Ford 2001-Lessons From Hospitality That Can Serve Anyone

Lessons From Hospitality ThatCan Serve AnyoneROBERT C. FORD CHERRILL P. HEATON

The hospitality industry has long knownthat the difference between success and

failure is the successful management of theservice experience for all guests. If you wantpeople to come back to your restaurant, ho-tel, airline, or theme park, you had betterkeep them not only satisfied with the expe-rience you offer but “wowed” with what youdo. Given the variety of people in the worldand the intangibility of the hospitality “prod-uct,” this is a major challenge. Organizationslike Marriott International Inc., SouthwestAirlines Co. and the Walt Disney Companytheme parks find ways to create memorableexperiences consistently. People rememberthese experiences as being so much betterthan those offered by competitors that theycome back time and time again. These bench-mark hospitality organizations must knowsomething that all organizations, service andotherwise, can use; they must be doingsomething right from which all organiza-tions can learn.

While many factors contribute to theirsuccess, these exemplars of hospitality havethree keys in common. What they do is nosecret. The service product they offer, thesetting in which they offer it, and the systemsthat deliver it are out in plain sight for any-one to observe. Unfortunately, too few orga-nizations bother to pay attention or evenlook. Although any organization can domany specific things to improve its service,the benchmark hospitality organizationshave found three keys to service success:

• Make every decision with the cus-tomer in mind,

• Build a strong culture of service, and• Manage each “moment of truth” in the

service experience.This article will talk about each key and howit leads to service success.

FOCUS ON THE CUSTOMER

Successful hospitality organizations knowthat they must make every decision with thecustomer in mind. Modern managers in otherfields will tell you that they also follow thisprinciple, but they really don’t. Most organi-zations have a tendency to look at the worldfrom their side of the cash register. Decisionson capital investments, facilities design, sys-tem design, and managerial policies and pro-cedures are too often made from the organi-zation’s point of view and conveniencerather than the customer’s. Consider a bankthat sets up its lobby so that long queues ofpeople in front of unmanned teller terminalsare created, an insurance company that in-vests in a major structural upgrade whileignoring employee training, a retail storethat creates awkwardly difficult product-re-turn procedures, or a health maintenance or-ganization (HMO) that is rude and unre-sponsive to its members. In each of thesesituations, customers are left wondering whyany organization would behave in such afashion if its future success and profitabilitydepend upon satisfying, if not “wowing,”the people it gets inside the door.

The benchmark hospitality organiza-tions have learned that they can’t succeed if

Organizational Dynamics, Vol. 30, No. 1, pp. 30–47, 2001 ISSN 0090-2616/01/$–see frontmatter© 2001 Elsevier Science, Inc. PII S0090-2616(01)00039-0www.organizational-dynamics.com

30 ORGANIZATIONAL DYNAMICS

Robert C. Ford (Ph.D.-Arizona State University)

is currently associate dean for graduate and

external programs and a professor of manage-

ment at the University of Central Florida’s Col-

lege of Business Administration. He joined UCF

in 1993 as chair of the Department of Hospital-

ity Management after serving on the faculty of

the University of North Florida and the Univer-

sity of Alabama at Birmingham. He has au-

thored or co-authored over 100 articles, books,

and presentations on organizational issues, hu-

man resources management, and guest ser-

vices management, health care and related ser-

vice management topics. His texts include

Principles of Management: A Decision Making

Approach and Organization Theory. His re-

cently published text, Managing the Guest Ex-

perience in Hospitality, is a compendium of

hospitality-based concepts important in man-

aging any service organization.

Ford has also been an active professional

serving the Academy of Management as direc-

tor of placement and the division chair for both

the Management History and the Management

Education and Management Development Divi-

sions. In addition, he has been the chair of the

Accreditation Commission for Programs in

Hospitality Administration and president of the

Southern Management Association. He cur-

rently is a Fellow of the Southern Management

Association and the associate editor and edi-

tor-designee of the Academy of Management

Executive.

Cherrill P. Heaton is professor of organiza-

tional communications at the University of

North Florida. In addition to teaching organiza-

tional and business communications in the

M.B.A. and M.Acc. programs at UNF, he has

taught over 100 short courses for business and

industry in these subjects. Formerly a stockbro-

ker in Miami and Wall Street, he is the co-author

of Essentials of Modern Investments. With Rob-

ert C. Ford, he has co-authored three books:

Principles of Management, Organization The-

ory, and Managing the Guest Experience in

Hospitality. He has a B.A. from Princeton Uni-

versity and M.A. and Ph.D. degrees from Flor-

ida State University.

SUMMER 2001 31

they treat customers this way. Instead, theythink of customers as their guests and treatthem accordingly. They go out their way tomake their guests comfortable, to help guestsderive the maximum value from the experi-ence they have paid for, and to ensure thatthe experience is as rich, enjoyable, and sat-isfying as they know their guests expect. Thissounds easy, but it isn’t; more is requiredthan just being nice to people. These bench-mark organizations also work hard to deter-mine the key drivers of guest satisfaction:what their guests want and what will satisfythem enough to keep them coming back.

