BITAC Casino Resorts 2025 Keynote: Beyond the Game: Building a Culture Where Employees Stay, Serve, and Lead

By Jim Nelson | August 14, 2025

BITAC, our sister company that produces executive events, recently held its annual Casino Resorts event with casino operators from far and wide. Our keynote speaker was Paula Allen, the CEO of Allen Academy, the director of leadership development and guest service at 7 Cedars, and an enrolled tribal citizen of the Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe in Sequim, Washington.

Allen began her keynote by sharing her personal BITAC experience and why she is so passionate about its executive events.

“I’ve been going to two conferences for 30 years,” she relayed, “and being in leadership development, I’m looking for certain vendors, and I feel like I don’t want to ‘waste my time.’ And BITAC was set up completely differently, and I didn’t know how much I needed BITAC until I experienced BITAC.”

Her role once included curating the artwork at 7 Cedars, which led to an interesting encounter at a previous BITAC event.

“We had one wall in the back area of our resort that was leaky,” Allen said. “There were rags at the bottom of this wall, and I would have to take art off of it and replace it; this wall was very irritating to me. At BITAC, I happened to be ‘forced’ to sit with a vendor, and this vendor handles that. Not only did he tell me why the wall was leaky, he told me how to overcome it, and I was able to bring all of that information back to our facilities director, and we were able to get it fixed. Those are the type of solutions that BITAC offers that I would not be exposed to at any other type of conference. So, I’m extremely excited that you all are experiencing this, some of you for the very first time.”

Creating an environment where guests feel valued is imperative, as Allen underscored with a personal story about a guest service experience.

“I had the gift of working with our CEO at 7 Cedars, and very early on I was exposed to a situation that clarified why we were there. I had a guest call me and he said, ‘You guys moved your slot machines; where there was a $1 machine now there’s a $20 machine, and I lost my money. I want my money back.’ I’m like, ‘Yeah, right.’ Thank goodness I did not [say] what I [thought] I should tell him. I have a process to go through, so I do exactly what I’m supposed to do: I create a relationship with him, and I go talk to my director about it, and my director says, ‘Give him the money back. Let’s just do it. Let’s just see; we want to create an environment where things are easy, where people like to come back.’ I was a little bit flooded, but I loved the idea, so I called the guy and said, ‘Come on in. We’d be happy to give you your money back. Just know that we move machines periodically.’ That was at noon; at 6:30 that night, I happened to be in the lobby, and he and his wife were getting off a machine and walking into the restaurant. Now, how many times over do you think we got that $20 back? And I would have probably told the gentleman, ‘No.’”

The importance of creating a culture that is easy for both guests and team members to navigate is also important, she added.

“You have to be strategic in setting up a culture that is easy for guests to maneuver in, but also easy for team members to maneuver in. Our goal, our vision, is to empower people to make bold decisions. We are in an environment where we need to make money moves. We want leaders to be able to make bold decisions, and we want them also to understand that how they show up matters, and so we take a lot of time taking a look at self-development.”

Mentorship and transferring knowledge from experienced executives to the next generation is also high on Allen’s list of priorities for the hospitality profession.

“Our mission is to make sure that the team member has the emotional intelligence enough to be able to meet the needs of what’s going on at the resort at the time,” she mentioned. “We also want to create this systemic process of mentorship. I don’t have to tell you guys in this industry, it being 30 years old, we are about to see a lot of executives retire with 30 years of experience. We have to find a way to transfer that information. We have to find a mentor system so that when these executives retire, we’re able just to plug right on into the systems that they’ve already created. When they’re going in to harvest a forest, they actually like to plant trees in forests that have already been harvested, because the trees before them have dug the hard roots, so it’s really easy for that [young] tree to plug right into those roots. That’s what we need to create right now. We’ve dug those hard roots, and we need to create a system so that the next generation can come and plug right on into our systems.”

Continuing her keynote speech, Allen highlighted the current positive trends in the hospitality industry, and the need to capitalize on them.

“Right now, our industry is on the rise. Right now, hotel occupancy is at 72 percent — pre-COVID numbers. So, we’re actually on the rise. We need to get our systems together; we need to have a process where team members feel welcomed and they want to plug right into our onboarding system.

“When you are onboarding a team member,” Allen continued, “I’ve heard it like this: ‘Why don’t we introduce them like we’re introducing our new mate to our family?’ You’d get to know them really well. You’d want to bring them to a barbecue and introduce them. But let’s change that onboarding piece. What can we do with the systems we already have to create more of a welcoming environment? And it isn’t about pay anymore; it really is about purpose. And I think connecting our team members even more so to the community is a benefit. Making sure that as an organization we’re investing in what is important to the community. If they want to do a marathon for a certain event, how can we get team members involved in that? How can we make sure that we are connected to the community? When you think about your organization, are you a workplace worth committing to?

“When I was facilitating leadership development at our MAT clinic, a medically assisted treatment center, we had quite a few people that had retired from very prestigious jobs at hospitals and at [dental offices] because they wanted to work for the tribe. We’re very mindful of the blueprint we leave, of making sure that our team members are happy and they want to work; they love that culture. When you think about your culture, is it a place worth committing to? Are you developing team members into leaders? And what does that look like for us? We start that right out of the gate, at entry level positions. If you’re a dishwasher at our organization, we have a supervisor leaning into you day five. ‘How’s training going? Where’s your next step? Where would you like to be?’ If they say, ‘I’d like to be a prep cook,’ great. ‘Let’s start training you for that now.’ So, they know where their next step is.”

Allen furthered her thoughts on company culture with an inspiring moment from a leadership class she facilitated.

“I was facilitating a leadership class at my tribe, Jamestown S’Klallam, and we had all of our directors, on the government side and on the resort side, and we always count how many years of leadership that we have in the room, and we had over 500; it was amazing for me to be in a room with 500 years of experience. A lot of us had 20-plus years of working with the tribe. That is systemic leadership, that is making sure that your team understands what the goal is, and they’re in alignment with that goal, and they want to be with that goal. So, are you a property worth committing to? Can they see the larger picture?

“I was at a BITAC conference — I think it was my first one — and I had given a presentation on tribal [processes]; just how we invest in the community, and what our primary purpose is, investing into our tribal citizens,” Allen added. “And the vendor said, ‘I get it now. I get why tribes are successful. You’re connecting with your community, and you’re supporting your community.’ During COVID, we went to work and started helping the entire community. When we open up a MAT clinic, we make sure the entire community is involved, because we’re brothers and sisters. We’re in relationship in this region, so we want to make sure that we’re connecting with the community as much as possible. When you think about what you can do for your team members as well, take a look at things like housing. When you think about connecting with your community, are there any vacant buildings around that you could invest in and create housing for your team members and the community?”

In the end, Allen stressed, it boils down to how the employee experience shapes the guest experience.

“Your employee experience will be your guest experience every single time,” she noted. “If you want happy guests, you want to make sure that you have happy employees.”