Speaker: Sarah Wexler, Director, Catering & Events
Sarah Wexler: I'm Sarah Wexler. I'm one of our corporate directors of catering and events sitting on the Americas managed commercial services team. Our team is responsible for overseeing the strategy resources, talent management and performance for our catering and events teams at all of our managed hotels across the Americas. And then I personally oversee our large convention hotels. So about 31 in the US and one in Canada and the responsibilities can range from taking a look at a hotel that might be having performance challenges and seeing what opportunities we can help the hotel with to get better at those specific areas. It could be interviewing for a director role and identifying some top talent for future roles. It could be working through banquet menus and looking at the creativity that they're able to put forth for events to enhance our customer experience. Really, every day is different and every hotel is different. So it kind of keeps the job exciting.
Can you share a recent project or accomplishment that you're particularly proud of?
Sarah Wexler: One project that I'm particularly proud of was the launch of the catering pace report that took place in Q4 of last year. One of the areas we recognized that there was a lot of opportunity was forecasting, especially amongst our banquet revenues for our catering and events teams. And last year with the help of a lot of partners, we were able to create a catering pace report, a data set that was not available to our teams for a while that provides them with some really good information regarding historical data for on the books revenue and to be revenue to help inform a better forecast. While I know there's a lot of work to go in this field, it was great to be able to launch a report that has helped so many understand their business and hopefully get more accurate in forecasting it.
How does your current role fit in to your career goals?
Sarah Wexler: I think my current role really fits into my career goals and that it's broadened my horizons in terms of people and teams that I've been exposed to, even though I've been with Hilton for a good chunk of time. There were still so many different teams that I wasn't even aware existed in our structure. And honestly, there's probably a lot more that I'm still not aware of. But moving into an above property role where I get to interact with different regions and countries and cross markets has really allowed me to have a better understanding of the business as a whole. And I've always been interested in the greater business strategy and how really different arms of Hilton can impact our hotel teams. So this has really helped broaden my understanding of that and I think will continue to do that.
What advice would you give to someone who is interested in pursuing a similar career path?
Sarah Wexler: I think there's a couple of really key pieces of advice that I would share. And the first one is, don't be afraid to ask if you're interested in something, whether it be a project, a position, a meeting, whether it's in scope of your current job or not. Don't be afraid to ask if you can learn more about it. Be a part of it, apply for the job, fill in the blank. The worst thing that can happen is someone can say no. And while it's hard to hear no, it's just a word and sometimes no's lead to really greater great opportunities in the future. So, you know, you may not be able to participate in a project or apply for a role today, but putting forth that interest to someone may make you a candidate for the future. And I just really, really encourage people to not let their fears stop them from joining something or applying for something, whatever that goal may be. I think the other piece of advice I would give is find really good mentors to surround yourself with. I truly would not be where I am today or have been able to participate in certain activities or jobs if I had not had really great people helping me and you know, that could be someone in the industry, it could be someone you work with. Now, it could be someone you've heard speak and would just like to learn more. It could be someone outside the industry but find someone who's going to really, truly support you and by support you I mean, not just give you positive affirmations, but it's going to help you grow and share with you what you could be doing better to get you to that next step and to get you into that room you want to be into.