Finding and Using the Key Drivers

The best way to keep up with the currentdrivers of customer satisfaction is to studyand survey customers continually. Most or-ganizations think they know what their cus-tomers want and expect, and to a limitedextent they do; they have to in order to stayin business. The best hospitality organiza-tions understand that they can’t really knowwhat factors are the key drivers of customersatisfaction and intent to return withoutcarefully studying the wants, needs, and be-haviors of their guests. Many times whatmanagement learns in such studies is a sur-prise, because what management thoughtwould be keys when it designed the experi-ence don’t turn out to be so from the cus-tomer’s point of view. This difference be-tween what the organization delivers andwhat the customer expects or really wants isthe “service gap” that Len Berry has identi-fied, and it happens. Organizations mustkeep working and studying until they knowwhat customers actually expect, how theyactually behave, and what their key driversare. Only then can organizations give theircustomers the experience that they want andwill come back again and again to enjoy.

Disney has even coined the term“guestology” to reflect the importanceplaced on understanding thoroughly howDisney guests actually behave, as well aswhat they want, need, value and expect fromthe Disney experience. Disney studies how

long a wait can be before guests becomeunhappy, what price points are acceptable toguests, and what number of drops the run-away elevator in the Tower of Terror musthave to satisfy the guest’s quality standardsfor the attraction. They seek to measure ev-erything that is important to their guests andmanage these key elements thoroughly.

Other benchmark guest service organi-zations study their guests as well. They sur-vey guests continuously and train their guestcontact employees to check with guestsabout their experience every chance theycan. The benchmark organizations don’tmiss any opportunity to talk to their guestsand ask them “How was everything?” Inaddition, they employ trained mystery shop-pers pretending to be guests, to acquire feed-back on the quality of the experience in astructured, systematic way. Even if theguests tell you what is important to them,you can’t always find out how well you didsimply by asking them. Mystery shopperprograms are another way of finding out ifyou met their expectations and kept yourpromises. The point is that the benchmarkorganizations spend a lot of time and moneyto find out what their guests value, expect,and want. Then they deliver it.

The Ritz–Carlton Hotels used customersurveys to identify 18 key drivers. Ritz–Car-lton then hired a process manager for eachhotel. That manager’s responsibility is toeliminate flaws and reduce work-cycle timesby 50% in the systems that deliver the 18keys leading to customer satisfaction. Thebasic drivers are so important that Ritz–Car-lton wants someone in every hotel to be wor-rying about them all the time.

The basic drivers may not always be theones discovered first. The company may of-ten have to dig below the surface to find outwhat customers really want. Southwest Air-lines surveyed its customers and learned thatthey wanted cheap fares, on-time perfor-mance, great meals, comfortable seats, freemovies, and more. Southwest quickly recog-nized that, human nature being what it is, ifyou ask people what they want—they wanteverything.


Southwest realized it couldn’t give itscustomers everything because nobody could.Gourmet meals with wine in big comfortableseats and low fares—it can’t be done. SoSouthwest did additional research to digdeeper into customer preferences andlearned that their customers really wantedlow fares and reliable schedules with friendlyservice. The Southwest product is now ex-actly what its target market wanted and,more important, wanted enough to pay forand to return again and again. Even betterfor Southwest, giving customers what theyreally, basically wanted provided extra costsavings to Southwest; turning an airplanearound between arrival and departure isconsiderably easier, faster, and cheaper with-out having to clean up all the mess and clut-ter caused by unwanted frills like food ser-vice.

Organizations in other industries cer-tainly don’t allocate resources on a hit-or-miss basis. But they often use allocation cri-teria like internal needs or top management’spreferences rather than the key drivers ofcustomer satisfaction. The benchmark hospi-tality organizations, on the other hand, relyon their knowledge of the guests’ key driversto allocate resources. They don’t want to putmoney into parts of the experience that don’tmatter that much to customers, nor do theyneglect parts that are truly important to cus-tomer satisfaction. If one component of theservice experience receives relatively lowratings, the organization may accept them ifsurveys also show that these ratings havelittle effect on guest satisfaction and inten-tion to return. If a component shows a strongstatistical relationship to guest satisfactionand return intention, it is obviously a keydriver; these organizations allocate resourcesto that component to wow customers andkeep them coming back.

