From a distance, the Oakwood Premier OUE Singapore looks and runs like any longstanding branded accommodation property in the city; smoothly and seemingly effortlessly, like a duck floating on the water.
As many in the industry know, this reality is often far from the case as each property faces its own series of trials and tribulations leading up to its opening.
Opened mid-last year, Oakwood Premier OUE Singapore comprises 268 units (including studios, and one- to two-bedroom apartments). It has a guest base of C-suite and higher-level executive business travellers on extended visits.
In a recent interview, Roy Liang (general manager, Oakwood Premier OUE Singapore) talked about the trials he faced in opening and running this latest Oakwood property and the deeper challenges it reveals about the hospitality industry in general.
Roy Liang, General Manager of Oakwood Premier OUE Singapore
First: manpower. Liang was faced with the challenge of finding and building his core team and opening Oakwood Premier OUE Singapore, all in a span of four months. “That includes everyone from department heads to their staff… and then training them [or] waiting for them to serve notices.”
For this, he sought out primarily online resources to scope out talent. “90% of my department heads, I contacted through LinkedIn… [where] you can get 70% of the information you need to assess a candidate.”
From there, it was a matter of efficiently scouting and meeting these potential hires, to verify that what they said online was in fact who they were in reality.
Second: trying to make a property from nothing into something. Liang understood that while he had the comforts of a corporate brand to set the framework of what he was to build, each property needed to thrive in its own right.
Liang also knew that accomplishing it would require all the support he could get from his new team… but that would only come if he could earn their respect.
“When you are climbing a ladder as a team, you will face a lot of challenges but it’s making sure [no one gives up] before the summit.
“A lot of staff come from operations backgrounds where everything is set in stone but when you are the one chartering the waters for the first time (in four months), it’s hard.”
Building a team that would brave testy waters means setting a strong working culture that cultivates a solid level of confidence in its leader. To do that, Liang doesn’t underestimate the importance of fair pay. “The candidate needs to know we have a long-term working relationship and we’re growing together.”
To ensure that employees feel their voices are heard, Liang said, “I try my best to create opportunities for department heads to come together and share ideas, then take these points and balance them against the direction that the property wants to go with.
“It’s my job to convince them that when we make a decision, we make it as a company. It’s a culture of discussion, it shouldn’t just come from the top down.” However, coming from an international company like Oakwood, naturally there are limits in the team’s flexibility to diversify the property from its original brand.
In Liang’s eyes, “brand guidelines are a skeleton so the team needs to take it and form the meat around it… but the beauty of a corporate chain is that it has the same essence of a brand internationally.”
Oakwood Premier OUE Singapore has been designed around the belief that corporate travel is no longer separate from lifestyle. It has focused on offering guests an environment where they can maintain their usual lifestyle habits (like going to the gym or cooking their own meals).
The Oakwood Executive Club lets guests enjoy typical perks of any large hotel, such as daily breakfast, cocktails and canapés in a private area. It hosts an in-house restaurant, Se7enth, to cater to business lunch crowds and in-room dining. Smart technology is integrated into every unit, with a tablet, Samsung smartphone and an Oakwood dedicated app to facilitate guest requests.
Oakwood also actively promotes its various wellness initiatives, branding itself as a health-focused property. For example, on top of its 24-hour fitness centre, it has partnered with WorldTrainer – a global network of personal trainers – and Aquaspin, which provides water aerobics and aqua biking classes in the property’s pool.
