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INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S DAY is March 8, and hotel owners and large hospitality companies are taking time to make sure the women in the industry are reaching their full potential. Recent data shows women are improving their position in the industry, but more remains to be done. For California hotelier Sunil "Sunny" Tolani, that means giving female employees at his company, The Prince Organization, special training and time off for health care. For Tina Burnett, recently promoted chief development officer at G6 Hospitality, home company of Motel 6 and Studio 6 brands, it means making sure women are included in the same way as their male colleagues. "At our company, we believe women to be just as smart and capable as men-if not more so and there are intelligent and highly competent," Tolani said. "The traits generally associated for good hospitality as good social skills, warmth, compassion, expressiveness, generosity and altruistic impulses. We are focusing on the next generation of women hoteliers and convey to them that really extraordinary careers can be made in our widely diverse Hospitality industry."

BLACK PEOPLE MADE little progress in the hospitality industry over the past year, according to a report from diversity advocacy group the Castell Project. The COVID-19 pandemic was particularly hard on Black hotel workers and executives. The Castell Project released the "Black Representation in Hospitality Leadership 2022" on Tuesday, which was International Women's Day. Much like last year's report, it showed little progress for racial diversity in the industry. For example, only 11 percent of the 671 hotel company websites reviewed for this study showed Black executives, director through CEO, prominently on their websites in 2021, down from 2019. Those Black executives represented just 2 percent of all hospitality industry executives on the websites reviewed.