Em Portugal, a célebre cadeia hoteleira, fundada em 1919 por Conrad Hilton, já está presente no Algarve, com o Conrad Algarve e o Hilton Vilamoura As Cascatas, devendo ainda arrancar este ano, em Óbidos, o Hilton Bom Sucesso.

A gestão do Fontana passou para o grupo Hilton graças a um acordo com a proprietária, a Turismadeira. A cadeia optou por estrear na cidade a sua chancela DoubleTree, insígnia de luxo contemporâneo que existe em vários países desde 1969.

O Fontana abriu nos finais de 2007, ocupando um edifício do início do séc. XX que chegou a ser a antiga metalúrgica Lisbonense.

"Estamos entusiasmados por entrarmos numa fascinante e histórica capital com o que é uma propriedade impressionante", comentava John Greenleaf, responsável pela marca. A promessa: oferecerá “uma variedade de serviços de luxo para todos os hóspedes", com uma "equipa única e atenciosa” e “comprometida com a comunidade local”.

Com 139 quartos, dois restaurantes, um bar e nove salas de conferências, um duplo no Double Tree by Hilton Lisbon reserva-se a partir de 80€.

New hotel of the Fontecruz Hotels hotel chain part of Authograph Collection - created by Marriott hotel group to market the luxury and design hotels around the world. The agreement allow the Fontecruz Lisbon customers to enter the loyalty program Marriott Rewards and take advantage of its benefits.

Fontecruz Hotel Lisbon will be the first hotel in Portugal to be part of the brand Autograph Collection. This innovative project of the Marriott group launched in January 2012 is included in the flags of luxury and lifestyle that the U.S. hotel chain is developing around the world and which has already incorporated more than 25 hotels.

TOP 25 CV Tips in 2014

The job search game is becoming increasingly competitive, and it isn’t going to change in 2014. If anything, it’s going to up the ante. Forget sitting around all day clicking APPLY to find a job. And while you’re at it, you can throw all those old resume rules right out the window. Here are TOP 25 Curriculum Vitae or resume tips: 

Create a master resume and commit to keeping it updated. When you suddenly find yourself job searching, and you sit down to write your resume, it can be awfully difficult to recall all the numbers, figures, accomplishments, and successes you’ve had over the last 10-15 years of your career. It’s much easier to keep a log of it as it happens. Sure, it might take a couple of minutes a month to jot down your most notable achievements, and to keep a log of them; but when you sit down to write your resume or work with a professional resume writer, you’ll thank me.

Consider creating a social media resume. Check out www.careercloud.com and review the information about social media resumes there. When you’re looking for a way to build, authenticate, and deliver your professional brand, this is one impressive and modern way to do it. Are you a do-it-yourselfer? If so, check out this step-by-step method for creating your own social media resume: http://mashable.com/2009/01/13/social-media-resume/

While you’re in your creative mode, think about an infographic resume. Would an infographic resume benefit you? The concept has been around for a couple of years, but it hasn’t been widely used by job search candidates. It could be an interesting way to stand out from the crowd. Especially if you’re in a field where this type of resume would be appropriate to use like more conservative types of positions such as banker or lawyer.

Thinking outside the box … Your resume on Facebook? I found this interesting article that lists 10 trendsetting ways to create a resume. One of the more interesting is #10—the ability to create a timeline resume within Facebook. http://thenextweb.com/lifehacks/2012/04/07/10-new-ways-to-build-a-kick-ass-digital-resume/

Get rid of the objective statement. Get a branding statement and laser-focused career summary instead. That objective isn’t doing you any favors.

Bring on the numbers. Going back to keeping a master resume … if you have one, adding in numbers should be no big deal. If you don’t, then start tracking those numbers now!  Quantify everything!  If you led a team, tell me how many people were on the team; if you saved money, tell me how much you saved. Grew revenue?  By how much?  Managed a budget?  Tell me how big the budget was. Always include a number!

Focus on facts and figures. Making generalized statements within your resume accomplishes absolutely nothing except taking up space. Give me something specific and tangible about your career history.