A Key Driver for Most Customers:Personalize

In the TV show Cheers, patrons went to thebar because it was a place where everyoneknew their name. Being recognized and ac-

knowledged as an individual is or can be akey driver for just about every customer.Everyone wants to feel special and be treatedas an individual. Personalizing the experienceis one way to wow customers. The excellentguest-service organizations that attract re-peat customers allocate significant resourcesto study their customers extensively and alsoaccumulate the information they havelearned. Computerized databases and so-phisticated techniques of database analysisallow the organization to know a great dealabout its customers as individuals. The besthospitality organizations mine these data-bases to dig up as much as they can aboutwhat is important to each guest so they cancustomize the experience. Intelligent use of acustomer database allows the best to get bet-ter at doing these things. Customizing orpersonalizing each customer’s experience tomatch the customer’s unique needs and ex-pectations is becoming increasingly easy forall organizations.

The increased emphasis in services onrelationship marketing or the “market-seg-ment-of-one” concept has been made possi-ble through the increasing power of comput-ers to store, digest and interpret largequantities of information. The idea is to findout so much about customers that the orga-nization can treat each person as a separate“market.” When customers return warrantycards on products, fill out the information oncents-off coupons, or send in for free premi-ums such as t-shirts and company-logo cof-fee mugs, they provide information thatcompanies can use to gain a better under-standing of their customers and their uniqueneeds.

Personalizing Through ComputerAnalysis: Ritz–Carlton and AMEX

Many hotels seek to provide more than just asimple clean room, and their informationsystems are designed to provide this extralevel of customer service. The Ritz-CarltonHotels, for example, offer an excellent cus-tomer experience partly because they pro-vide their customers with more than a clean

SUMMER 2001 33

room and bed. Their definition of a properlyprepared room includes having service pro-viders check the information system to re-view items that today’s incoming guestshave indicated in previous stays are impor-tant to them. They know from retained in-formation that certain customers expect tofind extra pillows, hot chocolate, or specificmagazines in the room when they arrive. TheRitz–Carlton database tells the hotel whatthe exact preferences of its guests are so staffcan be sure that the desired items are in theroom when guests arrive.

Ritz–Carlton also asks its employees toprovide information related to service deliv-ery. Employees are asked to listen for andrecord in the database any relevant guest-related information that might assist the ho-tel in adding value and quality to the guest’sexperience. For example, if a floor sweeperoverhears guests talking about celebratingtheir anniversary, the sweeper is supposed topass the information along so that the hotelcan take some notice of this special event.The employees help deliver the wow Ritz–Carlton experience by adding useful infor-mation to the organizational informationsystem, which helps to ensure that all thepeople involved in providing the guest ex-perience have the information they need todo their jobs in the best possible way. Thepowerful applications of modern informa-tion technology provide the employees withthe information necessary to satisfy and evenwow the customers by personalizing the ser-vice experience.

Ritz–Carlton is one of the best, but otherguest-service organizations have also devel-oped innovative ways to build a relationshipwith each customer based on powerful com-puter analysis of customer information.While personalizing is not easy with a high-volume, mass-produced experience like atheme park designed to appeal to thousandsof customers every day, these data-basedsystems are making it easier for service set-tings like hotels, and even restaurants, toprovide individualized customer interaction.Like managers everywhere, the managers ofthe best hospitality organizations know that

making every customer feel special is an im-portant way for an organization to differen-tiate its customer-service experience. The dif-ference is that these managers aggressivelyuse this knowledge to make their guests feelpersonally treated.

American Express Co. may have takenthis approach as far as anyone. In addition toputting basic demographic informationabout its customers into a database, the com-pany also stores information about everycustomer transaction. The company has ded-icated seventy workstations at its decisionsciences center in Phoenix to scan mountainsof data on millions of Amex cardholders.They know which stores the cardholdersshopped in, the restaurants where theydined, the places they visited, and the air-lines they flew, how often they went, andhow much they spent when they got there.Amex can infer from the data what is likelyto appeal to each customer in the future,and—to encourage customers to use theircredit cards more—can target specific pro-motions like weekend getaways on their fa-vorite airline to their favorite city to stay attheir favorite hotel. Amex figured in 1994that the personalized marketing strategymade possible by this relationship-based in-formation system increased member spend-ing by 15 to 20% in the markets where it wasused.

Any organization able to offer this de-gree of personalized service can make ittough for competitors who can’t providetheir customers with similar value. Informa-tion systems and the powerful advances ininformation technology make it happen, andmany organizations now have access to thepower of building personalized relationshipswith their present customers and offeringsuch relationships to their future customers.

The best hospitality organizations knowthat success is never final, and that the driv-ers of customer satisfaction today may notwork or may be too commonplace tomor-row. Because what impresses customers nowmay not be sufficient to encourage their re-turn in the future, organizations must con-tinually survey their guests, know the key


drivers of today, and project the drivers oftomorrow.

The Mantra: “Everything Startswith the Customer”

These benchmark organizations know thattheir long-term success depends upon theirguests thinking so highly of what the orga-nization does for them that they will comeback again and again. It’s not enough for anOlive Garden Restaurant to get people insidetheir place once. If only a few first-time vis-itors turn into loyal repeat patrons, the orga-nization’s future is limited. Thus, they worryabout the guests who don’t make a “top box”mark on the guest satisfaction surveys. Theyknow that unless guests think highly enoughof the experience to give it top marks, theymay not be back—and they certainly won’trecommend the place to their friends.

