Earlier this month Luck, in partnership with Great Place to Work, named Hilton #1 best workplace for its superior culture, commitment to inclusion and opportunities for career growth. These have long been the goals of its CEO Christopher Nassetta.
“I’m a real guy; I am who I am,” said Nassetta, president, CEO and chairman of Hilton Hotels & Resorts. Fortune Nick Lichtenberg in an interview earlier this month. “I’m not perfect. My intentions are always good, mostly pure, and I want what’s best for our employees because it’s what’s best for the company. And I’ll get anyone out of the way that I need to make sure that happens.”
Nassetta, who is approaching the two-decade mark at Hilton, also says he believes in servant leadership and that Hilton’s rank-and-file employees do “real work.” These are the building blocks of the corporate culture that Nassetta strives to develop.
This is no accident; More than their ancestors, Generation Z is especially concerned about authenticity, social justice, and equality in their workplaces. Ensuring equal commitment to all three quickly becomes critical to keeping them on board.
According to Nassetta, these battlements were his only goal for many years. “My whole intention in business is to do well by doing good, period. End of story,” Nassetta said. “I was [promoting] ESG has been around for decades because it’s good for business.” Despite working in management positions for more than 30 years, Nassetta said he doesn’t think he has a “big ego.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever had a big ego, but we all have egos, and especially being the first CEO, you have a little poser syndrome because you didn’t get it,” he said. “You haven’t built your cadence, and if you’re a public company, you haven’t built a relationship with shareholders where you have all this support and you’re worried about your board of directors and all these different stakeholders. There’s an inherent uncertainty about it all, but as you get into your rhythm, you figure these things out.”
There is also the issue of generational separation; Nassetta, 60, says that in his day, people didn’t bring many conversations about mental health or personal problems to work—least of all to their boss. But there are still some aspects of youth culture that he can address, such as flexible work hours, career development and mentoring. “The most important thing is that I am focused on the goal.”
Despite disagreeing with some of the “over-separation” that is a hallmark of Generation Z, workers of all ages generally want the same things. “Everyone wants to get ahead; everyone wants well-being financially, physically and mentally; everyone wants someone to mentor them,” he said. “Maybe Gen Z wants more formality in all this. But the only reason I am where I am [is] I’ve had the best mentors on earth, and I’m a baby boomer.”
Too many managers spend their time pointing out the differences between their own priorities and those of their youngest employees, Nassetta said. “I’m trying to think—as I run a company of 500,000 people, increasingly Gen Z—what are the common threads? My personal belief is that the fundamental things that young people want are more alike than not.”
But there’s one newfangled concept that Nassetta isn’t completely abandoning: putting her “whole self” to work.
“We want every person to be whole because a diverse environment is the key to success,” he said. “What I try to do is encourage people; we want to know what you think. I’m not always
I agree with this, and I could tell you that I don’t, but I want you to put your whole mind into it. I want you to do your best because you are why I want you here and hopefully it will help us serve our customers better. If I bring you here and say, “Fit into our mold.” and you cannot bring all of yourself, then by definition I have lost the value of this diversity.”
Workers must recognize that “you won’t agree with everything we do, but when you put it all together, you will agree with the outcome,” Nassetta continued. “In the world today, our entire political system is built essentially around our division, identity politics and all that.”
Nassetta says Hilton has no problem here, which he attributes to his employees’ trust that the leadership team has consistent and honorable goals. “[Workers] have a voice and what they think matters,” he said. “This doesn’t mean we can please everyone all the time; it would be chaotic to try to do that.”