The backbone - Rosemarie Preddie-Brown

Amitabh Sharma

Hospitality Jamaica Senior Writer

PUBLISHED: March 3, 2010

HOSPITALITY JAMAICA 

For Rosemarie Preddie- Brown work is nothing less than worship and she takes pride in the fact that she has never missed a day in the last 10 years serving the Jamaica Pegasus, Kingston.

“I have never been absent from work,” she said, with a touch of humility.

“I don’t watch the work,” the administrative assistant to director of Engineering, added, “I just work!”

It had been her dream to work at the Pegasus, “I used to see the building from the bus and hoped that I would be working here one day."

She joined the hotel as a housekeeping attendant in 2001; A year later she was promoted to the housekeeping department secretary, “I was called in by the head of the department and was informed that I would have to take charge as her secretary,” Preddie- Brown recalled. “I got one day training and was ready to go.”

She hasn’t looked back since.

By 2005, the acumen for streamlining operations and efficient time management saw Preddie-Brown moving to the engineering department as administrative assistant to the director of engineering.

In her current position, she is responsible for the smooth functioning of the engineering operations of the hotel, from troubleshooting and scheduling routine maintenance tasks to ensuring the hotel’s engineers keep the property humming.

GOOD WORK PAYS OFF
Ambitious to a fault, this mother of two daughters and a son and three lovely grandchildren, has never taken a vacation, “I have taken vacation only to study,” she said.

The years at the Jamaica Pegasus, one of the capital’s landmark hotels, has paid off well for Preddie-Brown who said, “I have learnt a lot here”. “I did English, Social Studies, Office Administration and Principles of Business working here, something I could not do before I came to the job.”

She is now far more qualified and marketable than the days she watched the hotel from the bus windows and confident in a position she has honed her skills.

Preddie-Brown, who calls Pegasus her ‘second home’, is exploring avenues to upgrade her skills and soon wants to go back to school and do a computer course.

Looking back, she is thankful for what her professional life has given her and attributes her success to ‘being the person that she is and not trying to be anyone else’.