Thus, when Darden Corporation designsits Olive Garden restaurants, it spendscountless hours and dollars making sure thedistance between the tables is just right, thevolume level and type of music are pleasing,and the people waiting in the inevitable lineshave something to occupy them (e.g., a menuto look over, or a display of tempting appe-tizers and desserts). They also test menus,portion sizes, and food quality continuouslyand extensively. It doesn’t matter if the man-agers, the designers, the corporate plannersor the engineers like something; if the guestdoesn’t like it, Darden doesn’t do it. Beforemaking every decision, they ask the ques-tion, “How will the customer feel aboutthis?”

In contrast, consider the many times youhave entered an auto dealership, bank, retailstore, medical office, or other organizationthat obviously doesn’t spend much timethinking about what it does from the custom-er’s perspective. The location, design, andhours of operation are clearly focused onemployee convenience, the product was de-signed by someone who never asked whatthe customers wanted, and the operationalpolicies and procedures are distinctly user-unfriendly. The point is simple: Benchmark

hospitality organizations excel at making ev-ery decision with guest satisfaction in mind,no matter how uncomfortable or compli-cated that decision may make their own livesas operators. Their mantra is simple: “Every-thing starts with the customer.”

A STRONG SERVICE CULTURE

A second key to service success in excellenthospitality organizations is to build a strongservice culture. Taking good care of customersstuck in the snow is no small matter. Duringa 1999 snowstorm, Northwest Airlines leftpassengers sitting in planes at the Detroitairport for eight hours. The negative effectson Northwest’s reputation lasted a longtime. Contrast Northwest’s customer servicewith that of the service-oriented Scandina-vian Airline Services (SAS) purser in the fol-lowing example. An SAS plane with 40 pas-sengers aboard was stuck at an airportbecause of snow. Because the purser knewthat an SAS cultural value was to do what-ever necessary to satisfy customers, or atleast try to, she decided to offer them freecoffee and biscuits. She went to the cateringsupervisor, a middle manager who out-ranked her, and asked for 40 extra servings.The catering supervisor wanted to help butrefused the request, because according tocompany policy each flight was allocatedonly so many cups of coffee and biscuits.

The purser could have let it go at that,but to do nothing was contrary to the guest-service culture of SAS. She noticed that theplane at the next gate belonged to Finnair, anairline that purchased food and drink fromthe SAS catering department. The SASpurser asked the Finnair purser to order thecoffee and biscuits, the SAS catering super-visor was required by SAS regulations to fillthe order, the SAS purser bought the coffeeand biscuits from the Finnair purser withpetty cash, and the stranded customers re-ceived a welcome snack. The SAS purser putservice first to achieve the airline’s primarygoal: customer satisfaction.

SUMMER 2001 35

Culture and the Front-LineEmployee

Every organization has a culture of somekind, whether or not anyone is managing it,defining it or teaching it to employees. Thebenchmark hospitality organizations create astrong culture with guest-centered valuesand manage it very carefully because theyknow its importance. In all service indus-tries, the “product” is largely intangible. Oneresult of this intangibility is that the valueand quality of the product are determinedexclusively in the mind of the customer.Only that person can tell you if the serviceexperience was a “wow” or an “ow,” andwhether the experience was worth the timeand money spent on getting it.

Because each customer determines thequality and value of the service experience,how should the organization concentrate itsefforts to make sure each guest has a goodone? Almost invariably, the customer’s judg-ments of quality and value depend on theexcellence of the customer-contact employ-ees. They can acquire the basis of that excel-lence in employee manuals and training pro-grams. But front-line employees frequentlyface problems and decisions not covered bytheir formal training. In those situations, em-ployees must be able to translate the culturalprinciples of guest service into the appropri-ate behavior in each situation where they areresponsible for making the customer experi-ence work well. The organizational culturefills in the gaps between (1) what the orga-nization can anticipate and train its people todeal with and (2) the opportunities and prob-lems that arise in daily encounters with awide variety of customers. There is no wayto anticipate the many different things cus-tomers will do, ask for, and expect from theservice provider. The power of the culture toguide and direct employees to do the “rightthing” for the customer becomes vital. Goodmanagers know that the values, beliefs, andnorms of behavior that the culture teaches itsemployees become critical in ensuring thatthe front-line employee does what the orga-nization wants done in unplanned and un-

anticipated situations, even if the organiza-tion hasn’t said so.

The culture must be planned and care-fully thought through to ensure that the mes-sage sent to all employees is the one theorganization really wants to send. An impor-tant part of any strategy is to ensure thateverything the organization and its leader-ship says and does is consistent with theculture it wishes to define and support. Themore intangible the product, the stronger thecultural values, beliefs and norms must be toensure that the customer-service employeeprovides the quality and value of customerexperience that the customer expects andthat the organization wants to deliver.

