Skift Take
Marriott’s next CEO is almost certain to come from within the company’s own ranks.
Marriott CEO Arne Sorenson on Monday lost a nearly two-year battle with pancreatic cancer. While the hotel industry mourned Tuesday over the death of such an enigmatic figure, it was only natural to begin wondering who might take over for Sorenson as leader of the world's largest hotel company. Marriott offered no further details on the succession plans beyond that a new CEO would be announced within the next two weeks.
The list of the favored candidates is likely small and internal.
Sorenson may have been the first outsider to take the top job at Marriott, but he built a relationship with the company for decades — first as an outside attorney for the company during its spinout of its Host real estate division and then joining Marriott as in-house counsel in 1996.
Sorenson’s own path to the executive suite shows the company favors someone with established ties to the company, and that’s why the short list is likely down to two candidates and potentially a wild card or two.
But this isn't a job promotion the winning candidate should take lightly. There was somewhere close to 730,000 people wearing a Marriott badge around the world pre-pandemic, Sorenson said in a 2019 speech. But the hotel industry of 2021 is a shell of its former self, with tens of thousands of staffers out of work across many companies.
Hotels continue to operate at fractions of their pre-pandemic vacancy rates. Even China, which Marriott expects to return to 2019 performance levels the quickest, faced a re
