From An Accidental Start, A Rise To The Pinnacle Of Luxury Hospitality

Caroline MacDonald has been a force to reckon with in ultra-luxury hospitality for over two decades–first at Auberge Resorts Collection, where she rose up the ladder to ultimately become CMO; now, at Rosewood Hotel Group where she serves as group vice president of sales, distribution, and business performance.

Caroline MacDonald, Rosewood Hotels and Resorts group vice president of sales, distribution, and … [+] business performance

Caroline MacDonald

Rosewood is an international hotel and resort management company operating in 16 countries. Based in Hong Kong, it manages 28 ultra-luxury hotels and resorts and has three more slated to open in 2021. Rosewood prides itself on every property being entirely unique while likewise offering a customized experience for every guest who visits.  An extraordinary number of Rosewood hotels and resorts–10 properties, representing more than a third of its portfolio–are currently awarded Forbes Travel Guide’s highest rating of five stars, which is devilishly hard to achieve (and retain).

The Carlyle, a Rosewood hotel, on Manhattan’s Upper East Side

Rosewood Hotels and Resorts

I caught up with MacDonald via Zoom at her home office in Los Angeles.

Micah Solomon, senior contributor, Forbes; customer service turnaround consultant: You found your way into hospitality by an unusual route. Can you lay that out for me?

Caroline MacDonald, group vice president of sales, distribution, and business performance, Rosewood Hotels and Resorts: I served in the Air Force in Europe, first in Germany, then in Spain. I stayed on in Spain after my service, but as things started to heat up in the buildup to the first Gulf War, I thought it was prudent to move home to the U.S. When I got back to the States (this was pre-tech boom) I found that the computer skills I’d learned in the military weren’t in demand the way I’d counted on them being. So completely accidentally, I happened into a hospitality job at a modest hotel in Northern California.

I found out that I loved it, and that I was good at it. I’ve worked in hospitality ever since.

Solomon: Was there anything from your life in the military that you’ve brought to the much warmer and fuzzier world of hospitality? 

MacDonald: Discipline, teamwork, working with a diverse set of people, the need to get details right, day in and day out, the need to understand and manage the systems behind the scenes that cause that warm fuzziness to be deliverable.

Solomon: Your industry isn’t always known to being conducive to family life, due to the travel and—worse–relocation that are sometimes involved, not to mention the long and unpredictable hours.   

MacDonald: For me, thriving in this industry starts with a partner who understands how energized I get from travel—and who enjoys the travel benefits that come to both of us from my working in this industry. My partner loves how much I love the travel, and he loves the unique hospitality experiences that we get to share as a couple and as a family as a perk of my position. 

Solomon: Talk to me about luxury in the time of Covid: With safety concerns driving the need to modify–or get rid of–some of the traditional luxury touchpoints, how have you managed to remain luxurious at Rosewood?

MacDonald: Our approach has been this: we’ll never take something away without adding something new, or making the required modification special in its own right. For example: we wouldn’t wrap silverware in Saran Wrap; we’d put it in a lovely bell-like enclosed glass jar. If we need to safety-seal a minibar, we’ll do it with a gorgeous, unique ribbon. 

Solomon: Tell me about being a woman in this industry.

MacDonald: For me, the best way to answer this question is to say how seriously I take the mentoring of girls and younger women in this industry. I love when I hear from women who have found themselves in tough situations that they’ve developed a habit of thinking, “WWCD – What would Caroline do?”–or that a small nugget of advice I once gave is still standing them in good stead.

Solomon:  What’s a day in the life look like for Ms. MacDonald?

MacDonald: My day starts early and moves with the sun, from Europe at daybreak to Asia in the evening. My days are long days. My life may look glamorous if you follow me on social media, but it’s made up of a daunting amount of work: making sure we deliver to customers all over the world and that our interactions with all the people involved in developing, operationalizing, and sustaining our special brand of hospitality are successful.