Service Employees: Always “OnStage”

Hospitality organizations, and most otherservice organizations, are different from tra-ditional manufacturing organizations insome fundamental ways. First, the people“manufacturing” a service experience are nothidden away in an “authorized access only”factory floor. They are “on stage” all the timewhile they are producing lunches, hotelcheck-ins, Disney magic, or trips to NewYork. If they don’t make the experiencework, it won’t work, and there is no reworkpile for a bad experience. Thus, employees inthe hospitality industry—like those in mostservice industries—not only have to be capa-ble of producing the service experience; theyhave to do so while guests or customers aretalking to them, distracting them, and watch-ing everything they’re doing. Additionally,these employees have to fix any errors madein this production process on the spot andappropriately. The skill set required of hos-pitality employees is considerably morecomplex than the set required to participatein the production process of a tire, refriger-ator, or auto in a manufacturing plant.What’s even more amazing is that the hos-pitality guest contact employees producingthese consistently outstanding experiencesare frequently the same young people whose


parents can’t get them to clean up theirrooms at home.

But the problem is even more compli-cated than merely training employees to dotheir jobs, on top of having good interper-sonal and problem-solving skills. The hospi-tality organization has to serve a multitudeof “very individual people” or VIPs, each ofwhom expects something a little bit differentfrom the experience. The hospitality productcannot be packaged and put on a shelf forpurchase. It is ever changing and definedanew in the mind of each guest every time itis experienced. Traditional organizationsrely on policies and procedures to ensureproper command and control of the employ-ees producing the products. Hospitality or-ganizations have to substitute culture andempowerment (to be discussed later) for com-mand and control, because no one is smartenough to anticipate and plan for every con-ceivable desire and requirement that eachunique guest will bring to the hospitalityexperience. Thus, benchmark hospitality or-ganizations spend considerable time andmoney teaching a culture value system sothat when a guest wants something that isn’tdiscussed in the training manuals or can’t bedone by the book, the employee who haslearned the culture will still know how to dothe right thing for that particular guest atthat particular moment, will want to do theright thing, and will be empowered by theorganization to do it. Here are some exam-ples of how a strong culture has motivatedand guided employees to make the right de-cisions.

Culture, the Front Line, andService Faults

People on the front line are often the first tonotice or be informed of service faults orfailures. If the culture has a strong serviceorientation, they will fix the problem if theycan; if not, they will report the need for im-provement. A British Airways baggage han-dler at London’s Heathrow Airport noticedthat passengers waiting for their luggage atthe carousel were asking him a strange ques-

tion: How can I get a yellow and black tag formy bags? The passengers had noticed thatbags with those tags arrived first, so theywanted the special tags. The baggage han-dler realized that because the passengersasking him the question were the first ones toarrive at the carousel, they had to be first-class passengers, who deplaned first. Andyet they had to wait 20 min on average fortheir bags, while some other passengers weregetting first-class luggage service. First-classpassengers are highly profitable to airlines,and the baggage handler saw that somethingwas wrong with the service being providedto them.

The baggage handler’s inquiries re-vealed that the passengers perhaps least de-serving of “first-class” luggage service, thoseflying on stand-by, were getting it. Becausethey were the last to board, their luggagewas loaded last and unloaded first. The bag-gage handler reported his findings and madea simple suggestion: load first-class luggagelast. Although the idea was simple and hadobvious merit, implementing it meant thatBA had to change its luggage-handling pro-cedures in airports all over the world, andthat took time. But it was done, and theaverage time of getting first-class luggagefrom plane to carousel dropped from 20 minto less than 10 worldwide, and under 7 minon some routes.

An employee who understood the BAculture saw a way to improve the system andgot it done. He had no idea he was going toreceive a service award of $18,000 and tworound-trip tickets to the United States on theConcorde.

The baggage handler didn’t take a cre-ative path to solving a customer problembecause he had to, but because he wanted to.He saw a problem, saw the creative possibil-ities in a new idea, and passed it along fordevelopment. How can any organization cre-ate and sustain a culture like this—in whichemployees not only do their jobs efficientlyand competently but also want to go theextra mile? How can such a strong customer-focused culture be created? Two ways sug-gested by the success of these benchmark

SUMMER 2001 37

guest-service organizations are (1) by cele-brating the organization’s service heroes andtelling their stories, and (2) by encouragingthe organizational members to teach eachother the appropriate cultural values. But thehospitality benchmarks also know that themost important contribution to the organiza-tional culture is the behavior and teaching ofits leaders.

