. You think about the business process reengineering experience. A lot of companies were interested in taking costs out and becoming more efficient and more productive. My 3 year first hand experience was very desirable. And then you look at all my systems experience, whether it be revenue management or electronic distribution, website, database marketing and salesforce automation. I have all that experience and it was very desirable. So I got offers for 2 jobs and I took the job with KPMG. And I did that for a year. That was tremendous experience because as a consultant, you learn so much because you have to be so broad based, you have to listen well, and you also have to be quick in formulating a strategy, putting together a straw man, validating it and doing research to test the approach and so on and so forth. So I learned a lot being a consultant, and it so happened that I did a consulting engagement with Best Western at that time for the loyalty program, because my database experience and my loyalty program experience at Hyatt, they hired me to do an engagement. And I guess I did a good job because they offer me a position at Best Western to be the vice president of strategic services. That was the consultant's worst nightmare because as a consultant, normally you go in and you present your findings and you present a strategy, you don't expect to implement it because implementing something is extremely difficult, much harder than conceiving an idea. And so I had to go make it happen. And I did. And fast forward to 3. 5 years later, I got offered the job as the president and CEO. And I was there for about 17. 5 years in that CEO position. We built a strong team and together with the team we transformed Best Western from being just one single mid scale brand to being a company with 18 different brands ranging from economy all the way up to luxury in every chain scale segment and every product imaginable. We had traditional hotels, we have soft brands, we have suites, extended stay and boutique hotels and so on so forth. And so if you look back in my career, I think there were several key inflection points and key learnings that I'd like to share. One is the need to build a solid foundation. I was in different positions, and I learned a lot through those experiences. And that involved taking risks. If you want to build your foundation, you have to take some risks because it involved sometimes taking lateral moves, sometimes taking a step back and sometimes taking a job you don't know how to do, but that is going to be tremendously important to building your career. The other thing that, I would suggest is think about building a good network, because when I was coming up the ladder, I was never very good at that. But through being a consultant, I learned the importance of networking. And the reason I think I got the job as President and CEO at Best Western was because I learned how to do that effectively. And also, I just want to share that if you look at my journey, it involved 3 phases. The first phase was the individual contributor phase, which means that you have to be really good at what you do. You are the hardest working person, the smartest person, in terms of a subject matter expert. And the go to person that everyone wants to seek out to solve a problem, you want to achieve all that to be a strong individual contributor. That's how you get noticed, and that's how you would be able to advance your career. The second phase that I went through was about being a good team leader. The ability to put together a strong team. And the ability to work with a team to achieve what is seemingly impossible. And this requires a lot of experience, and it's something that we have to put an effort to it. Jim Collins, in his book, Good to Great, talked about putting the right people on the bus, putting the right people in the right seat, and moving the wrong people off the bus. And then you can take the bus to where you want it to go. It is absolutely true. If you became a team leader, you're only as strong as a team. So you want to hire people that are stronger than you, that are smarter than you, that are more knowledgeable than you. That's how the whole team can be more successful. So you have to be humble and respectful and Understand that there are people that are stronger than you, that are better than you and be comfortable and accepting of that and understand that they would take you to far places. So that's a second phase. being a team leader. The third one is when you become a transformative leader, being able to conceive breakthrough ideas because you're in tune with the environment. You know what's going on and you can anticipate what's next and what's going to be important. That's a skill that you are going to learn over time by being curious and you have to be always thinking about things and evolving your thinking about things and testing the boundaries, and conceiving the idea, as I mentioned before, is really the simple thing to do. Anyone can come up with an idea. It's how you execute that's difficult because sometimes execution involves being able to convince the naysayers, which is a very hard thing to do because some people are very set in the way they think about things. And you have to be respectful and humble to win them over. And you also have to present compelling cases for them to understand what it is that you want to do and jump on the bandwagon with you. That is a very hard thing to do. And it requires strength. It requires resilience, and it requires being humble and respectful. So that's the third phase, being the transformative leader that you can be if you go down that path. So those are the three phases that I'd like to share.
Kate Kim:Thank you for sharing those phases. It is very helpful. And I didn't know that phases exist. First of all, so it's very helpful for me and I'm pretty sure what the students and participants here can learn from that as well. I remember my one of my professors saying network is your net worth. So I believe networking is really important as well. We all know that you got into the CEO position and it was a long journey, but we're curious to hear about why you decided to found DEI Advisors. Could you share a little bit about that?