Remove two words from your resume: success and results. For more information on why and what to replace them with, check out this article:http://www.greatresumesfast.com/blog/2013/10/08/two-useless-words-every-job-seeker-loves-to-use-on-their-resume/

Answer three simple questions. Three simple questions will help you write a more concise and polished resume. Here’s a link to those three questions and how to incorporate them into your resume: http://www.greatresumesfast.com/blog/2013/12/03/3-simple-questions-to-help-you-write-a-better-resume/

Add that LinkedIn profile URL. Employers will go to LinkedIn to find out more about you (90% of them anyway). And that’s a high enough percentage for me. Make it easy for them to find you (and make sure they’re finding the right YOU on LinkedIn) by including your personal LinkedIn profile URL on your resume.

Needs-based resume please! Long gone are the days of telling employers what you want and need (ahem … that objective statement that had BETTER NOT be on your resume!). Instead, review the job ad to see what the employer’s greatest needs are, and make sure your resume addresses your ability to meet those needs.

Give your career summary impact. Use numbers, company names, and figures. It may be a “summary”, but just because it’s a summary doesn’t mean it has to be bland and boring and sound like everyone else’s. Use things unique to you to create more depth and impact in your career summary. High-profile companies or clients that you can name—include those. Managed lots of projects or big budgets?  Use those numbers and quantify in your summary.

Cut the fluff. Cut the content to the lowest common denominator. Make your words work for you—and deliver the most bang for your buck. In other words, cut out the “team player”, “excellent communication/written skills”, and all those other overused terms and phrases that find their way into so many resumes.

Use keywords in all the right places. Don’t be afraid to put keywords in your headline, branding statement, career summary, and work experience sections. Keywords aren’t just for the bulleted “key skills and core competencies” section of the resume.

Call out those accomplishments. Have a career accomplishment or success you’re particularly proud of?  Create a key accomplishments section on your resume in the top third to really draw attention to the results you’re most proud of.

Brand yourself. If you don’t, the employer will. Here’s a basic-level crash course in personal branding: http://mashable.com/2009/02/05/personal-branding-101/

Incorporate YOU. I see so many resumes that contain generic and vague statements. I cannot harp on this enough: Get rid of all the general terms and phrases—especially within your career summary. If you get six seconds to capture the hiring manager’s attention and stand out from the other applicants, and the first five lines of your resume read exactly the same as everyone else’s, then you’ve done absolutely nothing to set yourself apart.

RUN from resume templates. Templates are cookie-cutter resumes that thousands of other job seekers are using. Again, not the best strategy when you’re trying to differentiate yourself from the others.

Include a specific position title. At the top of your resume, include the specific position title you’re applying for, and any relevant keywords. This creates the connection between your experience and the opening.

Commit to customization.  Make a commitment to customize your resume as you apply for each opening. It could be as simple as changing the position title or job target at the top of your resume to removing irrelevant keywords. The more you tailor the resume to the specific position, the better your chances are of it getting you an interview.

Reflect on past achievements. Take time to think about what you’ve accomplished in your career, and quantify it when and where possible. To help jog your memory, think about challenges you’ve faced during your tenure, how you addressed those challenges, and what the outcomes were. Typically, this great exercise will help you to think of two or three key successes that will work well on your resume.

Put those achievements in context. Once you’ve thought about those great achievements, put them in the context of how they relate to the position you’re applying for. Make the connection between what you can bring to the table (your past wins) and what the employer needs right now.

Nix the common resume myths. The false notion that a resume can be only one page long or no one will bother to read it is a myth. So are the misconceptions that you need to include an objective statement, that you have to include every job you’ve ever had—even back to the ’80s, and that you have to have a degree to get a job. What’s not a myth is that hiring managers spend only about six seconds on their initial resume reviews; so needless to say, the top third of your resume had better look really great.

Proofread it and then get three friends to do the same. Don’t ask them for their opinions about what it should look or sound like—unless they’re a recruiter or a resume expert. Just ask them to review it for any typos or spelling errors that you may have overlooked. Nothing gets your resume thrown in the trash can more quickly than a bunch of errors because you neglected to proofread.

Your Resume is Not an Autobiography. One of the most common mistakes people make who write their own resume is that they view their resume as an autobiography.  A resume must be viewed as a marketing document; with you being the product. 

