BCCJ Member Spotlight: Neil McInnes (Hilton Worldwide)

As Conrad Tokyo celebrates its 20th anniversary this year, the British Chamber of Commerce in Japan spoke to General Manager Neil McInnes about the hotel’s recent developments, as well as how Hilton is responding to Japan’s ongoing international tourism boom from his perspective as the company’s Regional General Manager for East Japan, Okinawa.

Congratulations on Conrad Tokyo’s anniversary.

Thanks, we’re celebrating 20 years of legacy and hospitality, which we’re enormously proud of. We’ll be celebrating in July with our team members, many of whom have been here since day one, and then celebrating with our guests. After that milestone, it’s about the next 20 years of our journey.  

What’s new at Conrad Tokyo?

Sustainable initiatives have been a big focus for us globally in the past few years; 75% of global travellers tell us they want a more sustainable stay so we are doing more while still offering a luxury stay. We’ve replaced all plastic bottles with glass or aluminium ones and replaced individual amenities with bulk ones, which has been well received. Any leftover amenities are donated to children’s homes, and used hand soap bars are recycled and distributed to charities. We’ve moved from plastic amenities to bamboo, too.

With a focus on wellness, in addition to our fitness centre, swimming pool and spa, we’ve partnered with an app called RunGo, which allows guests to plan their run around Tokyo. It’s got voice guidance so people can learn about the area, such as the palace or gardens, while they run.

Meanwhile, our Conrad 1/3/5 programme offers curated experiences whether guests have one, three or five hours to spare, and Conrad Art Encounters brings our hotel’s artwork to life. We’ve created a guide so guests can walk around and enjoy the art—with themselves or a team member—and learn the story behind it. It’s a Conrad Global Initiative that we’re bringing local.

What are Hilton’s development plans in Japan?

We have 31 hotels in eight brands in key sites nationwide—Tokyo, Osaka, Kyoto, Nagoya, Fukuoka, Hokkaido and Okinawa—with nine hotels in the pipeline. Our first Waldorf Astoria in Japan opened in Osaka on April 3rd. We’ve got a second Waldorf Astoria coming to Nihonbashi, Tokyo, and two Conrads in the pipeline—Nagoya and Yokohama—which are new markets for luxury brands. Canopy, our lifestyle brand, is coming to Miyako Island in Okinawa, next to our Hilton Okinawa Miyako Island Resort, to complement each other. And then we’ll have an LXR (another of our luxury brands) open in Hiroshima, with views of the torii gate of Itsukushima Shrine. We’re excited and there’s more to come.

What factors are driving Japan’s inbound tourism growth?

It all started after the 3.11 earthquake when the Japanese government focused on tourism as a driver of economic recovery, implementing policies such as relaxation of visa requirements. Exchange rates also became more favourable. Post-pandemic, as soon as the borders were reopened, those efforts came to fruition. In 2024, Japan welcomed 37 million tourists, so the Japan National Tourism Organization target of 60 million by 2030 is on track.

How are you catering to demand at Conrad Tokyo?

It’s enormously exciting to see tourism increase from single digits when I came here 15 years ago to now. Japan has so much to offer—safety, cleanliness, the world-class hospitality of omotenashi, powder snow, cherry blossom, autumn leaves. But there is so much more. When I hear about hidden gems, I research them to share with guests. Our concierge has become the busiest team, and we’ve added more members to it post-Covid. We engage with guests before they arrive as well as afterwards. They ask us about the rest of their Japan stay too, such as getting to Nagano or Okinawa. If they’re staying with us there, we’ll pass them on to our team members and, if not, we’ll give them information.

We’ve a great team. We came out of Covid well because we kept a full team, even hiring new graduates, during Covid so as soon as it was over we were ready to go. We welcomed 35 new graduates to Conrad Tokyo on April 1st and a further 300 around all our hotels in Japan. The labour market remains tough in our industry, particularly in some specialised positions like sushi chef, pastry chef or spa therapist. Our job is to make our industry attractive and continue to welcome people into hospitality because it is not necessarily the first choice for people’s careers.

What marketing trends do you foresee in the tourism and hospitality sectors?

Technology; at Hilton we implemented a digital key so guests can put their room key on their phone. Through an app called Kipsu we offer a chat service from guest rooms, which is generating really high engagement as we can respond quickly. We can interact with guests using mobile apps and messaging, too. And at Conrad Tokyo we just moved to online booking for the spa, offering real-time availability in line with our focus on wellness.

