We are looking for a Director of People & Culture to join our pre-opening team at Mandarin Oriental, Vienna, set to open in Summer 2025.

Mandarin Oriental, Vienna will be housed in a heritage building and comprise 151 guestrooms and suites surrounding a courtyard in the centre of the property, incorporating a restaurant, bar and outdoor garden. The property will also house a Spa at Mandarin Oriental featuring a series of treatment rooms, a swimming pool and a well-equipped fitness centre. A range of adaptable banqueting and meeting spaces will be available for events and social occasions.

The 17 Residences at Mandarin Oriental will be located on the top two floors of the building and will have private access to the roof, with several of the apartments offering outdoor terraces and stunning citywide views. These will be some of the most exclusive apartments in the city, with owners enjoying Mandarin Oriental’s legendary service and direct access to the hotel’s facilities.

As the Director of People & Culture, you will be the business partner to the General Manager and Leadership team, responsible for translating business strategies into relevant and actionable P&C plans. You will be responsible for building a cohesive People & Culture Team with competencies to deliver value-added HR solutions, which will create the MO culture to attract, retain and engage talents with an emphasis on creating colleague experiences that replicates the ones that MO would expect our guests to experience and to identify key performance measures to track the return on investment of People & Culture programs and services.

The Director of People & Culture will be responsible for the following:

• Formulation and implementation of the People & Culture strategy related to the hotel’s daily operational needs ensuring consistent guest services, colleague productivity, and safety while constantly striving for improvement.
• Formulation and implementation of the hotels involvement in the local community together with members of the Leadership Team.
• Development of colleagues through coaching, mentoring and general communications. To use the Balanced Score Card and other appraisal formats as tools for goals and target settings and to engage in feedback.
• Partner with the Senior Management team to devise, communicate and implement organizational structure, People & Culture programmes and activities that support ongoing business needs and deliver business outcomes.
• Provide effective tools and processes within the employee life cycle in the areas of recruitment, selection and orientation, learning and development, performance management, talent management and compensation and benefits programmes with the goal to attract and retain enthusiastic, and skilled colleagues who will deliver exceptional guest/colleague experiences in line with our brand promise.
• Develop a strategy for talent acquisition and recruitment taking into consideration the local nuances as well as retention of key colleagues.
• Define and communicate relevant HR and People & Culture metrics and/or KPIs to track the return on investment of programmes and services.
• Keep abreast of newest trends and innovations in the marketplace and be aware of competitors.
• Responsible for the compliance of relevant local labour laws and legislations.
• Act as the agent of continuous transformation, shaping processes and a culture that together improve the organisation’s capacity for change;
• Provide an infrastructure of planned training and development activity that meets the hotel, company and the individual.
• Responsible in driving the rationalisation of both the fixed and variable Human Resources expenses. Ensure alignments with the financial objectives and forecasts.

What are we looking for?

• Extensive Human Resources Experience in Hospitality operations. Experience in Luxury Hotels preferred.
• Excellent leadership skills. Able to partner with GM and leadership team to foster our MO People and Culture agenda.
• Effective communication skills both written and spoken, in German and English, with strong presentation skills.
• Ability to assemble, analyse, understand integrated spreadsheets, and complex information.
• Prioritisation and organisational skills necessary to meet deadlines and project execution.
• Knowledgeable of Austrian legislation and processes and proficiency in payroll and HR systems.