Mandy Holloway: Leading The Charge

Meet Mandy Holloway, the Executive Vice President, Chief People Officer of Montage International. Ms. Holloway is an award-winning, global human resources and learning executive with over 20 years of exceptional talent management experience in the hospitality and entertainment industries. Before joining Montage, Ms. Holloway served as the vice president of human resources and employee engagement at Universal Studios Hollywood, NBCUniversal in Universal City, California, where she managed operational staffing, employer branding, employee engagement, communications, and team member programs. Before that, Ms. Holloway held various leadership and human resources roles in top hospitality companies worldwide, including Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings Ltd. and Hard Rock International in Florida and The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company in Maryland.

The Start

Ms. Holloway’s passion for hospitality sparked at a very early age. Growing up in a household where both of her parents worked in the hospitality industry, she was immersed in the world of travel. From a very young age, Ms. Holloway developed a deep appreciation for diverse traditions, food, and culture.

Her first major career step took her aboard a cruise ship, an adventure which turned into career. Appointed as a Corporate Hospitality Trainer, Ms. Holloway soon found herself shaping the guest and employee experience across cultures.

“That was the real beginning of my career, and I have never looked back,” she remembers.

A Distinct Culture 

At Montage International, Ms. Holloway and her team focus on enriching lives and are intentional about the Associate Experience. “The Associate Experience isn’t just a people priority; it’s a business imperative,” she explains.

Montage International defines the Associate Experience as the sum of all interactions an associate has with their employer, from pre-recruitment to post-exit. This includes everything, starting from major milestones and personal relationships to technology use and physical work environment.

“Our model is simple, and includes five areas of focus: Attract/Select, Belonging, Leadership, Growth, and Transition. The key is being intentional about each. We take a holistic approach and want our associates to have full lives both within and outside of our organization,” explains Ms. Holloway.

Ensuring a Consistent Associate Experience (AX)

Ms. Holloway strongly believes that an organization is only as strong as its work culture. Beyond Montage International’s programs that allow its associates to work across the portfolio, the organization is committed to strong brand pillars that maintain consistency across the organization’s global team.

Montage International is grounded in a unified set of employer standards that shape every touchpoint of the associate experience.

At the heart of Montage International’s culture are three core brand pillars:

• Passion Holds True – Associates bring a clear sense of purpose and deep enthusiasm for their properties and the brand.
• Confidence in the Vision – Associates trust in leadership, believing in the integrity of their decisions and their vision for the future. This fosters a workplace built on transparency, consistency, and shared purpose.
• Pride in Our Family – Teamwork matters. They just don’t work together; they are constantly listening, learning, and have deep respect for each other.

The Montage employer brand is anchored in the brandline: “All Because of You!”

This holistic approach hasn’t gone unnoticed, and Montage International achieved USA Today, 2025 Top Workplace Recognition in 2025.

Ensuring Associates’ Financial Well-Being

Upon knowing that many Americans are struggling to make ends meet and one in three Americans run out of money before payday, Ms. Holloway contemplated the possibility of altering the payroll cycle.

Despite not being responsible for finance, she asked, what if an associate did not have to wait two weeks to receive the earned money? What if they could focus on not just physical wellness, but financial wellness?

This simple yet powerful question eventually led to the launch of DailyPay, a groundbreaking initiative that gives Montage International associates access to their earned wages on a daily basis.

“By introducing Daily Pay, we are not only supporting the associates’ financial well-being, but also making a strategic investment in our own long-term success,” she explains. “In order to thrive, we encourage all our leaders to ask, ‘What if,’ and build businesses that endure and have lasting legacies.”

Enriching Lives

The essence of Montage International is to enrich lives, whether it’s enriching the lives of the associates, the guests, or the communities in which we operate. “As leaders, we have a huge responsibility and innumerable opportunities to influence and enrich lives in the way we behave and the things that we do,” says Ms. Holloway.

One of Montage’s core values is learning. The organization focuses on nurturing leadership at every level, through its robust succession planning and leveraging of the platform, Career Hub, to manage and develop leadership around specific skills and competencies. Ms. Holloway also believes hands-on experience plays a critical role in leadership development.

Opportunities such as joining a task force during hotel openings allow team members to explore new markets, embrace diverse cultures, expand their internal networks, and gain transformative experiences that build future-ready leaders.

Staying Relevant

Ms. Holloway believes modern HR executives need to develop strategic, technical, and interpersonal skills to stay relevant. “Change is constant,” she often notes. “If you do not like change, you will like irrelevance even less.”

Being people leaders, HR executives must embrace change and turn that into an opportunity to meet the ever-changing world of work with confidence. She also believes modern-day HR executives need to possess business acumen, digital literacy, data analysis, change management, strong communication skills, as well as being adept at leading a positive associate experience.

Preparing for the Shift

Montage International will continue to invest in technology as a powerful enabler of human connection and service, but never as a replacement for the human touch. Workday is Montage International’s core platform, and it is already focused on maximizing the value of Workday’s AI capabilities and machine learning.

Ms. Holloway firmly emphasizes that the future of work is increasingly skills-based. Montage International recently launched Workday’s Career Hub to strategically manage and develop its associates based on their competencies and skills. The platform helps identify skills gaps, facilitates targeted training, and empowers associates to navigate career opportunities across the company.

To remain nimble in a rapidly shifting talent landscape, Montage is continually enhancing Workday to support an agile workforce structure. This includes the capability to effectively manage a range of talent, from full-time associates to gig workers, while staying responsive to evolving business needs.

Finally, the essence of Montage remains the same: to enrich lives. Whether through career development, technology, or workplace culture, the company continues to prioritize a holistic approach to associate well-being, expanding its support beyond traditional benefits to address physical, mental, financial, and social needs.

Building a Future-Ready Workforce

Montage International will continue to listen to its associates’ voices and prioritize their value propositions, provide training on traditional hospitality service but also in areas like technology, and data analysis, whilst delivering excellence through modernized leadership practices in order to remain competitive and retain top talent.

“The human element will always be critical in luxury hospitality. Future-ready professionals that excel in interpersonal communication, emotional intelligence, and problem-solving, ensuring personalized and memorable guest interactions are key,”– states Ms. Holloway.