Wordle it! Ever heard of www.wordle.net?  It’s this great word cloud creator, and you can use it to find the most common words contained within some specific text. Use Wordle to check job ads and see the keywords that pop up most often. Then use this information to ensure your resume has the right keywords for the position.

Additionally, you could use Wordle on your resume and LinkedIn profile. This serves to ensure you have the right keywords within your resume and your LinkedIn profile. 

We hope that you can see how valuable this tool is for providing you with a visualization of the keyword optimization of your resume and LinkedIn profile—and for discovering the most important keywords within a job ad.

JJW Hotels & Resorts, has announced an extensive renovation plan that is set to ensure the Dona Filipa Hotel maintains its rightful position as one of the finest luxury properties in Algarve, Portugal.

JJW Hotels & Resorts has been a major investor in the Algarve region for twenty five years and employs 600 local people. Mohsen MBI Al Jaber, Innovation Director at JJW Hotels & Resorts, is the next generation of the MBI Al Jaber family to be involved in the business in Portugal. He said: “The Dona Filipa Hotel’s unique location, just off the stunning Vale do Lobo beach, ensures the five-star property is always a firm favourite with visitors to the Algarve. However, I felt the time was now right to invest in the future of the hotel and make sure that it continues to deliver the very highest standards of comfort and elegance that our guests deserve.”

“We have been strong supporters of the Algarve for more than twenty five years and following our recent announcement that we have taken over the management of the Penina hotel under JJW Hotels and Resorts, this significant new investment in the region underscores how important the Algarve is to the future plans of the group.”

The carefully considered renovation will completely overhaul all public areas - including the lobby, lounge and bar - along with all rooms and suites at the beachfront Vale do Lobo property. The new interior design concept both embraces the elegance and charm of the Dona Filipa Hotel, whilst paying homage to its traditional Portuguese style.

Dona Filipa Hotel General Manager, Luis Filipe, stated: “We are delighted and excited with the final renovation plan. It will successfully reposition us alongside all our luxury competitors in the area whilst ensuring we still manage to deliver the highest levels of service expected from our five-star hotel.”

The work will be overseen by project designers Cunningham Mclean in association with ArtCatto.

The Pestana Group is Portugal’s largest international tourism and leisure group and one of the largest in Europe where it ranks 25th.

There are eight business divisions operating under the Pestana brand including; Hotels & Resorts, Pousadas de Portugal, Holiday Ownership, Gaming, Travel, Golf and Residence, Industry and International Business Centre of Madeira.

Starting with a 300 bedroom hotel in Madeira Island in 20th November 1972, the family owned Pestana Group has grown steadily and currently includes in its portfolio of nearly 90 four and five star hotels worldwide with two brands: Pestana Hotels & Resorts and Pousadas de Portugal.

In 1985, the Pestana Group began an expansion drive in mainland Portugal that was then followed by Africa and South America.

In 2010 the Pestana Group opened its first hotel in a European capital outside Portugal, in London, the Pestana Chelsea Bridge Hotel & Spa. In May 2011, it reached Berlin with the Pestana Berlin Tiergarten. In 2012, Pousada de Cascais is inaugurated and 3 new hotels: Pestana South Beach Art Deco Hotel, in Miami, Pestana Bogotá 100, in Colombia and Pestana Casablanca, in Morocco, continuing its ongoing global diversification process that has taken the Pestana hotels to 3 continents and 13 countries in the world: Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Venezuela, Portugal, Germany, England, Cape Verde, Morocco, Mozambique, S.Tomé & Principe, South Africa and United States of America.

In the leisure area the Group currently owns and manages, besides the 47 hotels (9 in Madeira, 10 in the Algarve, 1 in Lisbon (the Pestana Palace - a Leading Hotel of the World) 2 in Cascais and Sintra, 1 in Oporto, 1 in England, 1 in Germany, 9 in Brazil, 3 in Mozambique, 1 in South Africa, 1 in Cape Verde, 1 in Argentina, 1 in Venezuela, 3 in S. Tomé e Príncipe, 1 in Miami, 1 in Casablanca and 1 in Colombia),  37 Pousadas de Portugal, 15 Holiday Ownership units , 6 golf courses, 3 real estate ventures, two casinos (Madeira and S. Tomé e Príncipe), an air charter company and one tour operator.  In 2003 the group was awarded an international tender to manage the Pousadas de Portugal chain adding to its portfolio 44 unique properties located in converted monuments, palaces, convents and castles spread across the country.

