Tune In To Talk: What is a “Wellness” meeting with Michael Dominguez

In this webinar, Ruth Marion, The Sleep Forum had the opportunity to speak with Michael Dominguez, President of Associated Luxury Hotels International on MPI-NJ’s Tune In To Talk about wellness in hospitality and the Delos Wellness Accreditation for Meeting Professionals.

Dominguez and Marion begin by talking about the difference between health and wellness.  Although the two go hand in hand, they are two different conversations.

“We’ve spent the last two years focused on health – airborne pathogen and cleanliness.  However, hotels have always been a clean place to stay and our number one job (as an innkeeper) has always been the health and safety of our guests and employees, period.”  says Dominguez.

From a health perspective, Dominguez talks about some of the positives that came out of all this and protocols that have been adopted by hotels, transportation and other public space.  For example, we’ve learned a lot about the benefits and science behind air filtration, fogging and nano septic technology. A plane is probably the cleanest place you can be right now.

When it comes to wellness, we all remember that surge in hotels offering spa treatments, meditation classes and yoga.  All these components are necessary and great when we talk about mental wellness.

Dominguez tells us how he learned that wellness is more than spa treatments, meditation classes and yoga.  He reminds the listeners that all these are great for mental wellness but there’s more.

While Dominguez was at MGM, Delos, the founder of Delos Lab, integrated StayWell rooms into the MGM portfolio.  The rooms included led lights, air filtration, hypoallergenic mattresses, and vitamin infused showers.

Dominguez tells the audience he “became an avid scholar and disciple of the science behind wellness and what it means”.  He had a conversation with Delos about how to bring all that great science to the meeting room.

As meeting professionals, we focus on sets, budgets, food but we forget about the physical environment where our attendees will be for more than 90% of the time. How do we, as hoteliers and meeting professionals, create an environment or build a physical structure, that is conducive to learning and productivity?  That’s the piece of wellness we are talking about today and there is a science behind it.

What Dominguez went on to talk about was bringing these “wellness and science” components into the meeting room.  He discussed lighting for example, noting that LED lights cost the same as regular lights.

This is where we are headed and this is the evolution.  And this is our chance to step up our game.  This is where we can really learn and grow.  If we, meetings professionals, focus on wellness in the meeting room as much as they do sustainability, we would hit a a home run. As an industry, we need to push leadership in that direction and educate.  The more we educate, the more educated we will be.

Marion talked about getting her Delos Accreditation for Meeting Professionals and how it really shed some light on areas of wellness she did not consider.  It takes less than one hour to do the course.  At check out, use ALHI for a 25% discount.

For more tips from Michael Dominguez about wellness at meetings, listen to the entire discussion here.