TOURISM AND TRAVEL : O.C. Westin Hotel Sons Get Their Crack at Going to Parents’ Jobs

About 30 boys learned Monday how difficult it can be to operate a major hotel.

The boys were spending a day with their parents for “Take Our Sons to Work Day” at the Westin South Coast Plaza hotel, learning everything from how to fill out a job application to pitching the perfect pizza.

“We got the idea from ‘Take Our Daughters to Work Day,”’ a national event that celebrated its second anniversary earlier this year, said Wayne Bodington, the hotel’s general manager.

He said he brought his 9-year-old daughter to work then, and found out his 11-year-old son wished he could go, too. So he created the special day for boys. “It’s exciting for them and it’s exciting for us,” he said.

The boys started the day with the director of human resources, learning how to apply for a job. They split into two groups and went on thorough tours of the hotels, both the public and work areas. Then they joined the pastry chef in making pizzas.

In the afternoon, the group broke up and the boys joined their parent, or another worker, as they went about their regular tasks at the hotel.

Bringing sons to work isn’t the only innovation being tried by Bodington. He has also introduced ethnic days, in which hotel workers bring foods and artifacts that celebrate their national origins.

So far, the hotel has decorated the employee cafeteria for days celebrating Mexico, the Philippines and Eastern Europe. Next will be Japan.

“This is a way to recognize the cultural and ethnic differences” among the hotel’s 300 full- and part-time workers, Bodington said.