Insights From the C-Suite: Dina Belon, President, Staypineapple Hotels

As part of a new, members-only series, Women Leading Travel & Hospitality is asking industry executives about their professional journeys, mentorship, how they stay up-to-date on the latest industry technology and trends, how they take care of themselves, and so much more. This week, insight comes from Dina Belon, president, Staypineapple Hotels. We asked Dina a series of questions about her career journey, her leadership philosophy, empowering her teams, and more.

Women Leading Travel & Hospitality: What is your leadership philosophy and how do you embody it?
Dina Belon: Leadership begins with understanding your own strengths. Too often, people try to fit themselves into a mold of what they think a leader should be, but that’s not authentic. Embrace who you are and what you're good at. I use my top five strengths — futuristic, strategic, relator, responsibility, and activator — to guide my leadership. I communicate the vision (futuristic), keep things clear and realistic (strategic), trust and empower my team (relator), hold them accountable (responsibility), and drive progress (activator). That’s my focus every day!

WLTH: How do you ensure your teams feel included, valued and empowered to bring their authentic selves to work?
DB: It's simple, really: you just do it! At Staypineapple, trusting and empowering our hoteliers is EVERYTHING; it's our secret sauce. We hire people who genuinely want to help others and love making people happy. During interviews, we look for emotional intelligence and then trust our team to do their thing and get out of their way! 

Forget rigid training; we show them what excellence looks like and encourage them to connect with guests as themselves. Our hotel staff are the hoteliers, not the vice presidents. Our "surprise and delight" culture pillar is all about empowerment. Every team member has the freedom to do something special for a guest whenever they want. It’s about making both our team and guests happy — and who doesn’t love spreading joy?

WLTH: What innovative strategies or technologies do you see shaping the future of the industry?
DB: Hyperpersonalization is definitely shaping a lot of the technological changes we’re seeing. We’re focused on enhancing personalized guest experiences by using both historical and real-time data to understand guest preferences and passions. Our company has always prioritized building relationships with guests, providing "relationship service" that goes beyond basic customer service to understand what makes guests tick.

In 2024, we replaced the majority of our technology stack, which we’re now leveraging to share relevant information across our portfolio of hotels. This enables personalized recommendations and connections between team members and guests who share similar interests. It not only enhances the guest experience but also fosters a fun, engaging workplace culture centered around surprising and delighting our guests.

WLTH: How do you approach succession planning and developing future leaders within your organization?
DB: We value emotional intelligence and individual strengths over just technical skills or past experience. Take our chief growth officer, Michael Hirschler. He started in People and Culture but has an innate ability to cut through the clutter, identify what truly matters, and come up with innovative solutions. He’s a Cornell Hospitality Management grad (which he’d definitely want me to mention!) and has proven himself to have much more to offer. His emotional intelligence enables him to get our creative and tech teams working together seamlessly. Mike is a perfect example of how we identify strengths and create opportunities for growth at all levels of the organization. 

We also ask our team members about their goals and dreams during performance reviews. This helps us understand how we can support them, whether that’s with us or elsewhere. As a smaller company, we know that sometimes the next step for someone may be outside Staypineapple, but we’re always excited to welcome back “boomerang” employees who have gained valuable experience elsewhere.

WLTH: Staypineapple plans to use 90 percent renewable energy by 2026. Can you share the steps you’re taking to achieve this ambitious goal and any innovations you're exploring in renewable energy sourcing?
DB: I'm incredibly proud of our accomplishments and leadership in sustainability. Right now, seven out of 10 of our hotels operate with renewable energy. We've achieved this through a mix of being in cities with significant renewable energy in their grids, purchasing renewable energy credits, and investing in community solar projects. Our buildings range from new constructions in New York City to a historic landmark in Chicago, so their energy needs vary greatly. We continue to work to improve efficiency and we’re committed to purchasing renewable energy so our guests can rest easy knowing we’re reducing their carbon footprint.