Human Relations: CONFESSIONS OF A GLOBAL GYPSY

Dr. Chandana (Chandi) Jayawardena DPhi
President – Chandi J. Associates Inc. Consulting, Canada
Founder & Administrator – Global Hospitality Forum
chandij@sympatico.ca

Key Takeaway from Studies in France

I returned to Le Galadari Meridien Hotel in Colombo at the end of 1988 after company training in France and England. I was eager to share all that I had learned at the Institut International Meridien with my team in Sri Lanka. At the Institut, I had learned a lot about hotel finance, hospitality marketing, psychology and organizational behaviour.

There, influenced by the teaching of one of the French seminar facilitators, Alain Cardon, I increased my appreciation that human relations is the key ingredient for success in hospitality operations and management. Cardon inspired and challenged me at the same time. I was inspired to write books and do leadership coaching like he did, in time to come.

Alain had a unique, international background. He was born in Algeria, raised in Egypt, educated in the USA and France and had lived in Romania for some time. Very early in his career, these multinational experiences had served to train him to embrace diversity and to become a proficient, international, systematic team and organizational coach.

When I met Alain in Tours, France, in between his lectures to my group, he was writing chapters for his first book on leadership. Today, after publishing 28 books in English and French, Alain is a highly sought-after international, keynote speaker on systematic coaching. Alain taught us about human relations and his own concept of personality analysis. His personal style for executive coaching and team coaching was direct, confronting and empowering.

Alain categorized people into four main groups based on how they communicated, walked, talked and reacted to different situations. I told him that from my late teens I had been thinking a lot about different personalities and how to change the way I communicated with important people after quickly understanding their personalities. Alain liked to be challenged. When I disagreed with one aspect of his concept, he continued to debate with me after class till late evening, of course over a good bottle of Bordeaux wine.

Mastering Personality Analysis (PA)

When I was an 18-year-old student at Ceylon Hotel School (CHS), I was suspended for a month from school for cutting classes to go on a cross-country cycling adventure with nine others. As I wanted to keep this suspension a secret from my parents I found an unpaid job, but with free board and lodging at Barberyn Reef Hotel. That provided me with free time to think.

I thought about different people, their personalities and different ways to interact. Half the battle is won when an employee is able to analyse personalities quickly and adjust the way she/he communicates with each person (bosses, customers, peers, etc.).

During a CHS social trip in 1972, for the first time in my life, I realised how people, including our strict lecturers, behaved differently and more freely in more relaxing situations. I also learnt something new from my immediate supervisors in my first four, part-time jobs. Each of them had different personalities.

The West German Principal of CHS who suspended me, as well as my first boss, the Catering Manager of Hotel Samudra who fired me, were ‘no nonsense’ types. They liked to control others and boss around. I termed their personality type as “Toughie”.

My second boss, the Head Waiter of the Pegasus Reef Hotel, had a bubbly personality and loved dealing with all types of people. His personality was exactly the opposite of “Toughie”. I termed his personality type as “Softie”.

My third boss, the Butler at the famous Terrace of Mount Lavinia Hyatt Hotel, had another personality type in between “Toughie” and “Softie.” Owing to his attention to details and ‘prim and proper’ attitude, I identified him as another category – “Perfectie”.

Mr. Sudana Rodrigo, the owner of Barberyn Reef Hotel, and my fourth boss, ad a personality exactly opposite of “Perfectie”. He was a good man, but was a bit clumsy and often wore wrinkled clothing. He frequently got distracted and communicated with many messages at a time. Yet, he was practical, creative, funny and energetic. He was involved in many projects at a time and was not very punctual. In my mind I commenced identifying this personality type as “Confuzie”.

After serving a celebrity, who was my movie idol at Barberyn Reef Hotel, I realized that a smaller number of people did not fit into any of the four categories. Such people had a complicated personality. I termed that type of personality as “Complexie” – the fifth personality type of my evolving model.

None of these five personality categories were good or bad. My concept helped me to be flexible in the manner in which I communicated with these different personalities, particularly people who were important to me.

This is one lesson that helped me throughout my global career. As Alain’s concept was similar to my thinking in many ways, I was very happy. Moreover, I felt validated by an expert on human relations. For the first time, I decided to share and teach my concept, now modified with Alain’s philosophy.

