Carmen Riu (Riu Group), at ESADE: "We make a lot of decisions based on intuition, something we would not be able to do if we were a listed company"
"Luis [Riu] is very intuitive. He inherited my father’s knack of always knowing where to go and where to invest. He’s never been wrong." So described Carmen Riu, CEO of Riu Group, the decision-making process of her brother, with whom she shares the position and in whom she places the full confidence of the company, which was presented today as a case study within the context of the 7th ESADE-Deloitte Lecture Series in Madrid. She thus had no problem acknowledging that "we make a lot of decisions based on intuition, something we would not be able to do if we were a listed company". She moreover explained that her counterpart has her full support. "Yesterday, we bought a hotel in Mauritius. I told him to go ahead, without seeing it. I did the same thing with St Martin and Aruba."
"Few companies have two CEOs", Riu explained, in reference to the governance model of Riu Hotels&Resorts, which was founded in 1953 and is currently in its third generation. "In our case, it works out perfectly: the hospitality industry is a game of doubles." In her view, one of the reasons it works so well is because the basic principle of customer satisfaction is ingrained in the company’s culture. According to the Riu Group CEO, "We still use the same quality survey my father drew up." "The satisfaction rate is reported each month for each department at each hotel, and it directly affects the budget and employee variables", she continued.
In this regard, in reference to customers' current widespread use of ICTs to share their reviews of hospitality services, Riu noted, "At first, the Trip Advisor site really irked me, but then I realized that its measurement system and ours were not that different, and we could always find aspects to improve in both." "The problem," she continued, "is that even once you’ve solved an issue, the negative review remains. A hotel can change its chef and earn a Michelin star, but the website will still say the food is lousy."
Finally, the CEO of Riu, which currently employs some 27,000 people in 17 countries, noted that two of her main responsibilities and concerns are the transfer of the relationship with TUI [a German tour operator and long-time partner of the group] and the management succession to take place with her six cousins. To this end, she underscored, "We have always encouraged them to be close, and they joined the family council at a very early age."
