BEYOND SOPs: From Hospitality to WOWspitality™
What if the future of hospitality isn’t found in a checklist—but in a heartbeat?
In Beyond SOPs, award-winning trainer, international keynote speaker, author, and certified coach, Anton Tharaka Appuhamy, challenges the hospitality industry’s greatest illusion:
that great service alone is enough.
Service is a transaction.
Hospitality is a connection.
WOWspitality™ is an unforgettable emotional experience.
Where does service end… and real hospitality begin?
In this transformative guide, Anton Tharaka reveals why SOPs, checklists, and automation can never replace the emotional heart of hospitality. Through unforgettable stories and his original Hospitality PULSE™ framework, Anton shows how Love, Kindness, Compassion, and Care turn ordinary service into WOWspitality™ — the kind guests feel, remember, and return for.
If you work with people, lead teams, or serve guests, this book will change how you think, work, and connect, because hospitality isn’t what you do. It’s how you make people feel.
“Anton reminds us that we have perfected procedures but forgotten the heart. This book brings back the essential humanity of hospitality—rooted in love, kindness, compassion, and care.”
— Peter MacAlpine, Creator of Heart-Based Hospitality
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Anton Tharaka Appuhamy
Anton Tharaka Appuhamy is an award-winning hospitality trainer, keynote speaker, and ICF-certified coach with nearly two decades of experience championing heartfelt hospitality across Asia and beyond. He currently serves as Assistant Vice President – Talent Management & Quality Assurance for one of Asia’s largest hospitality groups in the Asia.
A recognised authority on human-centred service, Anton is the creator of the Hospitality PULSE Framework and WOWspitality™, concepts that help organisations move beyond checklists into emotionally resonant guest experiences. He has trained professionals from over 40 nationalities in 12 countries, earning accolades such as the Stelliers South Asia Human Resources Hotelier Award and Learning & Development Professional of the Year.
Anton holds an MBA and a bachelor’s degree in Hospitality & Tourism Management, and is professionally qualified as a Chartered Trainer (CIPD UK), CQHRM HR Professional, AHLEI-Certified Hospitality Trainer, and a Harvard-trained educator.
Raised in Negombo, Sri Lanka, he began his journey in hospitality from the ground up, serving in over 15 award-winning hotels and resorts. Those formative roles shaped his conviction that true hospitality is not a procedure, but an act of love, kindness, compassion, and care.
Through this book, he champions a simple mission: to bring heart back into the industry and inspire a new era of heartfelt hospitality.