Congratulations on your recent awards. Can you share some details?

I won Area/Regional General Manager of the Year (2023/2024). I don’t like the limelight but I was happy to get the award as it was recognition for my team; I couldn’t do what I do without them.

The award we’re thrilled about is third place in the Great Place to Work Institute Japan’s “Best Workplaces in Japan” ranking in 2025. It marks Hilton’s first entry into the top 100 in Japan and the company has been recognised as the top hospitality company. We’ve focused on enhancing the team member experience and their journey with Hilton over the past years and we’re really pleased to see those initiatives have paid off and team members are happy to work with us.

Why were you recognised?

One reason is our Thrive@Hilton programme, which supports team members’ wellbeing and career development by providing resources for mental and physical health, career growth and personal fulfilment. Last year we introduced an app called Intellect for our team members at Conrad Tokyo as a pilot to support their mental wellbeing. Post-Covid, people have been struggling and we want to provide help.

As a global company, we offer a Thrive Sabbatical, whereby team members can enter a competition to win a month paid sabbatical. Last year one of our 10 winners globally hailed from Japan: a team member at Conrad Tokyo whose son has autism and is unable to speak. He and his family visited our Hiltons around the country to give his wife and daughter a holiday and his son the experience. He took pictures in every hotel and told the story globally.

We also have a number of team member resources groups globally to help team members from different communities, such as LGBTQ+, women and people with disabilities. In Japan, the government issues a penalty for companies of a certain size that don’t hire people with disabilities. Many companies just pay rather than hire, but we took a stance a few years ago that we want to hire regularly team members with disabilities to give them career opportunities. We just hired two team members with Down syndrome as front-of-house staff at Hilton Tokyo through the good work the GM is doing there with not-for-profit organisation Hands on Tokyo. In an effort to promote understanding between team members from different generations, we’ve also held courses. These are just some examples of what we’ve been doing to make our company a better place to work.

How will Hilton Japan engage with Tokyo Rainbow Pride 2025?

Building on our activities at the event in previous years, we’ll have a stand in the main area to promote Hilton Japan, Hilton for the Stay (our marketing campaign to stay with us) and recruitment, to work with us. For the first time, team members from Hilton Tokyo Bay, Hilton Tokyo, Conrad Tokyo, Hilton Odawara Resort & Spa and DoubleTree by Hilton Tokyo Ariake will walk the parade together. We’ll also have a food stall, serving rainbow banana bread and showcasing the Conrad Bear. Tokyo Rainbow Pride has grown enormously in recent years, with lots of global companies, and we’re one of few hotel companies there.

How does your presence reflect your wider efforts on diversity, equity and inclusion?

At Conrad Tokyo, we’ve done in-house training on LGBTQ+ to ensure everyone is openminded and to foster an inclusive culture. Our panel for Women’s History Month event included a transgender panellist and we had a transgender influencer staying with us recently. We’ve educated our team members on pronouns and we give them confidence by roleplaying different scenarios.

Regarding women in leadership, Hilton has a goal to increase the number of female GMs, senior leaders and head of departments. We’re encouraging our female team members to step up by giving them confidence through various courses including tailor-made resilience training. I believe in having a balanced team, which we have here. To grow a development pipeline in Japan, we need more leaders and local talent so we’ve got to create that.

How does Conrad Tokyo support Refugees Empowerment International and other non-profit organisations?

We’ve had the pleasure of hosting the REI gala here for the past three years, most recently in March. With that comes our partnership in providing donations, such as hotel stays for the raffle. This year, two team members joined the REI field trip to the Thailand–Myanmar border, visiting three projects related to women, addiction and social development. They will share their experiences with our team members to help educate them on the plight of refugees. Hilton hires refugees in some of the countries where we operate, and the work REI does is meaningful and has impact.

Hilton is always working with new organisations where we can make a difference. Since the 3.11 earthquake, we’ve been working with Playground of Hope, a non-profit organisation that builds playgrounds in orphanages in Japan. We’ve supported 30–35 playground builds; they find a children’s home with space and we get the equipment, build it and do a BBQ for the kids and the community. We’re now hiring people from these children’s homes to work in our hotels in Okinawa, Tokyo and Osaka, giving them career opportunities and helping them navigate starting out in life.

These kind of projects are so rewarding and all related to Hilton’s Travel with Purpose, our environmental, social and governance strategy to drive responsible travel and tourism globally.