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By Dan Hounsell, Senior Editor 

June 2025

Florida’s climate can create problems for residents and visitors, from heavy rainfall and extreme heat and humidity to occasional hurricanes. For engineering and maintenance managers with the region’s institutional and commercial facilities, these climate conditions create circumstances that can test even the most efficient HVAC systems. 

For Oscar Cardona, director of engineering with Grande Lakes Orlando, the situation is compounded by expectations that come with overseeing high-occupancy facilities that offer luxury accommodations. Those expectations mean Cardona and his staff need to make certain the facilities’ HVAC systems deliver performance and reliability day in and day out. 

HVAC challenges 

Cardona oversees the engineering operations for Grande Lakes Orlando. The 2.5-million-square-foot development includes two luxury hotels — The Ritz-Carlton Orlando, Grande Lakes, and JW Marriott Orlando, Grande Lakes, which have a total of about 1,600 guest rooms, as well as The Ritz-Carlton Residences. 

Cardona and his team are responsible for the operations and performance of the facilities’ HVAC systems, and they need to be able to move quickly to diagnose and address in a way that prevents the issue from coming up again. 

“Why is (the issue) happening?” he asks. “Is it because the balcony doors are left open? If that’s the case, then we’ll find a solution. We find technology to help us through that. Through the years, every time that we have challenges, we get to the root cause by doing the analysis, and we fix it.” 

Because of the size of Grande Lakes Orlando properties, they contain a range of spaces that vary by size and use. So Cardona’s team needs to be flexible when taking steps to ensure comfortable indoor environments. 

“Pressurization of the air in common areas might be challenging, especially when we have big groups that leave all the doors open to the exterior because they have special events,” Cardona says. “Making sure that we have positive pressure in the public areas is very important to avoid humidity coming into the building. Challenges in maintenance always fluctuate. The most important thing is to get to the root cause and find a solution.” 

Cardona stresses the importance of HVAC system reliability and efficiency because of the central role they play in ensuring customer satisfaction. But performing daily maintenance, completing large-scale renovations and generally providing comfortable healthy indoor environments often are complicated by the properties’ constantly high-occupancy levels.  

“It is hard sometimes when we need to do a project,” he says. “We cannot interfere with a client. We need to make sure the guest has the best experience. The last thing you want is someone that comes for vacation and we make noise because we’re working on something.” 

However the job gets done, Cardona says the priority is to keep customer satisfaction top of mind.  

“We consider ourselves magicians at the end of the day,” he says. “We need to make it happen. Then the next day, we get those comments from the guests.” Maximizing customer satisfaction is one element of the ultimate goal of Grande Lakes Orlando — to be the first five-star hotel in the Orlando area.  

“In order to get those recognitions, we need to pay close attention to detail,” he says. “Any small defect that you might think is acceptable is not acceptable. Especially when we have large groups, we need to make sure that we go back and touch up any small areas or fix any small cracks in the furniture to make sure that the area always looks in immaculate condition.” 

Staffing considerations 

The task of preventing and addressing HVAC and related issues for Grande Lakes Orlando falls to Cardona’s team of technicians. The 65-person staff includes HVAC technicians, as well as electricians, plumbers, fire and life safety technicians, carpenters and painters. Cardona says he faces some of the same staffing challenges as his peers in finding and retaining qualified front-line technicians to deliver on the organization’s promises to customers. 

“It’s very hard to find people out there with talent,” he says “The ones that are there, they are really happy where they are, and they don’t want to move. Something that is very important within our department is opening the department and giving people chances to grow. We do have a lot of training in place. We have an HVAC technician, and we have a career path for our staff. We know exactly where they want to be. We ask those questions on the semiannual reviews: ‘Where do you want to be in the next year or two?’” 

That career path is a critical component of staff retention says Cardona, adding that allowing workers to gain experience in a range of areas often paves the way for them to stay with and grow in the organization. An entry-level worker might start as a painter but can quickly become electricians because they are exposed to a range of trades and tasks. 

“This is like a university for them,” he says. “Not only do they get paid for what they do, but they get to learn new things every day.” 

Staff retention has been a focus in ensuring the performance of technicians for Cordona, who says that providing tools and resources for technicians to grow professionally actually extends beyond the department to the organization itself. 

“Once they work in an environment that is very well organized and the communication flows properly, they feel that they want to be here,” Cardona says. “That has been our success in retaining people because finding new talent is challenging. In talking to other directors of engineering in the area, sometimes they have positions that stay open for six months because they don’t find the right talent.” 

A critical element in retaining staff at Grande Lakes Orlando is making certain workers understand the central role that maintenance and engineering play in the overall performance and success of the organization. That role goes beyond the daily operation of the facilities. 

“The role of maintenance is all about doing the right thing for the owners to make sure that we preserve the asset properly for them and supporting the brand reputation and making sure that we have the right guest experience all the time,” he says. “I find myself and my chief engineer being cheerleaders all the time just to keep the team motivated so they can also see the big picture. We always tell the guys that even if you’re a painter, you’re painting the wall for a purpose. You’re just not painting it because you need to paint it.” 

Strategies and tactics 

For Cardona and his team, meeting the challenges and expectations that come with Grande Lakes Orlando requires strategies that lean less on reaction and much more on data analysis and prevention to set priorities, schedule tasks and stay ahead of major problems. 

“The challenges fluctuate throughout the years, and that’s the reason why we focus so much on data,” he says. “If I see that we are getting a lot of temperature complaints in guest rooms, we gather all that data, and we find the root cause. 

“We want to make sure that we’re always proactive,” he says. “That’s the reason why we have preventive maintenance, to be predictive of anything that might go wrong. We don’t want to be reactive.” 

The team tracks facility and system issues each day, creating a list of defects based in part on guest complaints from the previous day. Unexpected defects get quick attention, while larger issues or recurring problems that might indicate a trend mean developing an action plan that involves getting to the root cause. 

In addition to Cardona’s day-to-day facilities maintenance and engineering management, he also plays a central role in developing the organization’s longer-term plans for renovations and new construction planning. 

“We’re very involved because (executives) rely on the director of engineering for knowledge of the property and where the mechanical equipment is, how things work,” he says. “We also need to know the day-to-day operation. When can they make noise? How is everything to be controlled?” 

In the last three years, the organization has invested close to $200 million in renovations of the properties, Cardona says. 

“The next upcoming renovation is going to be in the ballroom and some meeting spaces at The Ritz Carlton, and that’s starting in July,” he says. “The challenging part of this is we have groups that booked all the events in advance, and (the issue is) how to make sure that we can accomplish the renovation without impacting the revenues. That’s always challenging.” 

The success of renovations often depends on the ability of planners and technicians to complete a project with minimal impact on a property’s day-to-day activities. He offers the example of a recently completed project at JW Marriott Orlando, Grande Lakes. 

“We were able to complete the renovation of the meeting spaces and ballroom without displacing too much revenue,” he says. “That’s important for the owners. Sometimes, they hold off on renovations because they don’t want to lose the revenue. Making it happen for both sides and having that balance is important.” 

Through it all, Cardona says it is critical to focus on people involved in the processes and activities. 

“Our main goal of the day-to-day operation is employee satisfaction — making sure that our employees are taken care of so they can do a good job. That’s followed by guest satisfaction. If we have good people that we take care of, we know that they’re going to take care of our guests.” 

Dan Hounsell is senior editor for the facilities market. He has more than 30 years of experience writing about facilities maintenance, engineering and management.