PA in Action @ Le Galadari Meridien Hotel

Soon after returning from France, I spoke about my concept with the Training Manager of the hotel – Sunil Dissanayake (presently the Director/CEO of BMICH). Sunil was one of my batchmates from CHS and a good friend. “Chandi, I will organize a full-day workshop for middle managers with you as the presenter on ‘Personality Analysis’ (PA),” Sunil supported me. We agreed to do a pilot workshop for 26 managers and supervisors from my division. As the Director of Food and Beverage, I had 13 managers in my team managing different departments.

Soon after the commencement of this workshop, I realized the usefulness of the concept and how managers can improve departmental motivation, productivity, revenue, and service via PA. After a brief introduction, I got all participants to do a self-analysis and identify their personality type. After that I got the whole group to evaluate each other’s personality.

During the lunch break I was fascinated to note how people with similar personalities liked to be together and sit next to each other when we had lunch. I also realized that in departments where there were conflicts between the manager and supervisor, always it was because they belonged to opposite personality types. I wanted to experiment further.

I had six Maîtres D’hôtel (Restaurant Managers), each of them who managed one or two departments. Each of them had an assistant titled Supervisor or Senior Captain. As I believed in cross-training and to avoid having managers settle into comfort zones, I rotated them annually. Soon after the workshop, I shuffled Maître D’hôtel posts and coupled each with a supervisor with a similar personality. That action worked like a charm. During my last year at that hotel, my division had the smoothest operation without any conflicts in the food and beverage outlets. That lack of conflict, in turn, improved the customer service, customer satisfaction, revenue and departmental profits. I no longer had to spend any time on conflict resolutions in those six departments.

PA Seminars around the Globe

Soon after delivering my first-ever PA workshop as a pilot at the hotel, I received a call from the Training and Development Manager of Air Lanka Catering Services Limited. She said, “Chandi, I heard that you have developed an amazingly, effective seminar with a new concept. Can you present a few seminars for our senior managers and middle managers, who are from four different countries?” I agreed and delivered two seminars for them.

During the last 34 years, I have delivered around 100 PA seminars around the world on themes similar to ‘Personality Analysis: The Best Tool for Hospitality Managers’. This program has been the most popular among many of the teams of people I led as a hotelier and a dean, taught as a professor or coached as a leadership consultant. I have presented seminars on this concept in fifteen countries since 1989: Aruba, Botswana, Canada, England, Ghana, Guyana, India, Iraq, Jamaica, Kenya, The Maldives, Nigeria, Sri Lanka, United Arab Emirates and Zambia.

During the pandemic I delivered a few PA webinars to members of professional associations and a special lecture on Zoom to a group of master’s degree students at the University of Colombo, where I contribute as a visiting faculty member. The full video clip of this webinar is available on: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xED1WJWaiHQ

Over the years, I was always happy to share continuously, fine-tuned versions of personality types according to my categorizations identified 50 years ago – “Softie”, “Toughie”, “Perfectie”, “Confuzie” and “Complexie.” To me it is still relevant and useful, almost every day, when I deal with people in webinars, classrooms, boardrooms or even at Bridge tables when I direct my weekly games.

PA – Adjustments in Dealing with Bosses

A few months after I returned from France, I was saddened to hear that my mentor and boss — General Manager of the hotel — Jean-Pierre Kaspar, would be transferred soon. We commenced working in Colombo around the same time in 1986. Soon after he settled into his new job in Colombo, Mr. Kaspar became my mentor. We had similar personalities. Our offices on the mezzanine floor were next to each other. Often, in late afternoons, we had a casual chat over a cup of espresso and cookies in his office. I soon became his trusted wingman.

Mr. Kaspar had suggested that after I work as the Director of Food & Beverage of Le Galadari Meridien for three years, I would be ready for a transfer to a Le Meridien Hotel in the Far East or the Middle East for three years at the same level, but on an expatriate contract. That was identified as my route to eventually get promoted as an expatriate Le Meridien General Manager.

“I am asked to take over a challenging Le Meridien property in the Bahamas at short notice. They seem to have serious union challenges there, and I am required to leave Colombo as soon as possible. Don’t worry about your transfer to another country. I will mark it as top priority in my handover document to the new General Manager who has been transferred from Paris to Colombo,” Mr. Kaspar said.

When the new General Manager, Paul Finnegan arrived, everything changed. This Irish born Chartered Accountant had been the Financial Controller of a 1,000-bedroom Le Meridien in Paris. His management style was totally different. More importantly, his personality was exactly the opposite to Mr. Kaspar’s personality. My knowledge of PA became useful in immediately changing the way I communicated with my new boss. Mr. Finnegan, who was clearly a “Toughie” in contrast to Mr. Kaspar who was a “Softie.”

