The Wellness in Hospitality Podcast

Sonal Uberoi

Get insights firsthand! Join top global wellness expert and author, Sonal Uberoi, as she shares insights from hoteliers all over the world, managing all types of hotels, each with their unique set of challenges (location, owners, regulations, teams, etc.), and learn their wellness in hospitality best practices.

  1. 6d ago

    168. The Story Is Getting Written Either Way

    Who is writing your story?  Whether you choose to write it or not, the story of your hotel is already being written. Every decision you make, from every hire, every price you approve, every conflict you avoid, to every partnership you sign, is a sentence on the page of your next chapter. The only question is whether you're holding the pen, or letting the story happen to you.  Most boutique hotel owners let their story get written for them. They delegate the writing of their story either by the brand agency, by their past, or by whatever's easiest to explain.   In today’s episode, I talk about narrating, about writing your story on purpose, while you build, before there's any proof it'll work.   Because as I said, the story is being written either way. The only question is whether you're holding the pen.   Meryanne Loum-Martin understood that. Building Jnane Tamsna in Marrakech, she wrote her story as it unfolded, declaring in her own words that she wanted her place, her boutique hotel, to become the visible home of Black excellence in North Africa.   She wrote it down before it was that visible home of Black excellence in North Africa. Then she built exactly that.  In this episode, you'll learn:  1.- Why your story is being written whether you pick up the pen or not, and what it costs to let someone else write it for you.  2.- Why writing your story intentionally is what keeps you anchored to your vision when the day-to-day stops looking like the dream  3.- The three things that stop boutique hotel owners from writing their own story: handing the pen to a branding agency, borrowing the story from the past, and waiting for proof before writing a word    By the end of the episode, you'll know why the story only you can tell is already being written around you, and how to pick up the pen and write it on purpose, before the world writes it for you.

    37 min

  2. Jun 28

    167. Find The People Who Can Build And Hold Your Dream

    Who do you want by your side as you build the world that doesn't exist yet?  There is an inn on a remote island off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada. Four times the size of Manhattan. Only 2,500 people live there. The nearest city is hours away.  By every rule of conventional hospitality logic, it should not be one of the most sought-after destinations in the world.  And yet, Fogo Island Inn holds three Michelin Keys. Guests travel from across the globe to reach it. Almost nothing inside it was made by anyone with a hospitality background. And the woman who built it had never run a hotel in her life.  She didn't hire hospitality professionals. She hired quilters, furniture makers, and an architect who knew how to build with the land not just on top of it.  Zita Cobb knew exactly how to identify the artists she’d need to build the world she wanted to, a world that hadn’t existed until she had the audacity to build it.  In today’s episode I cover the 3 things that most boutique hotel owners get expensively wrong:  1.- Why hiring the most qualified person in the room is often the most dangerous move for your vision  2.- Why the people who built what you inherited cannot always take you where you need to go, and why that is not betrayal  3.- Why most boutique hotel owners never find their artists because they never defined the seats those artists would sit in  By the end of this episode, you'll understand why you keep choosing the wrong people and who exactly you’ll need to build the world you want to.

    41 min

  3. Jun 21

    166. Build The World First

    What if the reason your hotel isn't standing out isn't because you need a better product, better marketing, or better guest experience?  What if it's because you're still building for the people who already know you instead of the people who need you?  In this episode, I explore why the most remarkable destinations aren't created by following categories, trends, or industry expectations. They're created by people who build their world first and wait for the market to catch up.  There is a remarkable property in Spain sitting on the edge of one of the country's most prestigious wine regions.  Several years ago, they were faced with a choice. Join the region’s denomination of wine, the very region that had once rejected them, or go solo.They could have done what everyone expected and built their business to fit neatly into the existing system and earn the industry's stamp of approval.  Instead, they chose a different path. They built their own world. They planted what they wanted to plant. They created the experience they believed in.  They followed their own conviction rather than seeking validation.  Years later, the industry created an entirely new designation to recognise what they had already become.  They didn't earn their place in the world.  They made the world come to them.  In this episode, we’ll explore the following 3 things: 1. Why designing for today's loyal guests can stop you attracting tomorrow's guests Many hotel owners keep filtering every decision through the expectations of people who already love them. But your future guests don't have expectations yet. They don't even know you exist. 2. Why looking at competitors can make you invisible When your strategy is built through benchmarking and comparison, you end up becoming a variation of what already exists. The most memorable destinations don't follow a playbook. They create one. 3. Why permission always arrives after the fact Markets do not give permission for new ideas. They recognise them later.  The conviction must come first. Recognition follows.  By the end of this episode, you'll understand why true destination brands are built from the inside out. You'll see why waiting for proof often prevents the very thing you're trying to create.  And you'll learn why the strongest brands stop asking for permission and start building the world they believe should exist.

