Hospitality executive search for hotels, travel operators, airports and leisure venues. Clients include G Adventures and AGS Airports.
Oryx provides hospitality executive search for hotel and venue operators, restaurant and food service groups, tour and adventure travel businesses, airports, visitor attractions and conference and training centres. Clients include G Adventures, Swoop Adventures, AGS Airports, London Biggin Hill Airport, ACC and Eastwood Park. Leadership in this sector is judged on a rare combination: commercial control of revenue, distribution and cost per available room or seat, alongside genuine operational presence with a large, dispersed and often seasonal workforce. We search for people who demonstrably hold both, across general management, operations, revenue and commercial, marketing and customer experience, and multi-site regional leadership. Our coverage spans branded and independent hotels, serviced apartments and student and co-living operators, pubs, bars and casual dining groups, contract catering, airports and aviation services, and outbound and adventure travel.
Retained by operators, owners and venue groups who cannot afford a miss
Birmingham Airport (BHX) is the seventh-busiest airport in the UK, serving over 13.6 million passengers annually. Located in the Metropolitan Borough of Solihull, it sits about 8 miles (13 km) east-southeast of Birmingham city centre. Oryx handled two projects; one to recruit a new Development and Construction Director, the other to recruit a new Head of Corporate affairs and Marketing.
In 1990 G-Adventures was launched by Bruce Poon Tip with the belief that other travellers would want to share his desire to experience authentic adventures in a responsible and sustainable manner. Today over 200,000 travellers experience the real world with G-Adventures every year; there are 2,200 employees worldwide in 28 offices, and the group offers more than 700 adventures spanning the globe. In 2017, Bruce acquired the former All Leisure Group’s escorted tour brands Travelsphere and Just You, and they have been re-launched in the UK as G-Touring. Working with the new UK CEO, Oryx has helped to strengthen the senior management team with the appointment of an Aviation Director, an E-Commerce Director and a People and Culture Partner.
The Liverpool Experience campus (LEX) is one of Europe’s leading entertainment complexes and is home to The M&S Bank Arena, BT Convention Centre and Exhibition Centre Liverpool. Originally conceived as part of a plan to help regenerate Liverpool city centre, boosting the local economy and helping to elevate the city’s profile, both nationally and internationally, ACC Liverpool has, since 2008, attracted more than 6 million visitors to more than 3,100 events and generated £1.3 billion in economic benefit for the local economy. Since 2011, Oryx has appointed a number of board Directors and Senior Managers, namely; Kerry Mulloy, Director of Events and Operations, Ben Williams, Commercial Director and Adrian Evans, Asst. Director Conference & Exhibition Sales. In mid-2020, Faye Dyer, the Corporate Services Director that we had placed was promoted to become MD.
Our approach as a hospitality headhunter is research-led and retained. Rather than working from a candidate database, our in-house research team maps operators, brands and estates directly, then approaches individuals in confidence about a specific opportunity. That is how we reach general managers and directors who are performing well and would never respond to an advertisement. Oryx was founded in 1988 and is employee-owned, and our consultants typically remain with the firm for more than a decade, which gives multi-site operators continuity across successive appointments. Every assignment includes proactive primary research, weekly auditable updates, face-to-face candidate briefing and a pre-qualified shortlist within eight weeks. Our hospitality recruiters also deliver standalone talent mapping and salary benchmarking ahead of an acquisition, a new site opening or a succession round. We also work with private equity and family-owned groups where a leadership change follows an acquisition or a repositioning, and where the search has to run without unsettling site teams, franchise partners or guests.
Rebecca Ross
Director
26 years with Oryx
Nic Davis
Senior Consultant
11 years with Oryx
Colette Brown
Director
27 years with Oryx
Alex Mitchell
Director
26 years with Oryx
Will Strange
Director
28 years with Oryx
Gemma Killin
Senior Research Manager
12 years with Oryx
Phil Moran
Managing Director
37 years with Oryx
Jon Badger
Senior Research Manager
22 years with Oryx
Alec Berry
Senior Research manager
14 years with Oryx
