A 2015 alumnus, Charlotte Thouroude always knew that human resources was her thing.Preparing the reopening of the legendary Hotel de Crillon? A long-term challenge, but also a true opportunity for this young lady.

Why did you decide to work in human resources? 

In my middle school internship, I had the opportunity of working in all the departments of a hotel, and in particular, in human resources. I knew that that was what I wanted to do, a few years later, I applied to Vatel, with this goal in mind. The human resources management courses in the Bachelor curriculum convinced me I had made the right decision, especially as they were given by a passionate and exciting teacher.
I wanted to work in a field where I would be in contact with people and be useful for them, and that’s what you do in human resources: you must be a good listener, and it’s up to you to make everyone like their jobs. Human resources is much more than just recruitment, drawing up contracts and training employees.

A few hands-on missions in your current job:

• Making sure we comply with legal obligations
• Noting what our employees need and getting their feedback
• Making sure they have what they need to do their jobs well

A few administrative missions in your current job: 

This is what gives me the most work. Here, it’s mainly:

• Drawing up contracts
• Entering variable elements into the payroll system
• Daily updating the HR dashboards
• Managing housing requests with the French 1% employer scheme 

You started working at the Crillon in 2015 when it was still closed for remodeling: what did you do until it opened in July 2017?

Working in a hotel that was closed didn’t really impact our department because in human resources, our “customers” are our fellow employees. We kept all of our employees during renovation: some people worked in other hotels in Paris, and others were in training. There were 130 people in the hotel at that time, all managed by human resources.
Preparing the reopening of the hotel was a true challenge for us all: you still had to get your everyday work done, but at a much larger scale, as we hired 200 people! That means steering the recruitment process (job vacancies, sorting resumes, job interviews, follow-up, etc.), drawing up and signing each work contract, managing the mandatory medical appointments and assessments at the end of each trial period. A highlight for the hotel’s reopening: all 350 employees got together for three unforgettable integration days.
A few months later, there were still a few things that needing tweaking, but our restaurants and lobbies were always packed: the interest people had in this reopening was enormous and we were really proud.

Any classmates that you’re still in contact with?

Laura Benedetti, who is the Human resources manager at the Plaza Athenee in Paris.