Shangri-La’s Rasa Sentosa Resort & Spa – Their GM serves you breakfast!

The golden rays of an equatorial morning are a comfort to wake up to. You cannot bear to rise from the solace of your bed, yet you cannot wait to soak up the sun. For beyond your balcony, you see an idyllic Siloso Beach and the South China Sea.

I am in Shangri-La’s Rasa Sentosa Resort & Spa, Singapore, the only beachfront resort in Singapore.

Did you know that behind the scenes, there is a shortage of hospitality workers in Singapore? Singapore’s thriving hospitality sector with growing visitor arrivals and expanding hotel industry exacerbate the manpower crunch faced by hotels. To cope with the manpower shortage, hotels such as Shangri-La’s Rasa Sentosa Resort & Spa are looking for solutions to maximise what existing staff can achieve in their work.

In my recent stay at Rasa Shangri-la Sentosa, I observed quite a few novel ways how the hotel has made work easier, smarter and safer for their staff and maintain service standards for customers.

Mr Winston Wong, Director of Security, and Ms Liow Siew Ling, Assistant Financial Controller, (as seen in the photo) are helping the house keeping department with stripping and making of bed.

I learnt that hotel staffs are given opportunities to be multi-skilled by learning a new skill from another department or within the same department. During peak periods when the housekeeping team cannot cope with the workload, the management team will volunteer for 1-2 hours in a day to help with different departments.

Mr Wong said by doing so, they actually help to cut down about 20 minutes of housekeeping time. They are trained by the housekeeping department, although they are not as fast as housekeeping, but they have quality control one ok!

My Terrace pool view room which is super huge and gorgeous because it overlooks the pool and the sea. In case you are wondering, all the rooms here has balcony!

In Rasa Shangri-la, self-service laundromats are installed on the corridors of selected guestroom floors. They are available 24-hour daily and allow guests (especially travelling families on a long stay) to clean up their attire by the bulkload at preferred time. These laundromats let guests get their cleaned laundry faster and make work easier for their laundry team by decreasing the laundry load.

Early last year, Rasa Shangri-la replaced high energy consumption ice cube machines with industrial chilled water dispensers at their ballrooms. Because these dispensers produce high volume of filtered water at a consistent temperature of three to five degrees Celsius – the hotel staff saved on time to walk out of the ballrooms to the ice cube machines and could serve the chilled water straightaway. I was told that this idea won Rasa Shangri-la an award from NTUC, Food, Drinks and Allied Workers Union and Singapore Hotel Association for helping staff be more productive and have easier jobs.

If you are thirsty, you can also get ice and water from an ice-and-water dispenser at all corridors of the resort’s guestroom floors, as much as you need at no charge, in addition to the standard allocation of bottled waters in the guestrooms. It is part of the resort’s many value-added services available for guests.

The installation of these dispensers at every corridor frees up the Room Service team to concentrate on core function of delivering food and other beverages in a shorter period.

Isn’t it more efficient and productive that your food and drinks can be served faster?

While enjoying my breakfast at Silver Shell Café, I spotted General Manager Ben Bousnina serving drinks. He told me he manages the drinks counter and will always be there during breakfast to serve and also to talk to guests to find out about their experience. He even told me he has his own refreshing concoctions which is guava + orange. I am super surprised by this. I mean, which hotel GM will actually serve you breakfast right?!!?!?

It’s amazing to actually see how teamwork thrives in Shangri-La’s Rasa Sentosa Resort & Spa. Ms Judy Yeoh, Director of Human Resource, will fold napkins, while Mercadia Wong, Director of Sales (Travel Trade), is seen clearing dishes. Their teamwork helps the Food and Beverage team cope with extra workload and the entire team is happier and more cohesive.

Back to my breakfast, so happy to find appam here! It is made from fermented milk and rice flour, it resembles a fluffy pancake with crazily crispy sides. It is served with orange sugar and shredded coconut, yums!

Egg omelette at the live station. You can choose what ingredients to be added to your omelette.

They also have nasi lemak with super fluffy rice.

And of course I cannot resist waffles, pancakes and French toast.

Happy breakfast!

LOOK! As I was enjoying breakfast, a peacock walked past me and greeted me.

You know ah, Rasa Shangri-la pays attention to details. They have automatic (sensor) swing doors are installed throughout the resort’s operation areas such as in the kitchens and floor pantries. The sensor operated doors detect presence and staff can walk in and out without the need to stop and open the doors manually. In cases where a staff needs to push a trolley load of chinaware and/or other breakable items – this reduces accidents and makes their work easier, smarter and safer, because they don’t need to open doors manually. With faster transport of items, staff can save time and do more.

The resort’s seaside location makes it a popular venue for events. In order to cater to such demands, the resort needed to optimize its logistics – especially on the duration it took for food and equipment to be transported from the resort out onto the beach.

The resort then came up with an innovative idea. It modified a regular buggy into an open top buggy which can transport all the necessary equipment and ingredients for setting up the events, saving time and manpower needed to set up these events. Most importantly, this also means ingredients are kept fresh at all times – thereby promoting a safe and quality dining experience for the resort’s guests.

Thank you Rasa Shangri-la Hotel for the wonderful stay. It was really an eye opener!