David Kong:Yes, when I was CEO, I would be invited to CEO panels at major industry conferences, NYU or. ALIS or the lodging conference and so on and so forth. And it would always struck me as odd that I would be the lone token minority representation at these panels. There would be no women. There will be no people of color at these panels. It would be strictly white men and nothing against white men. All these CEOs of major brands are actually my good friends, and I respect them. They all worked hard to get to where they are today. I have the utmost respect for them. At the same time, there are lots of very capable women and people of color that are equally deserving of those positions. And, somebody said the other day, talent is distributed equally. But opportunities are not. And I think that's true. Sometimes women and people of color don't have the same opportunities as white people. And that's regrettable, because everyone is born with talent, and everyone can contribute. And a lot of people are Deserving of those opportunities. So I look at the situation. I thought to myself when I retire, I can dedicate some time to improving the situation. And when I did retire, I started looking at what the major brands are doing. Hilton, Marriott, IHG, Hyatt, Wyndham, Choice, all of them are actually doing some wonderful programs. Marriott's program and Hilton's program, I think, are just fantastic. Hilton, for example, has set goals for 50 percent of their general managers be female, which I think is tremendous. And they all have programs where they recruit diverse talent, develop the diverse talent, and also they set goals to advance their career. And some of them have board committees involved in oversight and giving executive leadership to the effort, which is wonderful. And I also like the fact that they hold themselves accountable by publishing quarterly reports, which is all tremendous. So I look at the situation. I said to myself, how can I add value to this? Because there are all these wonderful programs already. And I thought to myself what's missing is the piece about the individual personal empowerment, because the companies might provide you with opportunity, the individual has to be ready to take on the opportunity. And I know being an immigrant, the way that I think about my opportunities, I shortchange myself. And a lot of times I put challenges, self imposed challenges in front of me, so I can't realize my potential. And that is something that we can work on, self empowerment. So I thought maybe the best thing to do is to collect insights from successful leaders, people who have made it, whether it be men or women, whether it be Caucasians or people of color, it doesn't matter. Everyone has some learnings that they can share. Everyone has advice that we can learn from. So I began interviewing the successful leaders, CEOs of all major hotel brands like Tony Capuano and Mark Hoplamazian from Hyatt and so on and so forth. And they were absolutely wonderful. All of them were very gracious and very happy to help out with this effort of self empowerment. And they were very willing to share their stories. And their journeys, which is just fabulous. There's so much that we've learned. And through having done this for about 1. 5 years, we've identified about 20 themes, and these themes are things like the negative self talk that a lot of us have. The head trash, as I would call it, networking that we talked about, finding advocates or, just tips on a lot of different themes. And now I'm at a phase where I'm going to summarize all these different perspectives and advice, and share them through blogs. So I've already done the first phase of interviewing, 160 some leaders in the industry, C suite positions, educators and life coaches, best selling authors and so on and so forth, I collect a lot of wisdom. And they are available through YouTube or through our website, DEIAdvisors.Org, or they are available through Spotify. You search for DEI Advisors, you can listen to these interviews. You pay thousands of dollars to attend a conference to listen to these people. Now you can listen to them for free and listen to their life story, which is extremely beneficial and educational.
Kate Kim:That sounds an organization with a focus.. It's in my opinion, as a woman of color something that I always dreamt of. And it's so wonderful also that I can just access these with internet, not even having to go to a library or something. So I would like to pay gratitude for this opportunity. We're also curious about some lessons that you have learned throughout your career path. What are some lessons that you have learned from the biggest mistake that you've ever taken?
David Kong:I've made a lot of mistakes in my career, and I'm not afraid to make mistakes, although they are painful at a time, but mistakes are the biggest learning opportunities. If you don't make mistakes, it's hard to learn. And so I would suggest that don't be afraid of mistakes, take a risk and do something. It doesn't work out. You're going to learn from it and you're going to be a better person for it. I can give you two examples. One of the biggest mistakes I made in my career when I first started at Best Western, I had a series of quick wins. So I was full of myself. I was conceited. I thought nothing could go wrong. I'm the golden boy. Nothing would go wrong. And I came up with the idea of launching a virtual travel card, which means that you can buy that as a gift card and use it for travel. And Companies can use that to send their travelers on the road without having to worry about expense reporting because it can only be used at Best Western. It has a lot of different utility. And I was very proud that I came up with the idea, but I wanted to make it virtual rather than a tangible hard card. So I worked with a company and we built a platform and we launched it. And lo and behold, in the first month, we had 100, 000 worth of fraud people using fraudulent credit cards to buy the card, and at that time, I thought to myself, that was a huge mistake that I made because I didn't think it through. I was so full of myself that I thought nothing would go wrong. And I thought to myself, who's going to bother committing fraud on a Best Western stay. Little did I realize that there are always people out there that are gaming the system, and I didn't do anything that I'm supposed to do in terms of controls. So I worked with an accounting firm, we put in a lot of controls, and although we made the virtual card viable, we also have strict controls as to how people can use it, and we stopped the fraud. But then I have to report that to the board. Imagine facing the board, and I'm just trying to prove myself, and I was there for about three months. I was really nervous about having to report this to the board, but I decided to be honest because my parents had always taught me that. You want to be remembered as someone who is honest and has integrity. So I was honest. I presented the whole situation to the board. I admitted my mistake. And I shared with them all the controls that were put in place and how we're going to do things going forward. And you know what? It was totally unexpected. The chairman of the board said, we appreciate your honesty. And we like people who have integrity in what they do. You made a mistake, a big mistake, but you fessed up and you explained to us what you did to correct it. And we like that. And that floored me, but it's an important lesson. If we make a mistake, which is human, everyone makes mistakes. Be willing to fess up. And focus on what you can do to make it right and things will work out. So it is an important lesson for me, something that I've always kept in mind.
