Disruptive Leadership the FIVE Way

Dishaa Kappur, Group Director of HR, FIVE Hotels and Resorts

As Group Director of HR, Dishaa Kappur’s responsibilities extend across all of FIVE - FIVE Holdings, FIVE Palm Jumeirah Dubai, FIVE Jumeirah Village, and FIVE Zurich (i.e. over 1600 Tribe Members). Dishaa’s forte includes a dexterous expertise in talent management, orientation and on boarding, compensation and benefits, exit process streamlining, performance management, improving internal controls, training and business excellence, and serving as a business partner to stakeholders.  As a dynamic leader, she empowers her team of 22, to lead vital projects, deal directly with their peers across departments to ideate on tactical HR Solutions, to contribute concepts, notions and designs to improve the emotional and physical comfort of the FIVE Tribe and to work in a synergistic fashion alongside one another towards a common goal; creating a flourishing vibe at FIVE behind the scenes!

Her focus on the FIVE Family is made clear by FIVE ranked 6^th amongst best workplaces in the UAE in the 2022 Great Place to Work guide and 20^th amongst the best workplaces for Millennials in the GCC as well as a top ten organisation with the happiest employees in the region, by the same global authority on workplace culture!

Her role has been pivotal in building a strong leadership community within the FIVE Ethos. “Leadership development plays a key role in FIVE’s corporate philosophy. FIVE’s leaders are largely millennials – energised, motivated trendsetters with their sights firmly focused on the customer.”

What’s the magic sauce to creating record smashing leaders at FIVE? “I allow each and every individual to express themselves fully. Managers empower Tribe Members with skills training and an equitable platform of opportunities to reach their full potential. New joiners are encouraged to ‘dare to be different’ and to take ownership of tasks assigned.

At FIVE, leaders are always on-the-go, inspired,  positive, energized, unafraid of change, and – in true FIVE-style, fun loving! Mentoring is an essential component of the leadership development process.”

She goes on to say, “My personal leadership style is simply put – out of the box! A curated, vibrant approach to human resources to ensure the growth and development of future leaders across all departmental levels. I believe in encouraging both – creativity and commercial acumen in all Tribe Members for a holistic approach to personal progress,” She goes on to say, “Communication is key – across all levels of seniority, it is the best way to learn, grow, correct errors, ideate, and develop professional bonds in the workplace.” What makes for a great HR leader in particular? “Be present in the moment, understand every role, be cognizant of commercial goals, know your ultimate customer in order to best match a candidate to serve that very same customer and last but not least, be hands on – in the midst of operations, meetings, events etc,"

"Communication is key – across all levels of seniority, it is the best way to learn, grow, correct errors, ideate, and develop professional bonds in the workplace."

Championing inclusivity and diversity, she  says, “A forward thinking mindset, an innovator, a gregarious personality – at FIVE, this comes foremost, ahead of time-honored experience. This has enabled FIVE to cultivate a pioneering culture of boundary-breaking winners.”

Generous incentives (that are linked directly to performance a recent employee survey conducted by Aon Hewitt; they discovered the incentive pay-outs at FIVE to be 318% higher than the industry norm)  is a leading factor in FIVE’s impressive retention rate of 93.72% at FIVE Palm Jumeirah and 91.93 at FIVE Jumeirah Village.

Simply put, “FIVE is the Winners’ Circle!” she says; as her efforts in providing outstanding HR services in developing a FIVE team that stands head and shoulders above their contemporaries have resulted in room revenue growth of 131% this year with brand share in total room revenue generation being an average of 55% average for both hotels. This year, FIVE Palm Jumeirah and FIVE Jumeirah Village have consistently ranked #1 in STR comp-set for RevPAR and FIVE Hotels and Resorts is currently performing 235% higher than its comp-set in terms of TRevPAR. Due to a dedicated drive, FIVE Hotels & Resorts maintained a very impressive occupancy rate for FIVE Palm Jumeirah at 93.40% while FIVE Jumeirah Village has sustained a remarkable 95% occupancy rate bringing the average occupancy between both the hotels to a staggering 94.20%.

Dishaa concludes, “One can’t be the best-performing hotel group in the market without an adept HR department. I go to every business meeting as the voice of the Tribe to remind everyone just how important the talent and development departments are to our continued success.”