On the Journey to Transform the 150-year-old Hotel Brand— Meet with Sally Osborne, Director of Innovation & Kaleidoscope Lab, Peninsula Hotels

Sometimes the most meaningful and inspiring conversations happen over casual meals. The Time Auction Blog is a snippet of our meetings with people who have found passion in their lives and career.

In this digital era, innovation is key to success in nearly all industries. At Time Auction Hong Kong, we’re honored to host our first-ever Zoom event with Sally Osborne, Director of Innovation & Kaleidoscope Lab, Peninsula Hotels to share her journey on heading up digital innovation at Peninsula Hotels and transforming the 150-year-old luxury hospitality brand.

Meet Sally Osborne!

Sally is the Director, Technology Innovation at The Hongkong and Shanghai Hotels Limited (HSH) which owns The Peninsula Hotels, The Repulse Bay, The Peak Tower and The Peak Tram. At HSH, she leads the Technology Steering Committee with the objective of delivering the group’s five-year ambition for digital transformation.

In this role, Sally has also devised and championed “Kaleidoscope, The Peninsula Labs” start-up project, which launched at the 2018 StartmeUpHK Festival.

Prior to her current role at HSH, Sally was the founder of her own luxury hotel consulting firm, specializing in affiliate and partnership marketing, digital marketing, and CRM.

She was also a pioneer at the start of the online travel agency (OTA) era — launching the European website for Wotif.com, following the huge success of the Australian introduction, and the site was sold to Expedia at a market value in excess of US$756 million in 2014.

It’s Your Road.

There is a quote from Rumi, the Persian Muslim poet hat Sally would like to share with us:

“It’s your road, and yours alone. Others may walk it with you, but no one can walk it for you.”

Everyone has their own journey — Sally encouraged us that, we should always be responsible for our lives and go for what we want despite the obstacles that we might encounter.

Every decision you made shapes the present you today. This quote is impactful to Sally, as it reminds her of the reasons behind all those little and huge decisions she made, and how she comes through all the challenges in her life.

Inhale. Exhale. Reset Your Mind!

When being asked about the most impactful purchase of HKD1,000 that she has made, Sally said that it would be a mask for meditation that she bought recently.

Produced by a Hong-Kong-based start-up called Silentmode, a mask specially designed to blackout audio in the surrounding and provide curated relaxing music instead. Sally uses it for meditation, for around 5–30 minutes a day, to relax from a hectic day at work.

“It is important to take a bit of timeout from a busy life, just a few minutes. It is like a mental re-set.”

Sally recommended us to work on mindfulness, which she thinks that it is a way to nurture ourselves psychologically and allow us to reflect on our journey.

Be Inspired by Everything at All Time

In our life journey, we would be meeting a lot of people and there can be a unique lesson from each of them. Sally reminded us to keep an open mind to every opportunity, as we never know what lesson and experience it would bring us to.

“Learn from every person that you meet. You never know what you are going to pick up from them.”

Everyone has their personal stories, and perhaps interesting experiences that you may not be even imagined. Get fully inspired when we network with people, and never waste a conversation.

Thank you, Sally, for raising 99 volunteer hours and all the volunteers who dedicated their time for Golden Age Foundation, Junior Achievement HK and more!

For our upcoming experiences, visit Time Auction Hong Kong to volunteer and meet inspiring mentors!