Kate Kim:Yeah, this is my 2nd session that I've been moderating with and other professionals from my other session also said. Making a mistake is actually good because you can actually learn from it. And I've made a lot of mistakes, even organizing this conference and other conferences. But every time I make a mistake I learned something new. So I guess it's really important to make mistakes, but instead learn something and develop your personality and your career.
David Kong:There's another point I want to make about mistakes. Aside from owning up to it and making it right and learning from it. Don't let the mistake define you. A lot of people fail and they start blaming themselves and think they are no good, and that affects their performance. But the mistake doesn't define you. You know what defines you? What you do after the mistake defines you. If you're full of self doubt and you can't perform going forward, that tells people who you are. But if you react positively and constructively with strength and resilience, people are going to see that. They're going to see that, Oh, this person, like a lot of other people, has made a mistake. But how this person reacted? That's who he is. We like that. So think about that. Don't let the mistake define you. Let what you do after the mistake define you.
Kate Kim:Thank you so much for that response. It resonates really a lot with me because after, as a young person just entering the industry I got a little I lost confidence in myself whenever I make some mistakes, but it's really important to remember your lesson that it shouldn't be something that defines us, but we need to take courage and make a better decision next time. There are some students here amongst our participants. What kind of tips do you have for students here?
David Kong:First of all, you've joined a great industry. You look at around the industry, there are so many opportunities. I know a lot of people are hesitant to join the industry because they think, I don't want to be a front desk clerk. I don't want to be in housekeeping. The industry is far bigger than that. Of course, you can choose to start your career in operations. But if you don't like operations, there are lots of other opportunities because you have the brand side that gives you the opportunity sales and marketing, finance and accounting or any other interests you might have. You could be a commercial officer and go down the revenue management route, or you can be an event planner and go down that path. You can be investor you can arrange financing. You can be in construction architecture, design. There are so many different opportunities in the industry. So you've join a great industry. And I will also say that when you're starting off, don't be so impatient about where you want to go. You have to recognize that your career is a marathon. It's not a sprint. And if you try to get there too fast, you burn out or you flame out. I've seen a lot of people that made general manager before me None of them is actually in the industry. They just flamed out because they didn't have the foundation. So I said earlier, it's important, especially when you're starting off on your journey to build a solid foundation, take a lot of lateral steps, think about cross training, because in a marathon, you don't just run all the time. You have to take time to do strength training or other kinds of training because that avoids injury. And likewise, if you're working too hard on one path, you likely would burn out. So it's important to branch out and do different things. And pursue different interests at the same time. Think about using this period of your career to build a solid foundation, because you're going to be able to tap into it time and again,
Kate Kim:that is a really crucial part of the tip for students here, even I am considering different path and I know the students tend to get a little anxious about the path. We better remember that. My next question for you is, what are you most proud of, During your career?
David Kong:When I mentioned to the board that I was going to retire. I also presented them with 3 internal candidates. And one of them actually became the CEO and succeeded me. I'm proud of that because, at the end of the day, all the great things that you do in your career, it's soon forgotten, like I might have done a lot of great things at Hyatt during my business process reengineering days, I might have won the best hotel website award for Hyatt. Nobody remembers all that. It's gone. And it's not even important to me anymore, but what's important to me was I had an impact on someone and I helped them become more successful. My team at Best Western all worked for me for a long time. And there was only one person whom I had to let go. But of all the people that I've hired at Best Western, everyone stayed with me and everyone performed admirably. And that is something that I'm proud of because I was able to give them an opportunity. And I was able to take care of them and help them with their career progression that they all stayed because they found the job fulfilling, and they found that they have career progression, and they enjoyed what they do and cultivating that environment is something that I'm proud that people feel that way, and I was able to help people become more successful.
Kate Kim:That is such a heartwarming story. Thank you for that answer. My next question would be what's the one piece of advice that you would give to 25 year old David Kong, which is about the age of me and other students here.
