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The Michelle Pascoe Hospitality Podcast

The Michelle Pascoe Hospitality Podcast

By: Michelle Pascoe
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Welcome to The Michelle Pascoe Hospitality Podcast, where we explore the heart of the hospitality industry through conversations with leaders, experts, and innovators. Each episode brings you insights, practical advice, and inspiring stories that help you elevate guest experiences, enhance team performance, and stay ahead of industry trends. Whether you're an owner, manager, or passionate professional, this podcast will ignite your passion for hospitality. Tune in, learn, and grow with us! Economics Management Management & Leadership Marketing Marketing & Sales
Episodes
  • Why the Best Leaders in Hospitality Are Unforgettable

    Why the Best Leaders in Hospitality Are Unforgettable
    Jun 30 2026
    Real hospitality leadership reduces staff turnover, lifts team productivity, and builds guest loyalty — and according to Eoin Clancy, Principal Associate at Galileo Hospitality Consultants and a 40-year veteran of Hilton, Marriott, and the Cheesecake Factory, the clearest measure of a great leader is simple: would your team drop everything to work with you again? Would you pass that test? Michelle Pascoe is a Certified Speaking Professional and hospitality training expert with over 30 years' experience helping clubs, hotels, and hospitality venues build service cultures that retain staff and delight guests. In this episode, Michelle sits down with Eoin Clancy for a candid, experience-rich conversation about what servant leadership looks like in practice, why the hospitality revolving door keeps spinning, and what it actually takes to slow it down. Servant leadership works in hospitality because it creates the conditions where people stay longer, work harder, achieve their KPIs, and genuinely enjoy their jobs. Eoin learned this first-hand under a general manager at a 1,674-room Marriott in Atlanta who knew the names of all 1,800 staff members. Not from name badges. He actually knew them. That is what retention looks like in practice. Michelle Pascoe and Eoin also explore the multigenerational workforce challenge facing hospitality operators right now, and why blending age groups on the floor creates a stabilising dynamic that younger-only or older-only teams simply cannot replicate. Key Takeaways Servant leadership in hospitality is more aspirational than practised, and the gap between the two is costing operators staff, guests, and profitability. A leader who genuinely knows their team by name — not from badges — creates a level of loyalty and productivity that no KPI framework can manufacture. Reducing staff turnover starts with understanding the season of life each team member is in, and adapting how you support them accordingly. A blended multigenerational workforce is a deliberate retention strategy, not a compromise — experienced staff stabilise younger team members and reduce the speed of the revolving door. Consistency in systems, standards, and service is the foundation every successful hospitality operation is built on, regardless of format or price point. Next Steps Subscribe to The Michelle Pascoe Hospitality Podcast on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, and Spotify: https://www.michellepascoe.com/The-Michelle-Pascoe-Hospitality-Podcast Join Michelle's newsletter for leadership, culture, and service excellence: https://www.michellepascoe.com/blog Book customer service workshops and middle management programs tailored to clubs, hotels, and hospitality venues: https://www.michellepascoe.com/traininganddevelopmentprograms About Michelle Michelle Pascoe helps hospitality leaders build multigenerational teams, lift service standards, and embed values-led culture. A Certified Speaking Professional with over 30 years in the hospitality industry and Disney Institute Alumni credentials, Michelle delivers bespoke keynotes, workshops, and leadership programs for clubs, hotels, and hospitality venues across Australia and internationally. Book customer service workshops and middle management programs: https://www.michellepascoe.com/traininganddevelopmentprograms About Eoin Eoin Clancy is the Principal Associate at Galileo Hospitality Consultants and a seasoned hospitality professional with 40 years of hard-won experience across Hilton, Marriott, the Crowne Plaza, and the Cheesecake Factory. He has designed, built, and opened operations across Europe, the United States, and the Middle East, including his own multi-unit ventures. Eoin now brings that operational depth to hospitality businesses navigating leadership, culture, and performance challenges. Website: www.galileohospitality.co.uk
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    44 mins
  • Why Poor Service Keeps Winning in Clubs (And What It Actually Takes to Change It)

