Matt Sease was staying at the Super 8 motel in Bozeman while waiting for construction to be finished on his house when he found his next profession.

That six-week stay turned into a job as he was eventually hired as the manager of the hotel after also meeting the hotel’s owner Larry Lambert.

“Over that time I got to know the staff, I got to know a little about maintenance and about the hotel business,” he said. “When we moved out, Larry was putting an ad in the paper for a general manager, and we got to talking and in a few days I was offered the job.”

At the time, Sease and his wife had moved to Bozeman from Arizona while he searched for a job. He spent five years in Bozeman and then got the opportunity to come to Whitefish as general manager and a partner in the Hampton Inn & Suites, which opened in April 2016. The Hampton, and five other Montana hotels, are owned and operated by Lambert Hotels of Missoula.

“Whitefish is great,” he said. “There is so many great things to do here. Tourism is great — you get to share your lifestyle with others.”

Sease is originally from Alaska, where he retired from a career with the moving company United Van Lines. While in Arizona, he worked as a general manager for Circle K convenience stores and before being laid off after the housing market crash he was the warehouse manager for an interior design firm.

Working in the hospitality industry seems to be a good fit. Sease can talk about all there is to see and do around western Montana and he expresses pride in the hard work of his roughly 20 employees at the Hampton.

“I’m a people person,” he said while sitting down in a conference room at the Hampton. “I like to keep people happy.”

Sease recently received the Lodging Person of the Year award from the Montana Lodging and Hospitality Association, which represents the lodging industry and has a mission to support continued growth of travel and tourism.

In presenting the award to Sease, MLHA board member Jim Tucker read portions of his award nomination letter that said, “Matt is not only the chair of the MLHA, but he has been a dedicated and effective supporter of this organization for a long time. As a leader of the association, Matt has done a great job of representing the lodging industry both in Montana and at the national level. As well he is someone that takes the time to share his expertise and mentor others who are new to the business.”

Sease says he was surprised by the award, but also honored being selected for it from a group of his peers in the lodging industry.

Being a political science and history major, Sease says, makes it easy for him to get involved with legislation and policies impacting the lodging industry at the state and national level. He was among lodging industry professionals who lobbied the state eventually leading to an agreement between Airbnb and Montana for those who rent out their homes to begin collecting lodging taxes.

He says the change is an effort to have everyone pay their fair share.

“We want to be good stewards of the bed tax,” he said. “We want to be good stewards of tourism in Montana and keep people coming in.”

Sease says working on behalf of others in lodging is important.

“We’re competitors, but we’re still hoteliers and hoteliers are all part of the same fraternity,” he said. “We’re still doing the same thing.”