15 Things You Need to Know This Morning

Title: VP and Insight, Strategy & Innovation team lead, Marriott
Job: New products and service and business model innovations.
Years on the job: 4.
Company: 19 brands, 4,300 hotels in 81 countries; over 120,000 employees and nearly $14b in FY14 revenue.
Memorable project: Concept, design and development of JW Steakhouse at Grosvenor House, a JW Marriott in London. Completed on a shoestring budget and resulted in one of the brand’s most commercially successful restaurants. 
Current project: Major renovation and repositioning of Charlotte Marriott City Center–integrating innovations in architecture, interior design and soft programming in areas like arrival, public space, food and beverage, fitness and digital. 
Career: Started over a wok in family’s kitchen. Discovered love of Chinese food, which led to interest in cooking and ultimately hotel experience design.
Grew up: Farm in South Dartmouth, MA.
Current home: DC.
Why DC: Job opportunity in concept design for Marriott’s Food & Beverage. 
Schools: Northwestern University, Cornell and L’Ecole de Gastronomie Francaise Ritz-Escoffier. 
First job: Cooking at The Bridge Street Cafe in Padanaram, MA.
Job in another life: Explorer-in-Residence for National Geographic. 
Daily habit: Running.
Favorite app: Huffington Post.
Favorite movie: Mad Max: Fury Road.
Favorite restaurant: Obelisk.
Favorite band: Pink Floyd.
Favorite vacation spot: Ubud, Bali.
Guilty pleasure: Take-out Chinese.
Bucket list: Authoring book on past and present adventures. (Editor’s note: Matthew competed in Survivor: The Amazon in 2002.)
Family: Girlfriend and plenty of plants.
Hobbies: Endurance racing, exploring new restaurants and bars and writing.
Startling fact: Born in Hong Kong.