HOSPACE 2026 Sets Programme Around Margins, Tech and Workforce

HOSPA will hold its HOSPACE 2026 conference on Thursday 12 November at the Royal Lancaster London, with a programme built around commercial performance, connected technology and the hospitality sector's changing workforce.

The Hospitality Professionals Association's annual event will combine main-stage panels with practical workshops across its core disciplines: finance, technology and revenue management. ESG and commercial leadership sit alongside them on the agenda, and the day closes with a Gala Awards Dinner where the Inspirational Leader Awards winners will be announced.

Who is speaking and on what?

The morning opens with a welcome from conference host Peter Hancock and HOSPA's leadership team. HotStats CEO Michael Grove then presents UK hospitality performance data — a benchmarking session that anchors the day's commercial agenda in current operator numbers. UKHospitality chief executive Allen Simpson follows with an examination of policy and taxation.

A panel moderated by The Caterer editor James Stagg will weigh growth opportunities against risk. Two founders — Uli Pillau of hotel technology firm Apaleo and Fredrik Korallus of Otherwander — will then challenge established approaches to running hospitality businesses.

The afternoon shifts to hotel operations and commercial decision-making. Jon Davis, chief technology officer at Village Hotels, and Valerie Cook, revenue strategy director at Rudding Park, will discuss how connected technology can improve both. A guest experience panel moderated by HMA chairman Harry Fielder takes the question further: how digital tools can simplify the guest journey without displacing personal service.

What does this change for operators?

The commercial performance session is the programme's practical core. Janel Clark, HOSPA's head of professional development, will join Journey founder and CEO Simon Bullingham and The Mandrake managing director Eljesa Saciri to examine how decisions made across a hotel — not just in the finance office — contribute to financial results.

Two workforce-focused sessions follow:

• An ESG discussion on how evidence can strengthen the credibility of sustainability communications, pushing operators past unverified claims.
• A session with Sally Beck, deputy managing director of The Landmark Collection, and workplace happiness specialist Richard Clarke, on how leadership style and employee engagement support retention — a direct cost question in a sector where labour turnover drives recruitment spend.

Practical workshops run alongside the main stage, and five-minute 'HOSPA 300' presentations will introduce additional ideas through the afternoon. A closing leadership panel adds further operator perspectives. Networking drinks and canapés precede the Gala Awards Dinner.

The organiser's framing

HOSPA CEO Jane Pendlebury tied the programme's structure to the way investment decisions now cut across departments. "Decisions about commercial strategy, people and technology are closely connected," she said. "An investment in new systems needs to make sense for the team, the guest and the business."

She added: "We want delegates to leave with ideas they can question, adapt and put into practice within their own businesses. Bringing operators and specialists together is central to that."

Registration is open at hospa.org, with the full programme available at hospace.org. For UK hotel finance and revenue leaders, the 12 November date marks the sector's main end-of-year gathering for benchmarking, policy detail and supplier-side perspective before 2027 budgeting begins.