American Express creates and maintainsa strong customer-focused culture. One wayis by recognizing those employees who haveprovided exceptional service to customers asGreat Performers. Two customer servicepeople in Florida got money to a woman in aforeign war zone and helped her get on aship out of the country; travel agents in Co-lumbus, GA paid a French tourist’s bail so hecould get out of jail; an employee drovethrough a blizzard to take food and blanketsto stranded travelers at Kennedy Airport; anemployee got up in the middle of the night totake an Amex card to a customer stranded atBoston’s Logan Airport. Any organizationhas its cultural heroes—employees whohave gone “above and beyond the call ofduty”—and their stories should be pre-served and shared. American Express dis-tributes its Great Performers booklets to allemployees worldwide.

Teaching the Culture ThroughStories, Heroes, Myths, andLegends

The Olive Garden restaurant uses stories toteach employees the cultural value of serviceit hopes to communicate. At new store open-ings, when the corporate culture is beingtaught to new employees, the opening man-ager will usually tell a story about a cus-tomer named Larry. It seems that Larry cameto an Olive Garden and found the armchairsuncomfortable for his significantly above-av-erage weight. He wrote the company presi-dent a letter praising the food and complain-ing about the chairs. In response, the OliveGarden ordered and placed in each restau-rant two Larry Chairs that have no arms.These chairs are discreetly substituted for the

normal chairs whenever a person of extragirth comes into the restaurant. Needless tosay, telling the Larry Chair story at an open-ing reveals a great deal about the company’scultural values and sends a strong messageto the new employees about how far therestaurant (and they) should go to respondto and meet a customer’s needs.

All organizations can use stories, heroes,myths, and legends to help teach the culture,to communicate the values and behaviors theorganization seeks from its employees intheir job performance, and to serve as rolemodels for new situations. Most people lovestories. It’s so much easier to hear a story ofwhat a hero did than to listen to someonelecturing about “customer responsiveness”in a formal training class. Not only are thestories more memorable than some arbitraryfive points seen on a classroom overhead,but the tales can be embellished in the retell-ing and the culture thereby made more alive.Tales of “old Joe” and what wondrous thingshe did while serving customers teach desiredresponses to customer concerns and reaffirmthe organization’s cultural values at the sametime. Every organization should capture andpreserve the stories and tales of its peoplewho do amazing things, create magical mo-ments, to wow the customer. The effort willyield a wonderful array of inspiring storiesfor all employees, as well as send a strongmessage about what the organization valuesand desires in its employees.

Employees Teach Each Other

Another way to teach the culture is by en-couraging employees to teach each other.Outstanding guest-service organizations en-gage all their members in teaching each otherthe organization’s culture. Southwest Air-lines created a “Culture Committee” whoseresponsibility is perpetuating the SouthwestSpirit. Members promote the company’sunique, caring culture to fellow employees.They show up in an employee break roomwith equipment and paint to remodel it.They appear at a maintenance facility toserve pizza and ice cream to employees.


They may appear anywhere at any time tolend a helping hand.

Another Southwest effort to promote theculture and the Southwest Spirit was the“Walk a Mile in My Shoes” program, whichencouraged people to use a day off withoutpay to shadow another employee doing an-other job. The program helped employeesunderstand how their jobs fit together inmaking the organization work. They alsocreated a “Helping Hands” program, to getpeople to spend some time helping employ-ees at other locations where the growth intraffic was overwhelming. All of these pro-grams have had multiple positive effects forthe organization and its employees. They re-inforce the togetherness of the “extendedfamily” that Southwest believes is an impor-tant part of its cultural value system, allowmembers to teach each other the culturalnorms of helping, caring, and having fun atwork, and provide a strong visible expres-sion of the cultural values that all employeesare encouraged to share.

Culture and the Leaders

All organizational leaders are crucial intransmitting and preserving the organiza-tional culture. Managers of effective organi-zations constantly teach the culture to theiremployees, reinforcing the values, mores,and laws. Strong cultures are reinforced bytop management’s strong commitment to thecultural values. Ed Schein suggests that theonly thing of real importance that leaders dois to create and maintain the organization’sculture. Leaders who appreciate the impor-tance of culture spend more time communi-cating values than they do on anything else.The benchmark leaders worship at the altarof the customer every day, and they do itvisibly. They are personally involved in ser-vice activities. They back up slogans withdramatic, often costly actions. To instill val-ues, they stress two-way communications,opening their doors to all employees andusing weekly work-group meetings to in-form, inspire, and solve service problems.They put values into action by treating em-

ployees exactly as they want employees totreat their customers. They use rituals to rec-ognize and reward the behaviors that theculture values, and they praise the heroeswhose actions have reflected worthy culturalvalues. Other employees can use these herostories as models for their own actions.

