World-class luxury guest experiences

How do you define luxury service? At the Oberoi Group, it means following a simple philosophy: The guest is everything.

Since Mr. Mohan Singh Oberoi established his first luxury hotel in India in 1934, the Oberoi Group has garnered a global presence and reputation. Its 30 hotels, two cruise ships, and numerous travel-related services have won multiple awards for excellence. The group aims to deliver a luxury experience where every guest feels truly seen, heard, and understood. The key to achieving that level of service is people. Every person working at Oberoi Group must understand how to exceed guest expectations with every interaction.

Mr. Oberoi created the Oberoi Centre of Learning and Development (OCLD) in 1966 as a premiere training center to cultivate and share best practices for all Group employees. Traditional academic programs don’t prepare hospitality students for everything they need to deliver luxury service. OCLD changed the paradigm, setting a new industry benchmark with its mix of academic and practical training for all staff. The Group measures the impact of training through customer satisfaction scores, emphasizing the importance of guest service.

Today, OCLD has transformed into a corporate university supporting all levels of staff, from interns and entry-level associates to high-potential executives and managers. It delivers over 15,000 training programs annually across business units. Due to its reputation as one of the best hospitality programs in Asia, graduates have gone on to become leading executives at Oberoi Group and top hotels across India.

Leaders at OCLD, including Vice President Sangeetha Gandhi and former Deputy Vice President Pratibha Seth, now Vice President, Oberoi Contact Centre, take pride in how the training program has helped Oberoi hotels and resorts earn exceptional industry rankings and high customer satisfaction ratings around the world.

“Oberoi Group is unmatched in the industry in its commitment to delivering top, luxury service through learning and development,” says Gandhi. “Everyone from the top down is truly engaged. Our desire to do more for guests motivates us to create better learning for all employees.”

Gandhi, Seth, and the rest of the OCLD team constantly explore new ways to weave training into employee’s daily jobs. The team created a hybrid online/offline program with Adobe Learning Manager that blends standard training with flexible lessons that can only be taught on the job.

Balancing face-to-face training for better service

For Oberoi, only one thing determines the quality of its training program: customer experience. The Oberoi learning team knows that hands-on, personalized training is integral to achieving high customer satisfaction and giving it a Net Promoter Score of around 88%. New employees learn the tools of the trade by watching more established employees go the extra mile for customers. They watch how staff greet guests to make a great first impression, clean a room to exacting standards, or create an unforgettable dining experience.

But there are still many lessons best learned through independent study or group classroom environments. There’s required informational topics, such as IT security, human trafficking prevention, and fire and safety regulations. Depending on their role, employees may need to practice working with hotel operating software, learn how to mix common cocktails, or study kitchen hygiene standards. Scheduling training and tracking progress for thousands of employees working in dozens of locations can be challenging, increasing the risk that some staff might miss out on critical skill development. Staff now work with the Adobe learning management system (LMS) for self-guided training.

“We use Adobe Learning Manager like an assistant to our trainers,” says Seth. “It allows us to standardize and share foundational lessons so that our training team can spend more time building upon lessons and use one-on-one time more effectively.”

This combination of self-guided learning through the LMS and in-person training helped OCLD achieve an Employee Engagement Score of 84% according to talent advisory firm Kincentric. The company recognizes great employers around the world backed by decades of employee experience data. Oberoi’s commitment to engagement allowed it to exceed even the benchmark for companies named Global Best Employer. Most importantly, the higher level of training allows Oberoi to continue raising the bar on guest service.

Luxury training for all employees

The Adobe LMS makes it easy for staff at every level to find all lessons, from assigned courses to mandatory training to refresher lessons. OCLD enrolls staff into one of seven personalized learning paths depending on their role, from new hire to executives in training. The LMS tracks completion and performance evaluations to give supervisors insight into each employee’s strengths and weaknesses to inform lessons during live and on-the-job training. Having a central learning hub also allows Oberoi to provide employees with easily discoverable optional training for people who want to start advancing their hospitality careers.

While OCLD previously measured engagement in terms of hours, the team lacked a quantifiable way of measuring progress. Quizzes now provide immediate feedback to show people if they’re properly understanding information. Trainers record and upload classroom sessions to the LMS so employees can review training or catch up on missed lessons. Other courses incorporate interactivity and gamification to make learning more fun.

The engaging learning experience has helped OCLD achieve an overall learning and development score of 89% with management programs reaching up to 95% — well exceeding even the Global Best Employer benchmark of 87%. By nurturing its employees, Oberoi can encourage retention of quality staff and stand out even amongst luxury hotel and resort experiences.

Putting trainers at the head of class management

When comparing LMS options, Seth felt that the Adobe LMS stood out for one major reason: ease of use. Unlike other solutions, which require support from third-party consultants or IT resources to manage, the OCLD team can easily make changes, add courses, and define programs by themselves. They could customize the interface to make it easy to navigate while capturing the Oberoi brand. Even integrating the LMS with the SAP human resources solution was simple using built-in connectors.

“Installation was so simple that we hardly even needed IT support,” says Seth. “The Adobe LMS empowers us to gain more control over learning so that we can focus on developing the best training for our employees.”

Developing the top hoteliers in India

OCLD continues to build out the course catalogue in the LMS to deliver even more personalized learning paths to nurture talent and encourage a culture of continuous development. Combined with excellent in-person training from experienced supervisors, Oberoi Group continually sets new standards of exceptional service.

“Nothing is more important at Oberoi than the guest experience,” says Gandhi. “Adobe Learning Manager helps us facilitate the training we need to exceed guest expectations and provide a luxury experience they’ll remember.”