My Week as a Room-Service Waiter at the Ritz – Customer Service that Puts the “Ritz” in Ritzy

The vocalise the node is never wrong, has been attri simplyed to Cesar Ritz, the founder of the Ritz-Carlton empire. Needless to say, the man knew from client operate. How does this luxury hotel keep its customers contentand coming back?Paul Hemp, a of age(p) editor at Harvard Business Review, stepped into the shoes of a Ritz-Carlton room-service waiter to prevail divulge. One observation Empowering your employees to provide top-notch customer service is not plenty. You moldiness also inspire them to feat that power. by Paul HempReflecting on the experienceOne element of the Ritz-Carlton training is a follow-up session, known as mean solar day 21. It typically wreaks place nearly three weeks after the initial orientation. The mien is to review the Gold Standards after new employees excite had a lay on the line to put them into practice. Though I didnt work the full twenty-one days, I sit in on the half-day session (which, amidst the frenzy of the hotels early months, rattling takes place on the 49th day after our orientation). Training managing director Tim Kirkpatrick starts with another mock lineup.He discusses the new-employee job certification test that de dispersement managers should have administered. He announces a new lymph gland recognition hotline, which employees can engross to call in customer preferences. And he unveils an updated version of the companys principles, now in the form of a three-dimensional pyramid. This supplements the existing Gold Standards with an additional family unit of s flat key success factors. But for staff to delight customers, managers moldiness(prenominal) do more(prenominal) than grant their employees the freedom to do what is necessary they must motivate employees to exercise that freedom. Paul Hemp Employees are asked about their experiences on the job. Erin Garrity, the new front-desk clerk from Johnson & Wales, is disap breaker pointed she has been assigned the overnight shift but looks on the bright side. I get to see a allot of celebrities at that time, she says. Her goal for the year is to be named one of the hotels select five-star employees, and she intends to keep being the friendliest person I can be. John Rolfs reinforces his message from orientation that our sole job is to retrace guests smack good so they get under ones skin back.The hotels 320 employees have countless interactions with guests, he says, and it takes just one interaction to make a guest feel bad. If youre thinking about doing your job well, onerous to understand and master your day-to-day routines but not thinking about how guests feel, theyll have a difficult time forgiving you. Theyll probably exculpate us if the air-conditioning fails. But they wont forgive us for failing to make them feel goodbecause thats why they selected Ritz-Carlton. Tims final announcement concerns the results of the first monthly Gallup review of Ritz-Carlton guests, released to managers earlier that day.T he Ritz-Carlton/Boston Common leads the companys hotels in overall customer satisfaction. in that location is a stunned silenceafter all, this is a new hotel lighten smoothing out the rough spotsfollowed by loud applause. As I leave the hotel and walk across the Boston Common in the conclave dusk, I reflect on what Ive learned about teaching and make employees to provide truly memorable service. One thing have the appearance _or_ semblances clear. Great customer service should be based on dynamic principles rather than a loaded formula.You dont demand that employees say, Certainly, my pleasure, until it feels right to them. You dont mindlessly assume every guest wants to be pampered some mess just want to eat their dinners. I also ponder Ritz-Carltons efforts to win the hearts and minds of its employees by, for example, making them feel part of a proud heritage. A recent study of hotel workers by researchers at Cornells School of Hotel Administration found that, temporary ho okup job satisfaction plays a major role in employee retention, it isnt the key factor in a hotels ability to provide excellent customer service.Rather, it is employees turned on(p) commitmentwhich is achieved in part through symbols and rituals that enhance employees sense of identity with the companythat contributes or so to superior performance. Ritz Carlton certainly has an unusually rich tradition to draw on in creating that feeling of identity. But every company, even a two-year-old startup, has traditions and even legends that can be tapped to help build employee commitment. Great customer service should be based on dynamic principles rather than a rigid formula. Paul Hemp That kind of commitment serves as a driver of excellent customer service only when employees are empowered to take initiative. And that mannequin of empowerment has no potency unless employees are motivated to stamp down it. I am haunted by my failure to point out the confusing bin numbers on the hotel wine list, which led my guest to mistakenly order that half-bottle of burgundy. Certainly, I was encouraged during my time at the hotel to point out problems that needed fixing. Why didnt I follow through in this case? Im not sure.But for staff to delight customers, managers must do more than grant their employees the freedom to do what is necessary they must motivate employees to exercise that freedom. Doing that depends in part on the kinds of people you hire. Ritz-Carlton has an elaborate system for assessing in job candidates the qualities the company believes are crucial to its success. One night while I was working at the hotel, I went through the basic hearing to see how Id do. I was fairly confident I was just the sort of caring, conscientious person the Ritz was looking for.In fact, though, even after fudging my answers to a some questions, I got only ten points out of a possible fifteen in the composite hospitality judgement. Tim said that wasnt badthough, honestly, we d shoot for soulfulness with a twelve. I later discovered that I fell myopic in my response to a question asking me to cite an case when I took care of someone else. I said Id often provided emotional support to my sister during tough times. But the company was looking for something more than this, an extraordinary example of caring. Helping your sister? You better, Tim said with a laugh.Now, if youd go out of your house for a month and let her move in, that would be different. Since instituting its candidate assessment system in 1991, Ritz Carlton says it has reduced its annual dollar volume rate from 55%, roughly the industry average, to 28%. Certainly, a real(a) concern for the well-being of guests is key to providing superior customer service. But that isnt enough to truly anticipate customer needs. Another component of the Ritz Carltons hospitality assessment is empathybeing able to imagine guests emotional responses to their experience in the hotel.I am reminded of Ste ves care in preparing the champagne setting for the newlyweds that night and how he view back to his grandparents wedding seventy-five years before. To truly achieve empathy, however, I wonder if you need to jettison at least some of your in the flesh(predicate) perspective. One of John Rolfss comments during the Day 21 sessionabout the dangers of employees centering solely on the successful fulfillment of their dutiesresonated with my experience as a waiter.If youre constantly assessing how well youre doing in your jobeven in your attested efforts to satisfy guestsyou, not the guest, become the point of reference. Your self-consciousness, natural though it whitethorn be, distracts you from providing superior service. Its getting dark. And this train of thought risks hurtling far beyond the unimaginative demands of a frenetic evening of room service. But, when you get down to it, my musings dont seem all that far from the Ritz-Carlton philosophy.Companies dedicated to providing what might be called extreme customer service may need to recognize thatlike great military, government, or religious serviceit is, in the end, a truly selfless endeavor. They may need to establish such practices as the formal inculcation of a customer-centered credo. They might even consider providing workers with a weeklong immersion in the experience of being a customer Whatever the means, the aim would be getting employees to leave their egos at the door and adopt the mind-set of the people theyre serving.