I am Always Looking for More

It started when I was 14.

My first casual job was at Coles as a trolley boy.

Before the interview, I walked the aisles.

Nobody told me to. I just wanted to know what the place felt like.

Were people friendly? Was it a good place to work? Could I imagine working there?

It was.

I got the job.

I didn’t know it at the time, but I had started doing something that would follow me for the rest of my working life.

Before I stepped inside a business professionally, I wanted to experience it personally.

A few years later I applied for my first hospitality job at a five-star hotel.

I had never stepped foot inside a five-star hotel. I wasn’t even sure what five-star actually meant.

So, before the interview, I went in.

I wandered around and looked.

I was in awe.

I saw things I didn’t understand. Things I knew I wanted to learn about. And things I thought I might be able to do … maybe even better.

I got the job.

That instinct never left me.

I always wanted to know what I was walking into.

Over the decades that followed, I managed hotels and resorts, grew hotel groups, assessed hotels we were considering taking over, built and owned my own hotel, repositioned hospitality businesses and consulted across cafés, restaurants, accommodation, wedding venues, events and corporate hospitality.

Before I accepted something, I looked.

Before I signed something, I experienced it.

Sometimes I stayed overnight. I ate there. I wandered around.

And every time, I simply sat and watched.

I wanted to know what was really happening before everybody knew who I was.

Because once they did, things changed.

When I became a General Manager and later a CEO, walking into one of my own operations was very different.

Once my team saw me, their posture changed, someone straightened something, service became sharper. Standards were suddenly remembered.

Years ago, I walked into one of my own restaurants to meet a friend.

He said: “I knew you were on site before you walked in here. The atmosphere and staff changed about 30 minutes ago.”

I had arrived 30 minutes earlier to check on something elsewhere.

That isn’t necessarily false. It’s human.

But it taught me something important.

Management does not experience the same business its customers do … don’t fool yourself.

Fine is not fine.

Customers tend to tell businesses about the extremes.

Something goes badly wrong and they complain.

Something is exceptional and they rave about it.

But most hospitality lives somewhere in the middle, where everything is… The meal. The room was fine. The service.

Nobody complains.

They came. They left.

And it’s that middle ground that has always fascinated me.

Because fine is NOT fine.

Fine hides opportunity.

What could be added, changed or deleted to move to make something fine to good … even great?

What small detail would have made all the difference?

What could have made someone stay longer, spend more or remember the experience?

They are simply things that could have happened … and made all the difference.

But I notice the small things.

I’ve always been drawn to the front of house … the customer face…that’s where hospitality is.

You can have strategy, budgets, systems, policies and procedures behind the scenes, but eventually somebody walks through the door and that experiences say it all.

Sometimes I notice something significant.

Often it is incredibly small.

It is almost impossible for me not to see these things.

I am probably a nightmare to go out to dinner with.

I sometimes have trouble concentrating on family and friends because I was too busy in my head making lists.

I am effectively writing reports for myself.

Before taking on jobs, businesses or consulting assignments, I would make my own notes.

What would I keep or change?

What is working?

Where could things be better?

Was it an obvious commercial opportunity?

Could I genuinely make a difference?

Ive done this for decades without giving it a name.

It was simply how I thought.

Eventually, I gave it a name.

More than 20 years ago, when I created Hospitality & More, it was obvious that this way of looking at a business was part of what I offered.

Just experiencing the business organically and naturally, with decades of hospitality experience behind what I see.

And I am always looking for more.

So, it became:

Find the More™.

An independent hospitality and customer experience review focused on service, operational and commercial opportunity.

But the idea is much simpler.

What could make this business and experience better?

Even on holiday, I don’t turn it off.

Recently, I went away with family and friends to a luxury resort.

I wasn’t there to work…but….

We ate dined there many times, ordered room service, used the pools, walked the grounds and used all the guest facilities, including experiencing reception, housekeeping and the countless little interactions that make up a stay.

Family and friends were there too, and naturally we talked about our daily experiences.

So of course, I began making mental notes.

They soon turned into written notes.

And once I started, I couldn’t stop.

By the end of the stay, I had over 100 distinct observations and opportunities.

Not complaints… and that distinction matters.

Much of the resort worked. Some of it worked very well.

But everywhere I looked, I could see something else… I saw opportunity in service, operations, commercially, and presentation.

Simple changes that cost nothing, and others maybe something.

That holiday reminded me exactly why I created Find the More™.

Because sometimes the biggest opportunity sits quietly in the middle… between what management sees and what the guest experiences.

The business thinks the experience was delivered.

The guest thinks the experience was fine.

Nobody complains.

Nobody remembers.

And yet there may have been many opportunities to do...

More.

That’s where I’ve apparently been looking since I was 14.

I just didn’t have a name for it then.

Now I do.

Find the More™.

And this particular find the more journey?

It happened on holidays.

But it happens at almost every café, restaurant, event, hotel and venue I visit.

Even businesses that aren’t traditionally hospitality businesses.

Because I know a hospitality mindset can help any business Find the More™.