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INTERVIEW<br />
Interview with…<br />
Apurva Pratap<br />
Apurva Pratap is Vice President of Distribution & Commercial Marketing, Europe and has been heavily involved in creating<br />
the <strong>IHG</strong> ® Lowest Price Promise. Before joining <strong>IHG</strong> in 2009 Apurva held Director positions in global marketing and strategy<br />
at Starbucks Coffee Co. after crafting a successful career in the finance sector while establishing his family’s upscale resort<br />
hotel in India. We caught up with him to talk about his work-life balance, his passion for Shakespeare and childhood plans<br />
for time travel.<br />
What is your typical day like?<br />
I get up between 6:30-7:00am and my wife and I get my daughter<br />
ready for nursery. She is my first child and is two-and-a-half now,<br />
so it is precious time for us. I get into the office about 9:00am,<br />
but I’m only there about half of the time, the rest is spent travelling.<br />
A big part of my job is talking to our owner community. I go to sales<br />
and marketing subcommittee meetings, IT meetings, country owner<br />
meetings, owner board meetings. It is critical to get owner input,<br />
buy-in and endorsement because that’s what makes or breaks<br />
anything we do!<br />
You must be very proud of what <strong>IHG</strong> has achieved with Lowest<br />
Price Promise.<br />
I am very proud. It is a project that has required many teams. It’s<br />
our sales team ensuring our distribution channels are working, our<br />
brand team creating the messaging, our marketing team making<br />
sure the right message is conveyed to the right people in the right<br />
place, it’s revenue management ensuring price integrity, it’s the<br />
hotel, it’s operations; everybody had their role to play. Something<br />
that really engages the whole company is great because the whole<br />
is greater than the sum of its parts.<br />
Tell us about your most recent project, the Lowest Price Promise.<br />
It was born out of finding a way to address our guests’ key needs.<br />
They were telling us they wanted the best prices using a simple<br />
channel so over time and a lot of work, we devised our Lowest Price<br />
Promise. It’s important to emphasise that this is a promise that has<br />
real substance. It delivers the best results every time and never<br />
breaks that promise. We have rolled it out with Holiday Inn Express ®<br />
first and only when we are absolutely confident that we can achieve<br />
that across the other brands, we will roll it out to them.<br />
You are a numbers and a people man. Have you developed that<br />
balance over time?<br />
I have been fortunate to work in some fantastic organisations. When<br />
I was a consultant in McKinsey & Co. I spent a lot of time with six<br />
to eight other organisations and in general you find the thing you<br />
are most proud of is the degree to which you’ve made an impact<br />
on individuals. Yes, I take satisfaction from making an impact on a<br />
company, but it’s the impact on people that is really gratifying.<br />
Have you always had leadership in mind?<br />
I love to work in teams but I like to see myself making an impact. In<br />
school I led the debate team, the dramatics team and inter-school<br />
and collegiate competitions. Leading has always given me a great<br />
sense of pride. I think a team can achieve more than a single person<br />
and in a leadership role you get the benefit of that broader impact.<br />
So do you think you’re competitive?<br />
Absolutely! Our team won a lot of those debates in school! I always<br />
carefully choose what I take on, but when I take something on I have to<br />
do the best job possible.<br />
“<br />
I take satisfaction from making an impact<br />
on a company, but it’s the impact on people<br />
that is really gratifying.<br />
“<br />
Lowest Price Promise has been a huge project, how do you maintain<br />
a healthy work-life balance?<br />
It is naturally balanced because I love what I do. If you really love<br />
your work you don’t get home too tired to enjoy being with your<br />
family. One thing I do, which might be good or bad practice, is go<br />
through emails when everyone is asleep. It is my one little piece of<br />
time for quiet reflection and the rest of my time is spent with people.<br />
Tell us about your love of theatre.<br />
I was very fortunate in my school to get involved in theatre at a<br />
very young age. I love the fact that you immerse yourself into<br />
someone else’s life and learn about them. Learning is something<br />
that motivates me in everything I do. I especially love Shakespeare<br />
because it is so evergreen. It was written so long ago but still so<br />
much of it is true today.<br />
What did you want to be when you were a child?<br />
I always loved to travel so I wanted to be a pilot. When I was six we<br />
went to America and the 20 hours from India felt like days. I knew<br />
that the world turned in 24 hours, so I always imagined that if we<br />
flew straight up into the atmosphere and then came straight down<br />
we could get there in 12 hours just by the earth’s turning, and then<br />
if we went against the turn we could cut that in half again. It seems<br />
I was devising time travel from an early age!<br />
What are you working on at the moment?<br />
I am working on something called Loyalty 2.0 which is about building<br />
relationships with all our <strong>IHG</strong> ® Rewards Club members at different<br />
levels of loyalty. It aims to move beyond purely transactional rewards,<br />
like free nights, to build relationships that make sure we understand<br />
what matters to every customer and consistently deliver on that.<br />
Everything starts with the customer and if you get that right you can<br />
achieve anything.<br />
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