This paper reviews and critiques the management practices of Kimpton Hotels and Restaurants, a boutique hotel chain headquartered in San Francisco operating 65 hotels and 82 restaurants across 33 cities. The paper examines Kimpton's employee benefits — including parental leave, health coverage, tuition reimbursement, and pet insurance — alongside its longstanding commitment to LGBT inclusion, evidenced by a perfect score on the Human Rights Campaign's Corporate Equality Index for eleven consecutive years. The paper also explores Kimpton's environmental initiatives through its EarthCare program, outlining five management lessons drawn from the program's successful implementation and measurable environmental and financial outcomes.
The Kimpton Hotel chain features 65 hotels, and the company operates 82 restaurants in 33 cities. Headquartered in San Francisco and known for their quality and uniqueness, these boutique hotels and restaurants are also recognized as excellent places to work. Kimpton has taken notably open-minded positions when it comes to hiring minorities, women, and members of the LGBT community. Management at these properties is progressive in its approach to both guests and employees. This paper reviews and critiques Kimpton Hotels and Restaurants in terms of the quality of their management practices.
An article in Fortune points out that Kimpton offers six weeks of parental leave, preventative health services for women, and hearing and vision care for all employees. Kimpton also offers backup childcare and elder care, and one particularly distinctive benefit is pet insurance — the company even gives employees time off to grieve if their pet dies (Fortune, 2016).
According to the Great Place to Work website, Kimpton offers up to six weeks of parental leave for partners, mothers, and fathers for several qualifying reasons, including welcoming a new child through adoption or live birth. Employees interviewed on the Great Place to Work site reported a 97% agreement with the statement "I can be myself around here," which aligns well with Kimpton's company motto: "I can be me."
Kimpton hotels and restaurants offer a tuition reimbursement program of up to $1,500 per year and $100 per semester for books, applicable to courses related to employees' careers (greatplacetowork.com). The company also pays 65% of full health coverage for employees' dependents and 70% for employees themselves. Additional benefits include dry cleaning, fitness classes, free daily lunches, and onsite healthcare services such as flu shots, cholesterol tests, blood pressure screenings, and complete biometric screenings (greatplacetowork.com).
Furthermore, senior managers are eligible for month-long sabbaticals after seven years of service; however, there is a meaningful caveat — they must commit to fully disconnecting from work emails and phone calls during that time (Fortune, p. 1).
Fortune ranked Kimpton as the 20th best place to work in 2016, down from 11th the previous year. In 2013, Fortune Magazine ranked Kimpton 21st out of 257 companies surveyed, based on "employees' attitudes on management, job satisfaction, and company culture" (Shankman, 2014).
"Corporate Equality Index scores and HIV charity partnerships"
In the publication Hotel Executive, writer Jeff Slye explains that as early as 1985, Kimpton's management had embraced the goal of becoming environmentally responsible. That year, they created a rooftop park at the Galleria Park Hotel and developed the eco-friendly Hotel Triton. Kimpton's top executives subsequently hired a leading business consultancy called Business Evolution Consulting, which helped Kimpton create one of the most comprehensive eco-programs in the boutique hotel industry — a program called "EarthCare" (Slye, 2016).
The program has paid significant dividends for the environment, for hotel guests, and for Kimpton's bottom line. Within a short period, Kimpton had saved hundreds of trees, removed thousands of gallons of toxic cleaning supplies from rivers and oceans, and tracked over $500,000 in new revenue attributed to EarthCare (Slye, p. 1). Slye identifies five lessons other hotels can draw from Kimpton's experience.
The first lesson is that hotel managers do not need to be environmental idealists to demonstrate a genuine commitment to reducing their property's carbon footprint. When the EarthCare program began to be adopted by competitors, Kimpton's COO Niki Leondakis responded: "What could be better for the environment and EarthCare than having our program adopted by every hotel in the industry?" (Slye, p. 1).
The second lesson is that when vendors cannot supply the environmentally friendly products required, hotels should seek out vendors that can meet those standards. The third lesson is to form a dedicated working committee that will review and evaluate all products and practices from both an environmental and a financial perspective (Slye, p. 2).
The fourth lesson emphasizes the importance of communication. Kimpton involved management from all 65 hotels in the search for eco-friendly vendors and ran a company-wide contest — open to employees at all properties — to surface the best eco-friendly ideas (Slye, p. 2). The fifth and final lesson concerns momentum: every two weeks, each hotel is audited to assess EarthCare progress and sustain the program's forward energy (Slye, p. 2).
It is very clear that Kimpton Hotels and Restaurants are known for outstanding benefits for all employees, regardless of gender orientation, and are equally recognized for their commitment to environmental responsibility. Taken together, Kimpton's progressive management practices in the areas of employee welfare, inclusion, and sustainability suggest that the company has set a meaningful standard for both employee justice and environmental stewardship in the boutique hospitality industry.
You’re 71% through this paper. Sign up to read the remaining 1 section.
Sign Up Now — Instant Access Already a member? Log inAlways verify citation format against your institution’s current style guide requirements.