Untold - some of hospitality's incredible tales from around the globe. – Details, episodes & analysis

This episode features hotel industry legend Mr Anthony Liddiard—a man whose career reads like a travelogue of iconic names and bold ventures. From The Savoy Group, Hilton, Southern Sun to InterContinental and RMAL Hospitality, Anthony has worked with the biggest players—and brought global brands like Trader Vic’s, Wagamama, Frankie’s, and Marco Pierre White’s restaurants to life across the Middle East region.

Educated at the same British boarding school as Sir Rocco Forte, Anthony trained at Westminster College before cutting his teeth in London. But it was in the Middle East and Africa that Anthony truly made his mark—excelling in sales and marketing before realising his career ambition by becoming a General Manager, subsequently turning around the fortunes of the InterContinental Muscat and Crowne Plaza Dubai, prior to becoming the Operations Vice President for the UAE and Qatar.

So impressed were Anthony's Abu Dhabi owners, they asked him to build a hospitality empire from scratch. He answered the call, leading RMAL Hospitality as Chief Executive Officer for over eight years.

In this conversation, Anthony reflects on the mentors who shaped him, the mentees he guided, and the lessons that fuelled his journey. From a pivotal dinner conversation that set his course, to winning over skeptical parents with a career—and a lifestyle—most only dream of, Anthony Liddiard shares a story full of insight, impact, and inspiration.

Whilst now semi-retired in Thailand, hospitality runs in Anthony’s veins, and he maintains an equity interest in two hospitality businesses and is in high demand for consultancies where his schedule allows.  

This episode follows the career of the dynamic larger than life character, Showtune Shane Jameson.

From Country Victoria, Shane studied Hospitality in Melbourne as well as honing his love for fine coffee running Hudson's Coffee early each morning next to the Stock Market - providing caffeine and a refuge for traders looking for a much needed break.

Shane then headed to the Middle East, taking up a banqueting position at Jebel Ali Resort and Spa for the princely sum of 1,000 Dirhams a month.

Shane moved into Sales and his career really started to take off. Under the mentorship of David Thompson, Shane learned the leisure business inside out travelling the globe promoting the resort and Dubai as a destination. Shane then spent time with IHG across the Indian Ocean and Deira before joining Jumeirah. This chapter is worthy of a book in itself as Shane shares his experiences selling Al Naseem and Burj Al Arab and shamelessly name drops his favourite encounters with the global A List.

Shane is now in Bangkok with IHG writing the next chapter and awaiting the opening up of International travel and with exciting projects including a Bill Bensley project and a new Kimpton in Koh Samui, Shane is in his element and is leaving his indelible personality on the group.

The episodes intro and outro is kindly provided by Shane who has a residency at the Rosewood Bangkok and has a voice that makes a welshman jealous. Enjoy.

Post College Italian American Francesco followed many of his peers into the World of Investment Banking with roles in New York and London. Always a keen networker a chance interview in Ecuador on the same day of his wedding subsequently saw Francesco and new bride Brigit relocate to South America from London with Francesco given the opportunity of running a telecoms company.

Faced with a tough business climate beset with politics Francesco was transferred to head up the small boat cruise division with a fresh license overseeing the Galapagos Islands.

With the Peruvian and Ecuadarion economies booking and Francesco getting restless - a vacation discussion with his father in law Fred saw the ideation of Aqua Expeditions with the maiden launch of Aria Amazon just 9 months later. Despite the global financial crisis the launch was highly successful with the offering of luxury, design, great culinary and authentic destination experiences though leading guides proving to be a winning formula.

With Aria Amazon firmly established Francesco looked East, setting up a global HQ in Singapore and launching boat #2 - The Aqua Mekong. 12 years later Aqua Expeditions have grown to 4 boats with the launch of Aqua Blu and Aqua Nera.

This story captures Francesco's relentless energy, passion and entrepreneurial spirit and gives some insights into his views on hotels, restaurants, safari lodges, destinations as well as how he approaches management and leadership.

Following on from the first episode Pariva talks in intricate detail about her time at Marriott which saw growth from 6 to 40 hotels in India. Pariva & her team were responsible for completely changing the hotel selling landscape in the country via many India firsts: the first Marriott showcase, the opening hotel pathway, the first full sales team incentive plan as well as many new brand introductions to India. 

Pariva was subsequently headhunted to join hotel giant Hilton and to recruit and build a World Class Sales organization from the ground up. Her mandate was to create an enviable sales legacy and to create and build something new – she certainly successfully did that and she explains in detail the strategy and tactics she employed.   

Pariva then talks about her move with Hilton to the Asia Pacific Head Office in Singapore and her focus in relation to driving meetings and groups business and initiatives  in her strategic leadership role. Pariva also gives her view on diversity in the India and global hotel arena and gives some views on how female role accession can be improved.   

The pod concludes by seeking Pariva’s opinion on inbound itineraries to Incredible India, her post-Covid vacation plans and her guide to where one can find the very finest Indian cuisine in Singapore. 

In this enthralling episode Pariva talks about her early career and formative years in India. 

Hailing from a small town equidistant between Delhi and Jaipur in Rajasthan, Pariva followed in the family tradition in attending boarding school at the tender age of 4 and a half, to ensure she was recipient of the very best education possible.

The passionate delivery of a career counselling session by a visiting lady hospitality professional when she was in year 8 resonated strongly with young Pariva and set her on her journey.