In 2005 the Pestana Group internationalised the Pousadas de Portugal brand with the opening of the Pestana Convento do Carmo, by Pousadas de Portugal, a Leading Hotel of the World property in S. Salvador da Bahia in Brazil.

Between 2012 and 2013, the Pestana Group will continue growing with the opening of the following projects:

• Argentina: Pestana Buenos Aires Golf & Residences (the 3rd investment in the country)
  
  
• Angola: Pestana Luanda Bay, Luanda
  
  
• Portugal
  
  Pestana Tróia Eco-Resort, Tróia
  
  Pousada da Serra da Estrela, Covilhã
  
  New Hotel in Lisbon
  
  Pousada do Terreiro do Paço
  

Why Become A TripAdvisor Green Leader? 

Participation in the TripAdvisor Green Leaders program is a great way to attract the growing numbers of travelers who are interested in environmentally-friendly practices - helping you to stand apart from competitors and spotlight your green practices.

How It Works?

Any verified property business representative located in the continental US, as well as Alaska and Hawaii can complete our survey and apply for the program. There are two levels of participation: TripAdvisor Green Leader and Green Partner.

TripAdvisor Green Leader: Industry-Leading properties

Properties that qualify as a TripAdvisor Green Leader will be awarded a  badge on TripAdvisor, and their green practices will be showcased on their property page. TripAdvisor Green Leader status is granted on a yearly basis. Properties must reapply annually, to ensure that their TripAdvisor Green Leader recognition is current and accurate.

The TripAdvisor Green Leaders program has four tiers: bronze, silver, gold, and platinum.

TripAdvisor Green Partner: Environmentally Aware Properties

TripAdvisor Green Partners are properties that have all seven of the program's required green practices in place but which haven't yet reached TripAdvisor Green Leader score requirements. These properties will have their TripAdvisor Green Partner status shown in their amenities page.

The Green Practices survey The online Green Practices survey, which focuses on practices that lead to better environmental outcomes in the hospitality industry, consists of seven sections: a “required practices” section which all properties must meet in order to qualify for the program, and then six sections related to energy, water, waste, purchasing, site, and innovation and education. The survey focuses on practices which lead to better environmental outcomes in the hospitality industry.

To download the full set of survey questions, click here

To download a comprehensive guide to the survey, click here.

Program Partners & Advisors TripAdvisor developed the TripAdvisor Green Leaders program in partnership with a wide range of industry experts, including:

• The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's ENERGY STAR® program
• The United Nations Environment Programme
• The U.S. Green Building Council
• The Cadmus Group

CEO Frits van Paasschen is regarded as one of the brightest minds in the hospitality industry, which was on full display this summer at the hotel group’s annual Rendezvous sales pow wow in New Orleans. Starwood operates nine hotel brands: W Hotels, Westin, Sheraton, St. Regis, Starwood Luxury Collection, Le Meridien, Four Points by Sheraton, Element and Aloft.

Previously the CEO of Coors and GM of Nike Europe before moving into hospitality in 2007, van Paasschen has injected his lifestyle brand expertise into the Starwood brand building machinery. No hotel company has created and delineated hotel brand stories as well as Starwood.

During his 22-minute presentation at Rendezvous, van Paasschen defined today’s shifting global travel economy, tomorrow’s hotel trends and how his company is adapting to those trends ahead of the curve.

The following is a slightly abbreviated transcript of Frits van Paasschen’s speech at Starwood Rendezvous New Orleans 2013:

It’s safe to say it’s been a very big year. If you remember back to Seattle [Rendezvous 2012], we talked a lot about globalization and how the world is changing so quickly. One of the things we said then is that, ‘We focus on the trend lines, and not the headlines.’

That is how we shape our business and our brand, from what I like to call ‘our court side seats at the global economy.’ And that change we talked about a year ago, if anything, today it has accelerated.

