Alejandro Reynal is the perfect CEO for Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts, I learned from talking to him for CEO Agenda. Thanks to Lynn Yu for making the intro.
If you’d ask an advanced AI model to come up with the ideal CEO for Four Seasons, the luxury hospitality group owned by Bill Gates that operates 130 hotels in 47 countries, and offers “experiential offerings” on yachts, jets, and the world’s most exclusive bars and restaurants, I figure it would suggest someone like Alejandro Reynal.
Reynal looks the part: in his early 50s, the hospitality executive is well-groomed, likes to stay fit, and has his home base in Miami, a city that bathes in new luxury developments. The Harvard Business School graduate also speaks in a polished and polite way, exuding the sense of high-end hospitality synonymous with the hotel group.
Reynal’s answers in today’s CEO Agenda reinforce that image. He reveals that some top managers really do live and lead in a textbook way. Reynal gets up at 5 a.m. for a workout and meditation, likes to clear his inbox at the end of each day, and looks up to giants of the managerial class, such as Roberto Goizueta, the former Coca-Cola CEO.
If other CEOs in this series indicate some hints of eccentricity or peculiar personality traits, in our more personal questions, Reynal displayed none of it, either. His favorite company as a consumer? Four Seasons, he said at first, before reverting to Montblanc, the Swiss high-end pen manufacturer. Even our Zoom conversation was timed to perfection.
Though being so “perfect” isn’t my style – my inbox is currently at 8,307 unread, and I’m lucky if I get a workout once a week – I found it somehow fitting that the head of the world’s most luxurious hospitality group does live up to the image. This may be the smoothest, most polished #CEO Agenda so far. And that’s alright with me.