Three days after his arrival Mr. Finnegan was yet to talk with any of the divisional heads, who were all getting a bit anxious. I decided to take the bull by the horns. I went to his Personal Assistant and asked for an appointment. She slowly went into his office and explained my request. I heard him asking, “Who?” in a deep, gruff voice. The Personal Assistant came out and told me, “You have only five minutes.”

When I entered the General Manager’s office, it was totally different. Mr. Kaspar’s personality was evident in the way he had kept his office – a lot of light, plants, trophies, flowers and family photos. He had an open-door policy. Now the office was nearly dark, with one light over his desk, and no plants, flowers and photos. The windows were closed and a closed-door policy had taken effect.

I introduced myself and welcomed Mr. Finnegan to Sri Lanka and the hotel, but he was certainly not interested in small talk. He listened to me without any signs of interest and responded with one-word answers, twice. When I left his office within five minutes, I decided to totally change the way I communicated with the General Manager. Even my official memos to the new General Manager became as short as possible, getting to the point and the bottom line straight away. Mr. Finnegan liked that, and I got along well with him, unlike some other divisional heads.

On every weekday, the General Manager had a morning briefing with eight managers. It was held in the board room adjoining the General Manager’s office. As the board table had only eight chairs, I had arranged for a banquet chair to be kept permanently in the board room, to accommodate all nine attendees. During his second week in Colombo, Mr. Finnegan started holding morning briefings, with two small changes.

His meetings usually had one way communication. The other change he made, confirmed his personality type in my mind. He had ordered the removal of the banquet chair. When someone pointed out that we have nine attending, Mr. Finnegan said, “the last to arrive will attend the meeting standing!”

Training and Human Resource Development

In 1988, Le Meridien launched a chain-wide training and development initiative. They introduced three levels of recognition for employees who completed various types of in-house and external, training programs while earning Le Meridien training credits. The reward was a certificate and Le Meridien pin with a Logo in three colours indicating three levels of proficiency. These were called Logo White, Logo Blue and Logo Red (the highest level).

Sunil Dissanayake, who was an excellent Training Manager, championed this scheme in Colombo. I supported his efforts by motivating all 230 employees in my division to compete for Logo rewards. I wanted all managers in my division, to compete for higher Logo rewards. In leading others, one must lead from front while setting a good example. It was a great motivational tool to improve human relations with our internal customers. Thanks to my additional credits with Le Meridien training, I earned the Logo Red, and Sunil was very happy.

Relationship with SLAPS

I first heard about The Sri Lanka Association of Personal Secretaries (SLAPS) when I joined Le Galadari Meridien Hotel in mid-1986. A well-known Management Consultant, Mr. Eric B. M. de Silva had founded SLAPS in 1978, and every year it was getting bigger and more active. By 1988, SLAPS membership was getting close to 1,000. Later it was re-branded as The Sri Lanka Association of Administrative & Professional Secretaries (SLAAPS).

When the Executive Committee of SLAPS met me in 1986 to discuss a large-scale coffee morning event they were organizing at the hotel, I was very impressed with their commitment and efficiency. Knowing the influence secretaries had in their organizations when it came to business to five-star hotels in Colombo, I offered them several concessions for that event.

Soon I became an admirer and a friend of SLAPS. They made Le Galadari Meridien their main venue for meetings and events. Their President in 1988, Ms. Renuka Corea, liked some of my suggestions and we collaborated in organizing the ‘Secretary of the Year’ event and ‘Boss of the Year’ event. I helped them to create a new competition — SLAPS Queen, and a new event — SLAPS Nite, a large dinner dance held at Le Meridien in 1988.

SLAPS honoured me by inviting me to be the Chief Judge for Secretary of the Year Competition in 1989. In addition, they appointed me as the Vice Patron of SLAPS for three years. I keep in touch with a few of the Past-President of SLAPS from the late 1980, whom I consider my good friends. By mid-1989 when I decided to leave Sri Lanka to commence my global career, they pleasantly surprised me by organizing a farewell event and awarding me a special trophy.

I still have that trophy in my study. There are two, engraved messages on it. One says: “To Mr. Chandana Jayawardena – In honour of the deep appreciation and the unselfish services given to SLAPS while serving with outstanding leadership, vision and ability of upgrading the place of work – Le Meridien”.

Thank you, SLAPS!