INTERNATIONAL REPORT—Best Western Hotels & Resorts and IHG have made personnel moves.
Naran Named Best Western Board Chairman
Best Western Hotels & Resorts’ board of directors has elected Ishwar Naran as board chairman for 2021. Naran, who previously served as vice chairman of the board, brings more than three decades of hospitality experience and 17 years of Best Western ownership to his role as chairman. His deep knowledge of the brand coupled with his extensive industry experience make him the ideal candidate to drive Best Western Hotels & Resorts forward in 2021, according to the company.
Naran has developed, acquired and managed more than 30 hotels throughout his career. Currently, he owns three Best Western-branded properties: the Best Western Wesley Chapel in Wesley Chapel, FL; the Best Western Plus Daytona Inn Seabreeze Oceanfront in Daytona Beach, FL; and the Best Western Plus Columbia North East in Columbia, SC. During his time as a Best Western owner, he has served on numerous advisory committees within the organization and was elected to the board in 2016 to represent the interests of hotel owners in District IV, which includes Florida, Tennessee, Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina and Puerto Rico.
During the election, John Kelly was named vice chairman and Danny Lafayette was named secretary treasurer. Recently, Steve Wahrlich was also appointed to the board as director for District II, representing the interests of Best Western hotel owners in seven western states, including Alaska, Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana, North Dakota and South Dakota, and Canada’s western provinces.
Farooqui Joins IHG as Non-Executive Director
InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) has appointed Duriya Farooqui as an independent non-executive director of IHG. She has joined the IHG board.
Farooqui is currently an independent director at Intercontinental Exchange, Inc., an operator of global exchanges and clearing houses, and provider of mortgage technology, data and listings services. She serves on the boards of NYSE and ICE NGX, both subsidiaries of ICE, and co-chairs the NYSE Board Advisory Council of CEOs, with a mission to expand board diversity.
She was previously president of supply chain innovation at Georgia-Pacific, leading an organization where companies collaborated to solve supply chain challenges. Prior to this, she was executive director of Atlanta Committee for Progress, a coalition of more than 30 CEOs who offer leadership on economic development opportunities in Atlanta.
Farooqui will serve on the audit and responsible business committees of the IHG Board.