    27 min

  4. Jun 14

    165. The Ripple That Starts With An Impossible Idea

    What if the thing holding your hotel back isn't a lack of strategy, funding, or capability?  What if it's a vision that isn't bold enough?  In this episode, I share a story from my childhood about a hotel owner in Kenya who insisted on building what everyone said was impossible: a hanging swimming pool suspended over the hotel entrance with no visible support beams. Every single person of the design team deemed that hanging swimming pool as imposible.  One person said yes. And the ripple from that decision is still being felt nearly four decades later. That one person who said yes was my father. My father was a structural engineer who specialised in hotel projects back home in Kenya. One of his clients wanted something what back then was considered “crazy”: a swimming pool that appeared to hang in mid-air over the hotel's driveway. The international hotel chain rejected the idea immediately because that wasn’t how things were done according to their brand standards. But my father accepted the challenge. What followed was months of obsession, experimentation, late nights, failed attempts, and relentless problem-solving. Eventually, the team found a way. The pool was built and it still stands today. What fascinates me isn't the swimming pool itself. It's the ripple effect that impossible idea created. It activated an entire team. It inspired people to think differently. It became the landmark project of their careers. And it raises an important question: What happens when we stop having impossible ideas?   In this episode, we'll explore the following: 1. Why preservation is often fear wearing the mask of respect Many second-generation entrepreneurs believe their role is to protect what was built before them. But the thing they inherited wasn't the hotel. It was the audacity that created it. 2. Why waiting for everyone to agree is slowing you down The need for consensus often causes bold ideas to become smaller and safer. We'll explore why leadership sometimes requires moving before everyone is comfortable. 3. Why your future cannot be built around your past The guests, team members, and business model that got you here may not be the ones that take you where you want to go next.  At some point, every leader must decide whether they are preserving a legacy or contributing to it.  By the end of this episode you'll understand why every landmark business begins with an idea that initially feels impossible. You'll see why the success of your hotel can never outperform the vision you have for it.  And you'll identify the hidden beliefs that may be causing you to make your biggest ideas smaller than they need to be.

    35 min

  5. Jun 7

    164. Hospitality’s Wellness Deficit

    Most hotels focus on creating a better stay.  Disney focuses on creating a stronger emotional connection.  And that subtle makes all the difference.  In this episode, I explore what the hospitality industry can learn from Walt Disney and why I believe many of us have become so focused on luxury that we've forgotten something far more powerful: wonder.   While writing the first chapter of my second book, I found myself asking a simple question.  Why do families save for years to go to Disneyland?  Why do children dream about it?  Why are people willing to spend extraordinary amounts of money and invest so much emotional energy into an experience long before they arrive?  Here’s what came up.  People don't save for luxury.  They save for wonder.  Walt Disney understood that his job wasn't to build attractions. His job was to build a world. A place where something extraordinary might happen.  And the more I thought about it, the more I realised that hospitality has become exceptionally good at creating luxury, but not necessarily wonder.  In today’s episode, we’ll cover the following 3 things:   1.- The Wonder Deficit I believe many hotels suffer from what I call a wonder deficit. A hotel can be beautiful, luxurious, impeccably run. And guests can still forget it. Because luxury creates admiration. Wonder creates emotional connection. And emotional connection is what people remember. 2. The Anticipation Gap Most hotels behave as though the guest experience begins at check-in. Disney understands that the experience begins when the dream begins. The planning. The conversations. The excitement. The anticipation. By the time a family arrives at Disney, they are already emotionally attached. The experience didn't create the attachment. The anticipation did. 3. We May Be Asking the Wrong Question The hospitality industry often asks:  "How do we improve the guest experience?"  I think there's a better question.  "How do we become part of the guest's imagination before they arrive?"  Because once you start designing for imagination rather than simply operations, the entire experience changes.  By the end of this episode, you'll know what the hospitality industry can learn from Disney, why luxury alone is no longer enough to create lasting loyalty, and how what I call the Wonder Deficit may be the hidden reason so many beautiful hotels remain forgettable.

    28 min

  6. May 31

    163. The Self-Audit: Know Exactly Where Your Wellness Offering Stands

    You have tried everything.  You brought in a new therapist and a seasoned wellness director. You redesigned the menu. You invested in equipment you were told would make the difference. And you are still sitting here, looking at a wellness offering that is not performing the way you need it to perform.  The frustrating part is not that things aren't working. The frustrating part is that you don't know why.  What if the answer had nothing to do with any of those things?   What if the answer was already inside your business, waiting for you to look at it clearly?  That is what this episode is about.  But first, let me tell you what I have seen.  I know you didn't just stumble into this. You were intentional. You had a vision for what your wellness offering would mean: for your guests, your team, and for the legacy you are building with this property. Every decision you made was deliberate.  And yet here you are. What you have today looks nothing like what you imagined. And the harder you try to fix it, the more desperate you feel, because every new solution creates a new problem, and the cycle never seems to end.  Here is what I have seen with every single boutique hotel owner I have worked with in the last decade: the problem is almost never what they think it is.   They are fixing the wrong thing. Because they have never had a tool that shows them exactly where to look.  This episode gives you that tool. It is called the self-audit. It is the first thing I give every owner before we work together, because without it, even the best guidance in the world lands in the wrong place.  In today’s episode, we’ll cover the following 3 things:    1.- Why there are only two reasons your wellness offering is underperforming, and why knowing which one applies to you changes how you approach your business.  2.- The seven simple questions that tell you exactly where your problem lies  3.- How to use your answers to make smarter, faster decisions about your wellness offering, with or without outside help  By the end of this episode, you will have a clear, honest picture of where your wellness offering actually stands today, and you will know whether you have a design problem or a stewardship problem.

