When Angela Brav realized she wasn’t going to make a career of her first passion—playing tennis—a not so gentle push from a grandmother led her to the hotel industry.

The chief operating officer for InterContinental Hotels Group started as a front-desk clerk at a Ramada Inn in St. Augustine, FL after her grandmother told her she wasn’t going to be the next Chris Evert and should instead apply for work at the nearby hotel.

“That’s how I got into the hotel business,” says Brav, who played tennis at the collegiate level and still loves the game. Now she is one of the top executives for one of the biggest hotel companies in the world, helping lead IHG through an organizational transition during one of the toughest times in industry history.

Brav was named IHG’s COO for North America last year as the company combined what had previously been two separate and distinct divisions: the company-managed properties and the franchised properties.

“We merged into one united group with the intent to try and drive best practices across the entire system,” Brav explains. “Initially the belief was to save the best ideas and apply them in a company-managed environment. What we realized was we can leverage that at 200 hotels and see value or leverage it at 3,000 properties and see a real return.”

It’s a transition that runs parallel to Brav’s more than 20 years in the industry. After her start as a front-desk clerk, Brav become a regional manager working with several different hotels in the area. From there, she took a job with Holiday Corp. as a quality inspector.

“I realized in order to really take it to the next level I had to see different management styles,” Brav says. “I wanted to see what works, what doesn’t. I was trying to figure out who I was and what my style was.”

Brav eventually came to Atlanta with IHG and has worked in various positions, even helping set up franchise divisions in Brussels and Guadalajara.

“Angela is a quality driven leader who has an outstanding energy and passion for her hotels and her people,” says Jim Abrahamson, president, the Americas, IHG. “Her leadership skills and experience with IHG brands and systems have positioned her as a key person on our executive team.”

While vice president of franchise services approximately eight years ago, Brav established the field organization IHG still employs. Her “hub and spoke” system employs area managers throughout the country who work directly with franchisees to help drive performance at their properties by shepherding them to the tools and services they most need.

There are approximately 60 area managers in North America and each cover regions with about 40 hotels, now both franchised and company managed. Brav says it’s the strongest field organization of any hotel company and what makes IHG special.

Despite the recent downturn, IHG hasn’t cut any of its field support. In fact, Brav says, IHG has improved its inspection team by using quality consultants who don’t just point out problems, but offer solutions to fix them.

“What we’re trying to do is get ready for the upswing with everything we do,” Brav says. She is cautiously optimistic that will be soon—IHG’s global RevPAR was up eight percent in July—but she’s still worried about unemployment numbers and a government she feels is working against small businesses.

Brav cites her “people portfolio” as the key to her success. “Things are changing so rapidly,” she says. “By the time you read the statistics, it’s too late. Your employees know what’s going on when a program isn’t working if you’ve hired the right people. You don’t have to wait for 1,000 people to send in a survey. Leaders who lose the ability to stay connected lose touch with what’s going on.”

That leadership developed in part because of the push from a grandmother who worked as a pianist in luxury hotels in Italy. “I just remember being a young kid at home and my grandmother loved to entertain and would always recreate things from hotels,” Brav says. “Our tables were set like you might see in a ballroom and my brother and I would have to stand at the door and welcome people. Everyone thought it was the cutest thing.

“Hotels are all about creating an environment that makes you feel special. That’s why it’s called the hospitality industry.”

It’s a lesson Brav learned at a young age and one she now looks to spread to her employees and across all of IHG’s properties.