Bill Marriott, Jr., Herb Kelleher,and Walt Disney

Bill Marriott, Jr., provides a good example ofhow a leader can help to sustain the culture.He is a constant teacher, preacher, and rein-forcer of the Marriott cultural values of cus-tomer service. He believes in staying visible.He flies more than 200,000 miles every yearto visit his many operations and to carry theMarriott message visibly and personally toas many people as he can. He is famous fordropping in at a hotel and chatting witheveryone he sees. He has been known to getup early in the morning and wander into theMarriott kitchens to make sure the pancakesare being cooked properly. This intense com-mitment to personal contact with each andevery Marriott employee and visible interestin the details of his operations have becomeso well known that his mere presence on anyMarriott property serves as a reminder of theMarriott commitment to service quality.

Southwest Airlines is also famous forthis hands-on commitment to service. HerbKelleher was the premier example of quiteliterally walking the walk through airports,planes, and service areas to show employeeshis concern for the quality of each customer’sexperience. Even today this tradition lives onas all Southwest managers are expected tospend time in customer-contact areas, bothobserving and working in customer-servicejobs. These actions send a strong message toall employees that everyone is responsiblefor maintaining the high quality of theSouthwest experience. This same modelingbehavior can be seen in the many hospitalitymanagers who visibly and consistently stopto pick up small scraps of paper and debrison the floors as they walk through their fa-

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cilities. Employees see and emulate this careand attention to detail.

Walt Disney was a benchmark of how toteach the organizational culture. Here is howhe described his function within the organi-zation:

My role? Well you know I wasstumped one day when a little boyasked, “Do you draw MickeyMouse?” I had to admit I do notdraw anymore. “Then you think upall the jokes and ideas?” “No,” I said,“I don’t do that.” Finally, he lookedup at me and said, “Mr. Disney, justwhat do you do?” “Well,” I said,“sometimes I think of myself as alittle bee. I go from one area of thestudio to another and gather pollenand sort of stimulate everyone. Iguess that’s the job I do.”

Walt was supporting and maintaining theculture. He knew that to do so, he had to stayclose to both his employees and Disney’scustomers. Only in walking around can man-agers see for themselves that the quality ofcustomer experiences is high, that concernsof customers and employees are being met,and that everyone remains focused on thecustomer. Unlike the manufacturing indus-try, which can rely on statistical reports totell managers how things are going on theproduction line, managers of these bench-mark service organizations inform them-selves about how things are going by stayingas close to the point where the guest experi-ence is produced as possible. Many restau-rant managers are told to meet every cus-tomer and to make as many table visits aspossible to talk to them; hotel managerswander the lobbies to observe the reactionsof customers; and theme park managersmonitor the looks on guests’ faces to makesure they are having a good time. All thesestrategies are based on the simple idea thatthe reason for the organization’s existenceand basis for its success is the customer. Forthese benchmark organizations, being outwith the customers and interacting with the

employees who take care of the customers isan important organizational value and notjust a company slogan, and managers fromthe top down must set the example.

Culture, the Leader, and theReward System

Leaders also teach the culture by what be-haviors they support and don’t support. Apopular buffet restaurant decided to add a“greeter” position to welcome customers asthey entered the restaurant. The managertold the newly hired employee explicitly thathis primary responsibility was to greet andwelcome the customers. However, as timewent on, to keep the employee busy whencustomers were not entering the restaurant,the manager added responsibilities to theposition—such as checking periodically tomake sure there were enough trays or mak-ing sure that the butter dish was always full.The greeter quickly realized that the man-ager never complimented him for properlygreeting the customers, nor did he ever sayanything to him when he missed a customerbecause he was too busy with his other du-ties. But if he ever let the buffet line run outof trays or butter, he was strongly repri-manded. Therefore, by her actions or lack ofaction, the manager had redefined the jobdescription. The manager made her real pri-orities clear, and the employee adjusted hisactions accordingly.

Many a company tells its employees thatthey should make every effort to satisfy thecustomer. Then the company evaluates andrewards employee performance only accord-ing to the budget numbers. This practice hasbeen called “rewarding A while hoping forB.” Most employees will naturally focus onthe budget numbers and not on the custom-er-satisfaction ratings. Similarly, if the com-pany tells its employees how important teamperformance is, but rewards its employeesonly as individuals, employees will see thatteam effort doesn’t really matter that much.In the best guest-service organizations, thereward system gets constant and careful re-view to ensure that it is supporting and re-


warding behaviors that the organizationwants repeated. Leaders can teach the cul-ture by how they publicize and reward suc-cess. They can also teach the culture by howthey react to service failures. Whether theorganization handles service failure well orpoorly affects the customers, of course, but italso tells the employees how committed theorganization is to customer satisfaction. Em-ployees need to know that this commitmentis more than a slogan. How the organizationfinds and fixes its service errors sends a loudmessage to employees about what the orga-nization truly does believe in. Let us say thatthe management of Hotel A is defensiveabout customer complaints and keeps themsecret (though employees will hear aboutthem), resolves complaints as cheaply andquietly as possible, and seeks people toblame for the complaints. The managementof Hotel B, on the other hand, aggressivelyseeks out and fixes service failures. It dissem-inates findings about complaints and failuresto employees, makes quick and fair adjust-ments for failure, and seeks solutions ratherthan scapegoats. We can predict that the em-ployees of Hotel B will give better service.

