An economist by training, Ana Galo entered the hotel industry via outsourcing while still a university student. Conquered by this area, she stayed and intends to continue, attracted by the possibility of seeing the results of what is done immediately and also by the adrenaline rush that the profession generates. Today she runs the Montebelo Vista Alegre Lisboa Chiado Hotel and won the Xénio Award for Best Young Hotel Manager. I'll start at the end, which is exactly Montebelo. Ana is responsible for the group's hotels and restaurants in the Lisbon region? Yes, everything to do with hotels and restaurants in the Lisbon region is my responsibility. Montebelo Vista Alegre Chiado, a five-star unit, but also Montebelo Lisbon Downtown Apartments, which is a local accommodation development that we have in Rua da Prata, and then in the restaurant area, the Zambeze restaurant in Miradouro do Chão do Loureiro, and in Praça do Comércio the Antártida brewery and the Tropo Squisito restaurant. Here in Chiado we also have the hotel restaurant Ponja Nikkei, which opens onto the street, and La Panamericana, a restaurant in partnership with Chef Chacal, on Avenida da Índia, next to the Cordoaria Nacional, in the Casa da América Latina. I noticed that although your area is hospitality, this project has a lot of restaurants. Was this the most important challenge you've had to date? I understand your question, but not necessarily. It is, in fact, the position with the most responsibility and the most units, but it's not the most important position for me. The most important were all the others that led me to this position, which is why I mentioned the issue of the teams when I received the award. It was the teams that helped me build this path. I'll never tire of saying this, and I don't care what clichés you make of it, because if I don't have teams that are committed, dedicated, passionate and focused, my work is absolutely useless. I'm just a support here, if I'm not there, they can do everything, but if they're not there, I can't do anything. My position is a consequence of the work I've been doing together with the teams this year. Instead of saying someone has to be in charge, in this case it's someone has to coordinate, isn't it? Yes, precisely. "I told you to do it this way" is not an expression you'll hear me say. Of course, sometimes you need a final word, but I'm more of a "What do you think about doing it this way or that way?" kind of person. "Being able to access the results very quickly and having the ability, if something isn't going so well, to get around it, I think that's what made me stay in the hotel business - and this adrenaline, because I think you have to like it, you have to have a certain energy to be in the area" What made you choose hospitality for your professional career? Hospitality ended up coming into my life without me expecting it and I ended up staying in the area. My degree is in economics, so I was very distant from the hotel business and the operation itself, but while I was still at university, and with outsourcing, I started working in hotels, in 5-star units, and I began to get a taste for the profession and to realize that there was an operation here that captivated me. This organization of the operation, this planning, with almost immediate results, because we receive a client or an event, and we can see immediately if it's going well, what the client's reaction is, if we're meeting expectations, I think that's what leverages me. Being able to access the results very quickly and having the ability, if something isn't going so well, to get around it, I think that's what made me stay in the hotel business - and this adrenaline rush, because I think you have to like it, you have to have a certain energy to be in the area. You've worked in various outsourcing units. When did you first settle, outside the outsourcing company, in a hotel? With outsourcing, there was already a tendency to stay put, because I started working almost 15 years ago in the hotel business and I began to realize that it could be a way forward, because I was doing what was known as extra work and the units I worked in tended to ask my manager at the time to hire me. So I began to realize that it could indeed be an asset, but 15 years ago the thinking wasn't the same, the financial factor weighed a lot more and outsourcing has a completely different remuneration. When did you first settle down? With outsourcing, I spent a lot of time working in various units, at Dom Pedro Palace, at the Champalimaud Foundation, at the old Fontana Parque Hotel before it was converted into a Hilton and I was at the opening of the Bairro Alto Hotel and the Valverde on Avenida da Liberdade, where I also spent a lot of time. In the meantime, I left to take on a restaurant management project, and then decided to stop outsourcing and returned to the Fontana Parque Hotel, after it had been converted to a Hilton. When I arrived for the interview, I already knew the team, but the F&B director was a new person, who didn't know me, but I knew the unit perfectly well and he needed a hostess and a waiter, so I accepted the hostess role, but I offered to work as a waiter too, and he agreed with a better pay offer. That's when I took on my first permanent project. After two months, I moved up to F&B supervisor and started building my career. After her first permanent job, will Ana go on to work for HF Hotels? The Fénix group, with four units in Lisbon, at the time as assistant F&B manager for all four units. In the meantime, after a year and a half, I moved up to F&B manager of the four units and after a couple of years, I became director of HF Fénix Music Lisboa and HF Fénix Garden, two hotels with very different concepts that allowed me to create, together with the teams, some ideas that we developed over the years. "There's a long way to go here at the Montebelo Group. My work started less than a year ago, and when I leave a project, it's because I feel there's no more for me to add. Here I feel there's still a lot to give, there are many units with enormous potential, so the future belongs to God, but for now I'm doing very well here." And back to the beginning of our conversation: is that when you joined Montebelo? Did you come straight away to take on the role you have today? Yes, I came straight into these roles. There were several factors that came together and that Montebelo's management considered fundamental for me to take on this role: the knowledge of how Lisbon works, the background I already had in F&B, which was very important for Montebelo, which has all these restaurant units. What's next? Do you think you still have a long way to go in your career? There's a long way to go here at the Montebelo Group. My work started less than a year ago, and when I leave a project, it's because I feel there's no more for me to add. Here I feel there's still a lot to give, there are many units with enormous potential, so the future belongs to God, but for now I'm doing very well here. Doesn't an international experience entice you? I've been more seduced by international experience, not least because I was with Hilton a few years ago and that could be one of the ways forward, but for now I'm not thinking too much about it. I'm not ruling it out, but I'm very happy to represent a national group with such great potential and international recognition. So maybe I'll represent them in Mozambique, where we have other units. Maybe that's the way forward. In academic terms, what paths did you follow? I have a degree in Economics, and at the end of my degree I was already working in hotels. I then did a postgraduate course at ISEG in Marketing Management and dedicated myself exclusively to my professional life. More recently, I took the Associação dos Directores do Hotéis de Portugal course, with a specialization in Hotel Management, because although I had done some smaller courses over time, some specializations, my question was "do I know what I'm actually doing or do I need some support here?" and I felt I needed that course to test my knowledge. With this award for Best Young Hotel Manager in the Xenia, he received a prize to do a postgraduate course at Les Roches in Marbella. Will you continue your professional development in this way? It was something I'd wanted to do for some time because I suffer a bit from the "impostor syndrome", we do it, we do it, but I felt I needed more knowledge - hence the ADHP course - and that confirmation. This Les Roches course is spectacular, it's everything I wanted to have done, not necessarily at Les Roches, but somewhere else, still in Portugal. So it's the icing on the cake and it was, without a doubt, an award that left me very satisfied. With all this work, with all your commitment and involvement, where does that leave your private life? We manage to reconcile it. The family is obviously a great support, but when I started raising them, they already knew about my career. I don't have children, but my husband is also in the field and that helps a lot. It was in this environment that we met and our friends are also from this environment, so I think it's easier to understand. You have to be organized, but you have to remember that there are times when you have to stop, and you also have to remember that there are emergencies that you have to attend to, so you have to try to strike this balance, but I still manage to enjoy some personal life, yes. To conclude: is it good to work in hospitality? I think so. It has its quirks, like all areas, but I still think it's good.