David Kong:The advice I would give to my 25 year old self would be to be kind to myself. I was born a perfectionist because of my upbringing. My parents were perfectionists. They always wanted everything to be proper and done correctly. I was brought up in that environment, and I inherited that. Looking back, things did not need to be that perfect. It's okay if they're not perfect because as I mentioned earlier, all these achievements at the end of the day didn't mean too much. At the time, they meant a lot, but looking back, they didn't really mean that much. And why did I allow all those little things to bother me so much? And sometimes they even derailed my ability to do other things. So I think if I could advise myself back then, I would have said, be kind to yourself. Don't be so harsh on yourself. You have a lot to be thankful for, and you could do great things. And if this didn't work out, try that. And, if things didn't go right, it's okay. Learn from it and move on. And also you didn't have to work so hard. Because I remember when I was a management trainee, I finished one shift. I go and work another shift just to try to learn as much as I could. Okay, that was admirable. It probably helped me with my career. I stood out because I was always working so hard, but there's a price to pay for being so hardworking and dedicated because you compromise your health when you do that. And when all you think about is work. It also compromised your mental being and I didn't have to do that. Thinking back, I should have learned to work smarter, not harder. And that's something that I learned over time that eventually after I became CEO, I learned to work smarter, not harder. So the advice again is be kind to yourself. And don't let little things bother you, and pay attention to self care.
Kate Kim:Self care is really important. And this is the kind of advice that I actually needed because I believe people In my age, at least, they go around, do internships they make mistakes and they be hard on themselves, like me being harsh on myself because I want to do better and getting anxious. Oh, if I don't become a GM and when I'm like 30. It's a failure. I believe some people like me who tend to be perfectionist are harsh on themselves. But as you said, things will come naturally. And it's not really that deep sometimes. I believe this is something that all of the participants can learn from as well. What's the one piece of advice that you give to David Kong today right now?
David Kong:Today, I'm just grateful and thankful for everything because I've been given opportunities. I've capitalized on opportunities, with my God given talent, I've made it work. I'm in a position to help other people and I am doing my best to do so. I have a great family, I don't have to worry about much. So I am just grateful. I'm living every day, being thankful for All that had been given me.
Kate Kim:That is very good to hear. We're good to hear that you're grateful. Then this is my personal question. What do you think is the secret to be happy in your own opinion?
David Kong:It's to be content. with everything that you have right now to be grateful. Always look for the silver lining in things. When things don't go right, you always have to shift your mindset from blaming yourself and hard on yourself to what can I do about the situation, doing something positive and constructive to make you feel better, but also looking at the silver lining and saying, this is a wonderful opportunity to learn because next time the mistake could be much costlier. This time, it's only this, and I can learn from it, and I can avoid making the bigger mistake in the future.
Kate Kim:Then what do you think is the secret to being happy in the workplace? I know some participants here are students, and they're looking forward to internships, right? I would personally like to know how to succeed in being a happy person in the workplace.
David Kong:Gallup has a five question employee engagement test, and these five questions are tried and true. And if you look up any big companies employee engagement survey, they will be on there in one way or another. And one of the question that always struck me as being odd is, do you have a good friend at work? Do you have a good friend at work? Because if you have a good friend at work, you're going to be happier and more engaged. It's incredible. That is one of the most predictive questions on the Gallup survey. So to be happy at work, you got to have friends at work. And again, I talked about the network that you need to build. It's not just for future use. It's also for how you feel about the work environment. Let's face it. Sometimes you get a boss from hell and they make it a toxic environment. And it's not enjoyable at all, and that's when you'll have to ask yourself, is it worth it? If it's only temporary and you just have to to bear it for a few months or something, and things are going to improve. That's 1 thing, but if it's really that toxic, you're going to be kind to yourself and say, life is too short. Move on. Somebody said to me the other day. When you're interviewing for a job. It's not about getting hired. It's you are hiring your boss. And that is very telling because when you're interviewing for a job, you're gauging whether it's an environment that you want to enjoy, right? By the person who was interviewing you. If it's the supervisor was interviewing you, you're going to be working for that person. Would you enjoy doing that? Does that person have the same values as you? It's really important to find a place that's going to help you with your career progression.
Kate Kim:Yeah, since I'm also a student looking for an internship, students tend to position themselves and being, I gotta look better because I need to get hired instead of thinking I'm actually hiring my boss as well. I gotta think about that when I'm actually looking for an internship. And with that, I want to wrap up our conference today. And this marks as our last session for the conference. So I would like to thank Mr. Kong again for joining and all the participants, school speakers, panelists who have been joining us for this conference. For all the graduates who are entering the field, congratulations as well. We wish you a very good week, and we will see you at the next year's HSMAI Intercolleges Conference. Thank you, and goodbye.