    26 min

  7. May 24

    162. You Can’t Standardise A Soul

    Think about your most loyal returning guests, the ones who come back year after year, without a discount, without a loyalty programme, without being chased.  Now ask yourself honestly: why are they coming back? It's not your brand. It's a person, a special place, an indescribable feeling that exists nowhere else on earth.  That distinction is key. Because if you're trying to grow your boutique hotel collection by borrowing the playbook from larger hotel chains, you may be destroying the very thing your guests keep returning for.  I'm currently working with a family who own seven boutique hotels, beautiful properties in beautiful locations, built over two generations. The second generation recently took the reins and, quite naturally, started looking at what the big brands do: collections, brand standards, a recognisable guest journey across all properties.  It made complete sense on paper. So they went down that road.  Within a year, they started to notice an important change they didn’t expect.   The waiter who knew every returning guest by name and their favourite table was being retrained on service standards. The wellness therapist guests would drive hours to see was now following five-star protocols that weren't written for her or for them.  The hotels were more standardised than ever. Yet the repeat guests were coming back less.  In today’s episode, I’d like to tackle why that happened.  Today, I’ll uncover the following:  1.- Why "brand loyalty" and "relational loyalty" are structurally opposite, and why confusing the two is costing boutique hotel owners their most valuable guests  2.- Why the chain hotel playbook doesn't just fail in boutique hotels, it actively works against you, and what to reach for instead  3.- The Renga framework — a different way of thinking about coherence across a multi-property collection, one that preserves what makes each hotel irreplaceable while still creating something unified  By the end of this episode, you'll see that the thing you're most tempted to standardise is the thing you most need to protect. And you'll have a clear, practical lens for building a coherent boutique hotel collection, without flattening the soul out of each property to do it.

    27 min

  8. May 17

    161. The Employee That Nobody Remembered

    What if the belief that you genuinely care about your team is the very thing stopping you from ever changing anything?  Today I want to talk about how a thought, a well-intentioned, completely sincere thought, can become the most expensive belief in your business.  A few years ago I sat in a meeting with a hotel manager. She'd called me in to review my therapist manning. I'd asked for extra support staff, our team was at capacity (a good problem to have).  What followed was a line-by-line negotiation over my spreadsheet. We were nickelling and diming over hours. A five-star property. A hotel manager who genuinely cared about the team. And me, someone who had built a career on protecting my therapists.  But here's the irony.  I have been that hotel manager. Not in that meeting, but in others. I have sat across from someone on my team, heard everything they said, felt the truth of it, and still made the decision that contradicted it. Because in that moment, I was running a completely different thought. A thought about cost. About optimisation. About what the business needed right now.  And that thought won.  It always wins. Because the mode, the P&L, the budget review, the productivity spreadsheet, generates that thought automatically.   The thought creates the pressure, the pressure creates the decision. And genuine care about our people doesn't interrupt that loop.   That's what this episode is about.  In today’s episode, I’ll cover three things:  1.- The disconnect between what we believe about our people and the decisions we actually make   Most of us walk into a budget meeting genuinely believing we value our team. And we walk out having made a decision that contradicts that. We call it a tough call. We call it the reality of business. But what if it's neither of those things? What if it's simply the predictable output of a model that was never designed to hold both thoughts at once, and the wrong one keeps winning?  2.- The difference between caring about your team and caring for them.  Caring about is a feeling. You see someone struggling, you sit with them, you mean every word you say. It's real and it costs you nothing. Caring for is a decision. It's the policy you change, the cost you incur, the conversation you have with the VIP client when you tell them the treatment isn't happening tonight. One lives in your values. The other lives in your budget, and your actions. Most leaders have an abundance of the first and a shortage of the second, and their teams know the difference.  3.- Why employee wellbeing will never work as a People & Culture initiative.  As long as employee wellbeing sits in a separate conversation from guest experience, it will always lose. It will always be the softer priority, the initiative that gets shelved when things get tight, the value on the wall that doesn't survive contact with the P&L. The only way it works is when it becomes structurally inseparable from the guest experience strategy.    By the end of this episode, you'll see that the problem was never that you didn't care enough. The problem is the thought you're running when the decision actually gets made.

    42 min
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Get insights firsthand! Join top global wellness expert and author, Sonal Uberoi, as she shares insights from hoteliers all over the world, managing all types of hotels, each with their unique set of challenges (location, owners, regulations, teams, etc.), and learn their wellness in hospitality best practices.

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