We see so much change in the world that we’ve coined the phrase ‘The Age of Great Change’ to describe what’s happening. Because around the world as we speak to customers and companies and industries in every sector, we also spend time talking to pools of capital and investors in over 100 different countries…. They are the people who build hotels with us. And maybe most importantly, every day we see the faces of over a quarter million travelers, and what’s going on in 1,150 hotels around the world. And here’s basically what we’re seeing.

We’re seeing change at a rate that’s unprecedented in the history of humanity. Behind that change are two pretty much unstoppable forces: Rising wealth and greater global connectivity through technology.

Staggering numbers of people are entering the global economy every year. So if you go back 20 years, there were roughly a billion people in the global middle class. Move forward to today, 20 years later, and we’ve added another billion. We’ve doubled the number of people in the global middle class….

In the next 20 years, we’re going to go from two billion people in the middle class to five billion…. It’s hard to overstate the impact on the travel business. In fact, my view is the stakes couldn’t be higher….

So that means more roads, airports, buildings and hotels will be built in the next four years than have been built in all of history before that.

The other force behind the Age of Great Change is hyper-connectivity through technology. And this is reshaping the global business environment at least as much as that rising wealth.

There were 500 million internet users in 2000. Now there is roughly two billion. In the next decade, that two billion goes to five billion. And sometime over the next year or two, there will be more mobile phones than there are people on the planet.

With technology changing this quickly and this profoundly, we have no idea what’s going to happen. The best we can do is get a glimpse by seeing what’s happened over the last few years up until today.

If you think about it, anybody today with an iPhone has more computing power in their pants than a Department of Defense computer did in the Clinton administration. And that fast pace of change is creating gaps not just across generations but even within generations….

[van Paasschen discusses here how children today in middle school have access to social media like Instagram, unlike their siblings five or six years older.]

I was thinking about all of the things that have disappeared into my iPad over the years. Our offices are essentially wherever our devices are today. I don’t even use a laptop anymore. I think it’s safe to say technology has changed the way we work and the way we live.

But it might also be changing the way we think…. For example, today’s luxury is turning into tomorrow’s necessity by technology. And this is something that’s been happening for a long time.

[van Paasschen mentions that ultimate luxury once meant electric lighting in JP Morgan's office 100 years ago.]

So people start to take for granted what’s widely available. So today for example in the travel business, a hotel brand can’t stand apart just by having a comfortable, reliable, clean room. In fact, hotel brands can’t define themselves simply by promising a delivery on guest experiences. Because I think that’s increasingly becoming table stakes in our business. If you want to have the world’s best brands, which we do, then we know we’re not successful unless our guests are happy and having their expectations met and exceeded.

And that expectation today, driven by technology, is personalization.

Anybody today who owns an iPad, anybody who buys something off Amazon, anybody who spends time on Facebook intuitively knows what we mean by personalization.

So how long will it be before all of us expect a hotel brand where we spend x number of nights a year to know things like what temperature we want our rooms set at, what our comfort foods are, where we might like to go on vacation?

At Starwood, we’ve come to realize that our next innovation may not be a physical thing, like a bed or a shower. Think about those things that disappeared into my iPad. But instead it could be about service and personalization. Because I think looking ahead, hotel brands—in fact, I think all consumer brands that live in the Age of Great Change—they’ll have to know what you want and they’ll have to know that you want it right now. And to be able to deliver that consistently and globally.

This is a big change. And for us, meeting those expectations is a daunting challenge. We have something like a half billion touch points a year with our guests. We have 40 million guest stays, we have over 200,000 associates working in our properties, 1,150 hotels, 100 countries.

So this has to change the way we recruit, the way we train, the way we talk to our associates, and how we think about leading our business. Because you know, in Starwood tradition, when we see things changing we say, ‘Bring it on.’

If you go back to the 80s and 90s, we were going global before it was cool to go global. In the 90s, we were the first company to create a signature design to position a brand like Westin. In the last decade, we built a global brand around W based on new insight about what people said they wanted from hotels.

Delivering meaningful, personalized branded experiences for our guests is what we’re about. Knowing what people want, meeting those expectations and creating memorable experiences consistently around the globe is what we’re working to do.

So let’s tie these two ideas together. Thanks to the Age of Great Change, there are more people in more places with a demand for more luxury. But today’s wealthy aren’t the faces of past generations, right? They’re more diverse, they’re more sophisticated, they tend to be younger, and a lot more of them are women. And no surprise, they’re a lot more global.