    Why Poor Service Keeps Winning in Clubs (And What It Actually Takes to Change It)
    Jun 23 2026
    Poor customer service keeps winning in registered clubs because the cost of inaction is invisible. Hospitality training expert Michelle Pascoe, a Certified Speaking Professional with over 30 years in the industry, explains that until club leaders build a single service liability number, training investment stays optional, budgets stay cut, and service standards keep drifting.What would change at your club if the board could finally see what poor service is actually costing them?In this episode, Michelle identifies the structural reason service training doesn't stick: the environment it lands in was never designed to hold it. Training works because the culture surrounding it reinforces it. When middle managers aren't modelling the same standards, when recognition systems only notice what goes wrong, and when frontline staff intelligence never reaches the decision-making level, even the best workshop evaporates within weeks.The same revolving door that loses members also loses good people. Every time a service-oriented team member leaves, they take with them the member relationships they built, the institutional knowledge they developed, and the standard they were holding.Key Takeaways Poor service persists in clubs not because nobody cares, but because the cost of inaction never appears as a single number alongside the cost of acting. Service training fails to stick when the middle management layer hasn't been developed to reinforce and model the same standards on the floor. A recognition culture that only notices what goes wrong actively undermines what training is trying to build. The intelligence frontline staff gather about member experience rarely reaches decision-making level because the loop is structurally broken. Changing club service culture requires three things operating together: leadership that understands service as a commercial priority, a visible recognition culture, and training that is reinforced rather than delivered and forgotten. Next Steps Reach out to michelle@michellepascoe.com for a free copy of The Real Cost of Poor Service Calculation Guide - a practical tool for club and hospitality leaders who've ever hit budget or board resistance when making the case for training investment. Subscribe to The Michelle Pascoe Hospitality Podcast on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, and Spotify: https://www.michellepascoe.com/The-Michelle-Pascoe-Hospitality-Podcast Join Michelle's newsletter for leadership, culture, and service excellence: https://www.michellepascoe.com/blog Book customer service workshops and middle management programs tailored to clubs, hotels, and hospitality venues: https://www.michellepascoe.com/traininganddevelopmentprogram About Michelle Michelle Pascoe helps hospitality leaders build multigenerational teams, lift service standards, and embed values-led culture. A Certified Speaking Professional with over 30 years in the hospitality industry, Michelle delivers bespoke keynotes, workshops, and leadership programs for clubs, hotels, and hospitality venues across Australia and internationally. Book customer service workshops and middle management programs: https://www.michellepascoe.com/traininganddevelopmentprograms
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    14 mins
  • Is Customer Experience Dead or Just Changing in Hospitality?

    Is Customer Experience Dead or Just Changing in Hospitality?
    Jun 16 2026
    Is customer experience dead? No -- but the way hospitality leaders have been managing it is. Rick Denton, host of CX Passport and a 30-year corporate customer experience veteran, joins Michelle Pascoe to explain why CX as a discipline isn't dying, but the branding around it is -- and what hospitality leaders must do differently to stay ahead. Are your venues investing in the right things, or are you cutting the very people who make the guest experience worth returning for? In this conversation, Michelle and Rick get specific about what hospitality leaders are getting wrong right now -- from over-relying on data dashboards without acting on them, to cutting frontline staff in the name of efficiency and wondering why revenue is falling. Rick's view is direct: CX will never die because customers and experiences will always exist. What's dying is the version of CX that couldn't prove its value in dollars. Key Takeaways Why the branding of customer experience is fading and what hospitality leaders should focus on instead. How AI is freeing frontline staff to spend more time with guests -- and how companies are getting that trade-off dangerously wrong. Why CX data and dashboards are worthless unless leaders take meaningful, revenue-linked action on what they find. How frontline teams hold the most valuable guest insight in any venue, and why most leaders never access it properly. What hospitality leaders must do to stay relevant as AI, cost pressure, and the polycrisis converge. Next Steps Subscribe to The Michelle Pascoe Hospitality Podcast on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, and Spotify: https://www.michellepascoe.com/The-Michelle-Pascoe-Hospitality-Podcast Join Michelle's newsletter for leadership, culture, and service excellence: https://www.michellepascoe.com/blog Book customer service workshops and middle management programs tailored to clubs, hotels, and hospitality venues: https://www.michellepascoe.com/traininganddevelopmentprograms About Michelle Michelle Pascoe helps hospitality leaders build multigenerational teams, lift service standards, and embed values-led culture. A Certified Speaking Professional with over 30 years in the hospitality industry, Michelle delivers bespoke keynotes, workshops, and leadership programs for clubs, hotels, and hospitality venues across Australia and internationally. Book customer service workshops and middle management programs: https://www.michellepascoe.com/traininganddevelopmentprograms About Rick Rick Denton is the creator and host of CX Passport, a global customer experience podcast with more than 250 episodes and listeners in over 100 countries. Before podcasting, Rick spent three decades leading customer-focused initiatives inside large organisations. He is also the co-host of The Loud Quiet, a podcast and community he launched with his wife Clancy for empty nesters navigating a major life transition -- which became the basis for their 2026 book, The Loud Quiet: Love, Laughter and Life in the Empty Nest. Rick is based in Dallas, Texas. CX Passport: https://www.cxpassport.com CX Passport on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@cxpassport The Loud Quiet: https://www.theloudquiet.com
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    39 mins
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