I first met PRS Oberoi (‘Biki’) in 1976, when I headed Human Resources for ITC’s Hotels Division in New Delhi. ITC’s diversification into hotels proceeded rapidly, and the manpower requirements soon outpaced our training capacity. There was no way out but to recruit talent from the established players — Taj, Oberoi and ITDC. So it was no surprise when Biki ran into me at an industry event and remarked accusingly, “So you’re the man who’s been poaching our people!” Then he smiled. “But it doesn’t hurt us”, he continued, “one day I hope you will see our Training School.” Biki reminded me of this incident when I joined his company as President of the Oberoi Group almost twenty years later. “You’ve come over to the dark side,” he joked, “but I can assure you that it will be an exciting journey.” Never had he spoken a truer word.

Biki foresaw what Manmohan Singh’s economic reforms would mean for the Indian hotels industry. Not only would there be a surge of foreign business travellers and tourists into India, but international hotel groups would follow, setting new product and service standards. Indian hotel chains would have to pull up their socks. Through his several decades of living in the worlds’ best hotels, Biki had formulated his vision of the ideal hotel: one that would harmonise the science, technology and precision of the West, with the grace, hospitality and sensitivity of Asian cultures. Thus, whilst India would provide the colour, flavour and human touch of the exotic Orient, safety, security and privacy for the guests should attain the highest contemporary global standards. Above all, he wanted his hotels to be an oasis of comfort, calm and serenity for the guests — primarily business travellers and high-end tourists — who had travelled there for a purpose. These ideas were quite novel at the time.

Click here to follow our WhatsApp channel

To convert these concepts into practice, Biki introduced a ‘transformation programme’ into the existing hotels in the Group. Alongside came an opportunity to also set up some greenfield projects to embody these ideas — the top-end boutique properties of Rajvilas (Jaipur), Udaivilas (Udaipur), Amar Vilas (Agra) and Vanyavilas (Ranthambore). No effort was spared to create these hotels luxurious, aesthetic, green and serene. But the project costs were mind-boggling! Many in the industry (and some within the company) were sceptical whether these projects would ever see the light of day, let alone become profitable. Biki, though, never lost faith. He quoted his father — Rai Bahadur MS Oberoi, the founder of the Oberoi Group: “Always offer the best, and the profits will automatically come in.”

But what was ‘the best’? To Biki, it was two things —impeccable quality and unsurpassed service. To him, these were not just management buzzwords. He walked the talk by directing that all customer complaints — every single one of them — were to be sent to him directly in sealed cover. Every morning, he read all the letters and responded to each of them, whilst instituting his own method of follow-up to ensure that the individual hotel managers had implemented the necessary corrective measures. This took him about two to three hours daily. When I queried him about this, he looked at me for a moment and said: “This is the best use of my time as chairman.” 

He also realised that a mere system of command and control would be insufficient. Quality and ‘service orientation’ had to be built into the product and imbibed by the people who delivered the service. The first was the easier task. Biki was passionate about hotel design, and he loved spending time with architects. Not the slightest detail in their drawings escaped his attention. In a rare moment when he reflected upon what he would do after his ‘retirement’ (a concept completely alien to his nature), he told me, “I will certainly not grow roses or play golf all day, but I would love to be a hotel designer.”

Imbuing a love for service and an attention to detail into hotel staff was more challenging. Biki decided that he would prefer to recruit people with the right ‘attitudes to service’ rather than go merely by qualifications or experience (“Experience can be a collection of bad habits”!). An elaborate recruitment method was devised to screen applicants for these two attributes. More important was the reconfiguration of the Oberoi Hotel School (the pioneering venture started by MS Oberoi) into a full-fledged academy for initial as well as life-long training in hotel operations and management, with particular attention to service orientation and quality. It is a testament to this training that Oberoi managers and staff have always been highly sought after in the hospitality industry in India and abroad.

After a long stint in ITC Ltd and BAT plc, Ravi Bhoothalingam was President of the Oberoi Group of Hotels from 1995 to 2001