For them, whether they’re old money or new money, luxury and luxury brands are a personal statement. Because it used to be that luxury was very prescribed. Right? Society dictated what luxury was. You drank scotch because you were supposed to like it. You went skiing in Maine because it was supposed to be fun. Right? Society dictated to us it was all about china, crystal and caviar.

But today, your definition of luxury isn’t my definition of luxury. Today, our guests are the true arbiters of what luxury is, which is really important. A couple are still the same. Luxury is still about exclusivity, and exclusivity is still about scarcity. But now with things as diverse as they are, exclusivity and scarcity mean very different things to different people.

And that plays into our luxury brands. So, we realized that we were in great position with three luxury brands to play in these spaces in different ways, with a great platform between W, Luxury Collection and St. Regis.

So take W, for example. It takes that old definition of luxury, that prescribed notion, and puts it on its head. And so exclusivity with W is about insider access to what’s going on here and now with the W Insider experience.

Compare that to Luxury Collection. This is a portfolio of iconic properties, some of them five and six centuries old, there to create real indigenous experiences, which in this Age of Great Change, is becoming increasingly difficult to find. And some of these hotels are just impossible to replicate, right? You’ve got the Gritti Palace, Alfonso XIII or the Imperial in Vienna as examples.

And then there’s St. Regis. So the whole idea of St. Regis is taking that heritage of the St. Regis at 55th and 5th in Manhattan and redefining traditional luxury for a new age. And take that century-old tradition of a gathering place for masters of the universe, social swans and robber barons, and creating a new gathering place that’s relevant to today’s global elite.

So today we have these three distinct luxury brand propositions between W, Luxury Collection and St. Regis. In fact, put simply, growing brands are what we’re all about. It’s leveraging our global platform, SPG, our mobile apps, our relationships and tapping into what we call our “global smart teams” around the world….

We are united by a simple, single belief. And that is: People want a better way to experience the world, and it’s our job to give them that better way.

Greg Oates covers hospitality trends and next generation hotels. He has participated in 1,000+ hotel site inspections in over 50 countries.

The Algarve looks for differentiation in its Hotel offer.

Faro council has signed a contract that will see the creation of a new four-star hotel take shape in the Faro parish of Santa Bárbara de Nexe.

By signing the contract with developers RGM – Empreendimentos Turísticos e Desporto, Lda, the council has given its OK to the construction of the 160-bed hotel project that will also comprise a nine-hole golf course, swimming pools, lakes and tennis courts. The Monrepos Resort is to be built in Palhagueira, Gorjões, in the parish of Santa Bárbara de Nexe. The council recalls that under the Algarve’s current land plan no building is allowed to take place on rural terrain, with the exception of isolated hotels.

Faro has granted a maximum of a 160 new bed-resort to be built through that loophole. The council describes the project as being of maximum importance to boosting tourism in the municipality’s interior area.
Covering an area of 13.4 hectares, the architectural draft of the hotel shows it will follow a modern, contemporary design.

“It is a quality product that is so important for boosting the region’s tourism, in particular in its interior”, and is “directed at a niche market of quality, from a sustainable perspective”, Faro Town Hall said in a statement.
With the decision, the council also believes it is adding value to the parish of Santa Bárbara de Nexe, as it will “allow the number of permanent residents to be increased as well as increasing the number of direct and indirect jobs to be created.”

Is the Algarve ready for the new Age?

Portuguese group opens new South Beach hotel
 
Portugal's Group Pestana has opened its first U.S. hotel in Miami Beach.

The grand opening for Pestana South Beach Art Deco Hotel, 1835 James Ave., was Monday. The tourism and leisure company bought the vacant property in 2008 for $10 million and invested $25 million in major renovations.

With four buildings, the hotel has 97 rooms and suites, two two-bedroom apartments, a pool and a restaurant.

The property, built between 1940 and 1952, was formerly known as the Hotel Milejan.

Group Pestana, which is family-owned, includes almost 90 hotels around the world under the Pestana Hotels & Resorts and Pousadas de Portugal brands. By Hannah Sampson