Post Convent School and fully supported by her family, Pariva signed up to Mangalore University, specifically spending 3 years in Manipal. Following the best 3 years of Pariva’s life it was time to enter the world of work. Her early mantra was that: “Discipline and dedication are here to stay” and “bring the best version of yourself to work each day”. 

A productive management traineeship with International Travel House which included many shifts from 20.00 in the evening till 04.00am concluded with Pariva determining that her path was to be via sales and marketing as opposed to operations. 

The episode concludes in Delhi with Pariva sharing insights, learnings and experiences from her progressively senior roles across some of the world’s top luxury hotels and brands and their growth in India. The luxury training was particularly technical which included the presentation of business cards, in-depth understanding of design, wine and how to sell rooms north of $800 per night through storytelling. 

Another few soundbites encapsulate these years perfectly namely:

“I stuck my heels into the ground and said, I am not giving up!” and on the power of networking – “I constantly reminded myself – people need to know Pariva, they need to know me!” 

The Anand story is one of tremendous success from modest origins. Dev and his brother Ranjit setup Expotel in the early 70s and by the time they sold it two decades on it had a turnover in excess of £100m. 

Expotel was the first hotel booking agency globally and with a slight degree of serendipity, its foundation coincided with London opening scores of hotels off the back of the Tourism Act transforming it from a sellers to buyers market almost overnight. In addition to favorable market conditions Expotel managed to dramatically increase their business marketly through buying one of the UK’s first telephone numbers when a US company IRL retreated from the UK market despite having conducted a year long campaign in the Evening Standard promoting the very number that Expotel purchased. 

Other pioneering business practices included the inception of the corporate rate, the London hotel wallchart, the foundation of the Hotel Booking Agency Association, commission on catering bookings and many more. 

Dev was also one of the first adopters and sellers of corporate hospitality and he tells the tale of how this started and its transition from sketchy cash in hand deals to the purchase of Keith Prowse, complete with Royal Warrant which still today remains a leader in global corporate hospitality from many groundbreaking innovations started by Dev. 

Dev reviews some of Impetus Marketing’s stand-out successes and concludes by talking about how business has been for the past decade as an active hotel broker through his company The Hotel Property Team. 

The episode contains Incredible insights and anecdotes which span five decades and with no sign of slowing down, debonair Dev continues to be at the heart of the industry – continuing to liaise with hotel buyers, sellers, agents and development professionals with his trademark humour and eye for a deal. 

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This episode of Untold follows the early career of one of New South Wales’ best exports, Mr Andrew Hughes. Andrew talks extensively around some of the experiences and learnings that shaped his approach to business and indeed career. A recurring theme throughout is Andrew’s love of storytelling and the importance he places on it.    

Andrew truly caught the travel bug as an 18 year old. Skillfully winning a place on a Rotary exchange programme, and financially supported by his proud pom parents with extra spending money from shifts at his local McDonalds, Andrew headed off to spend time in Northern Germany. During the early weeks of the exchange, the highlight of each day was the noise of the letterbox, triggering a Pavlovian-like response from Andrew as it meant fresh letters from family and friends had arrived to help combat his homesickness.   

A post Uni exchange to Southern Germany was followed up with a full European Tour consisting of bar jobs as well as becoming a professional tour guide spinning yarns about some of Europe’s most prominent Cities before making it back home to Australia. Andrew also talks about how he almost became a Travel Presenter and a household name across the region – the tragic events of 9/11 putting the kai bosh on this. Australian TV’s loss was definitely hospitality’s gain.   

Andrew talks about his early days as a hotelier with Best Western and how his career changed gears when he joined IHG Australasia in a business development role. 

Then Dubai came calling – Andrew joined Atlantis Dubai and in this career defining pre-opening role was ideally placed to hone and develop his love of storytelling taking it to the next level. With Atlantis the Palm successfully positioned and launched, Andrew teamed up with Mike Scully at Seven Tides. 

This edition of Untold is with luxury travel market and community builder, Serge Dive. 

Serge talks about his early career and how after studying Financial management at the university which should have led him to a career in Investment Banking, he joined the Ministry of Finance to hold a wide variety of international events promoting France’s many greatest exports including, fashion, technology and french gastronomy over the globe. 

Following such a successful event in the UAE, Serge was headhunted by the Government of Dubai and became a Deputy Director in Paris where continued success led to the Government asking Serge to also take up the reigns for promoting Dubai Tourism. With Serge’s passion for pleasing people the move into the travel industry was inspired.  

Amongst the travel landscape, Serge spotted a gap in the market and with both the vision and fortitude launched what has become an iconic show – ILTM on the Cote D’Azur in Cannes. Following the show’s tremendous success, Serge expanded the show taking it to Shanghai with ILTM Asia in 2008. 

Following the sale of ILTM to Reed, Serge did not slow down and has become even more prolific with successful shows under his company banner This is Beyond including: LE Miami, We are Africa, Pure Life Experiences and Further East. Serge covers all of these shows with tremendous illustrative narrative and conveys with passion how these events are driven by purpose and how they have built genuine communities. 

Never standing still and always innovating Serge also talks about 2021 and the recent announcement of This is Beyond, Private Members Club called the House of Beyond (www.thehouseofbeyond.com) as well as hinting at 3 new events to launch – watch this space.