Kim Garner’s career in hospitality started like many others, working a few casual jobs with a mix of retail and bar work whilst she completed her studies.
But Kim Garner always had a bigger plan. She completed a business degree, majoring in Hospitality and HR, and determined that one day she’d lead people for a global hotel company.
Her first hotel role was as a Room attendant at Daydream Island.
“Not quite the people experience I’d imagined, but it was the best foundation I could have asked for. While there, I experienced a hotel ownership transition firsthand. Watching how deeply organisational change impacts the people who deliver the guest experience was a defining moment. It cemented my belief that people strategy isn’t a support function - it’s business-critical.”
From there, Garner worked her way through the Front Office before stepping into HR when the owners engaged Accor to manage the asset. She later tested whether her “big degree” and hotel grounding could translate globally, moving into international HR roles, before returning to hotels with Starwood Hotels & Resorts, then back to Accor again.
Garner also broadened her commercial lens in corporate HR through in-house roles at one of the world’s largest recruitment companies and McDonald's Australia, but her love for hotels ultimately brought her back. She joined TFE Hotels in 2016.
Leading, supporting and guiding the business through COVID across ANZ has been the highlight of her career.
“Every day brought new challenges. Legislation shifted rapidly, borders opened and closed, government incentives and entitlements varied across states and countries, and workforce decisions had to be made in real time,” she said.
What she is most proud of is that TFE led with trust and unity.
“We retained a large portion of our teams, continued opening new hotels (in states that I couldn’t travel to), introduced new brands like Quincy and F&B offerings that allowed us to reposition TFE in the market as an employer of choice with a strong employee experience.”
She said it was the ultimate test of leadership, balancing compliance, commercial reality, and genuine care for people, it reinforced that culture isn’t built in the good times, it’s revealed in the tough ones.
The most important advice she has received during her career was that if it’s important to you, you’ll always find the time and space for it.
Her biggest mentor was Sandy, her Global CFO, when she was working in recruitment.
“He taught me the power of silence; that you don’t need to rush to fill the room when presenting a business case,” said Garner.
“More importantly, he gave me the confidence to speak up with balanced counsel, blending commercial reality, people impact, and legislative risk.”
Since she joined the industry, she said there is more intuitive and personalised guest interaction.
“Gone are the days for onboarding team with a long script for guest interactions.”
In the future, she would like to see the ongoing conscious balance of leveraging technology to enhance guest experience continue, not to replace it.
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