After completing the Baccalaureate, I had to make a choice regarding studies and my future. I always enjoyed inviting people to my parents’ house and organising dinner and making cake and pastries, and at first I wanted to go into a kitchen and be a pastry chef but I realised there were more opportunities in hospitality generally, so I did an MBA at hospitality school.

My first job was at Accor, the Hotel Sofitel near the Arc de Triomphe in the centre of Paris. I was the housekeeping manager for the ladies and men who were cleaning. I had to inspect all the rooms to make sure everything was perfect because it was a 5-star hotel; it was a high standard.

It was not easy because it was my first job at 18, and to manage women and men who were twice my age or more, my parents’ age, that was tough but in the end we had a great rapport because they finally understood I was working with them and that I could give them any help they needed. It was one of my best experiences in hospitality because I learnt how to treat people; it was great to have that opportunity in a luxury hotel.

During my studies, I decided to explore all areas of the hotel, so after housekeeping, I went to reception, then F&B as a waitress, then I discovered finance and finally human resources – this department is fantastic and it is for me.

Although all my experiences were amazing and I learnt many things, when I did my first internship in human resources, it was at the Hotel Fairmont in Canada, it was still in luxury, and it was wonderful. That is when I realised that thanks to my bits of knowledge of various aspects of hospitality, it was easy to recruit, train and help people, understand them and create a good atmosphere in the hotel.

I graduated my MBA in Hospitality Management and then decided to do another MBA into International Human Resources with an Erasmus in Madrid, Spain.

Today, I am working in Paris which is where I was born and where I did my studies; I am at the Pullman Paris Montparnasse, a premium hotel, and I am still in HR. I am now in training and talent experience to attract, maintain and create connections between people.

Hospitality is about people and for me this is the main point; with customers and talent and the connection that exists between them, we can create something that is much more than a hotel and a company. That is important because we spend half our time or more at work, so it needs to be fun; it is essential that everyone wants to come to work.

At the moment I am working on training and talent experience and every two weeks there is an integration week where we welcome all the new talents. We are the biggest hotel Accor in Europe with 500 employees, so we are hiring and training a lot of people and the integration week is huge.

I give them some training and talk about the Pullman brand image. I spend a week with them and almost every week some new talents come to thank me because they say they are strongly motivated “and this is partly thanks to you, you gave that to me”. This is a success!

To be a Heartist®, you need to be real, authentic and to have empathy. That is key to understanding other people, to understand why a person is smiling one day and not another, to notice, and to try do something to change that. This empathy is essential with customers and colleagues.

My advice to people new to the industry is to ask as many questions as you can, do not hesitate; there is no such thing as a stupid question! Make as many mistakes as possible because that lets you grow and rise into hotel and the company, and your own life; then start again until you grow.