The Most Important Job

The most important job of the leader may beto frame the culture’s beliefs, define its val-ues, reinforce the appropriate norms of be-havior, recognize and tell stories about thosewho personify what the culture should meanfor the customer, and find every possibleoccasion to celebrate when the membersmake good things happen for their custom-ers. If peerless service is important to theleadership and they tell the members so,clearly and without equivocation, the mem-bers who believe in that culture will do theright things to make excellent customer ser-vice happen.

Disney, for example, teaches each em-ployee the hierarchically arrayed goals ofsafety, courtesy, show, and efficiency. Eachemployee knows that the first priority issafety, the second is courtesy and so on.Whenever employees confront a new situa-

tion, they use these cultural values to guidetheir behavior and act accordingly. In addi-tion, as part of their teaching responsibility,managers tell stories about employees whodid outstanding things for guests. Disneyemployees know that the commitment of theorganization to guest happiness and satisfac-tion is nearly absolute and that they shoulddo whatever they can do ensure the deliveryof this service product, this happy experi-ence, to each and every guest.

Culture makes a tremendous difference,and the benchmark organizations protect,nurture, and teach it whenever they can. Or-ganizational leaders in all fields know intel-lectually that “culture is important,” but theydo not always teach and live the culture withthe force and consistency necessary to driveemployee behavior.

Employee Empowerment Makes ItPossible

A strong, customer-focused culture createsemployees who are eager to give outstand-ing service, but that is not enough. Theymust be enabled or empowered to do what-ever it takes to meet and exceed customerexpectations. The empowered service pro-vider can personalize the service experience tomeet or exceed each customer’s expectations andcan take whatever steps are necessary to preventor recover from service failure. And on thosecomplementary ends can hinge organiza-tional success or failure.

A young family was visiting the MagicKingdom in Orlando. They had saved forsome time to come from their home in theMidwest and had planned carefully to makethis trip truly memorable. They were spend-ing the week in the Grand Floridian, themost expensive resort on the property, andwere enjoying their trip fully. One day, to-ward the end of their visit, they were on theHaunted Mansion ride, and the little boy inthe family lost his Mickey ears during theride. At the exit, the father displayed hisobviously distraught son and asked the rideoperator to look through the cars to see if theears might be there. These weren’t just a hat

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to this little boy; these were his prized pos-session, purchased on the first day of thevisit and worn faithfully ever since. The rideoperator looked. The ears were nowhere tobe found, and the operator watched as hopedied in the little boy’s face and the father’sconcern grew.

The ride operator seized the moment,went across the walkway to a souvenirstand, took two Mickey hats, put one ondad’s head and one, triumphantly, on theboy’s. Management got a letter of thanks afew weeks later. The family spent a lot oftime and money at the theme parks, but thisone simple act by a truly committed em-ployee made the trip memorable for thisfamily. If the Magic Kingdom employee hadnot been empowered to go grab a set ofMickey Ears for the little boy, the familywould have returned to the Midwest un-happy. The ride operator had absorbed Dis-ney’s guest-focused culture and had alsobeen empowered to take any reasonable ac-tion necessary to achieve guest satisfaction.The action cost Disney a little bit of money,but the payoff Disney earned in good will,customer satisfaction, and positive word-of-mouth advertising more than made up forany lost revenue.

Employee empowerment is essential inhospitality because situations occur so fre-quently in which the employee must make adecision on the spot about what to do for theguest to produce a wow or fix a problem. Ifthe guest asks for special service, complainsabout a service error, or wants to substituteone thing for something else, the guest con-tact employee must know what to do and beable to do it. Training and culture teach theemployee what to do. Organizational will-ingness to empower the employee to do itwill ensure that the employee can match theexperience to the guest’s expectations.Clearly, employees have to be not only welltrained, but also well trusted to make theright decision for the guest without requiringtime-consuming checks with a senior man-ager for approval. Guests want their prob-lems solved and their needs met now. Em-ployees must be empowered to respond

now, or guest expectations will not be met,and guests will go elsewhere in the future.The benchmark organizations give their em-ployees the training and latitude to makethose responses.

MANAGE EACH MOMENT OFTRUTH

The third key to hospitality success is thatthe successful hospitality organizationsmake an enormous effort to study, under-stand, and then manage each moment of truthoccurring during the guest’s experience.Some of these moments can be known orpredicted and can be managed; some thatoccur only occasionally can be prepared for;and some may take the organization by sur-prise. The benchmark hospitality organiza-tions have confidence that “culture will fillthe gaps” at such moments. The moment-of-truth concept was popularized by Scandina-vian Airline Services’ Jan Carlzon, who usedit to make his employees aware, first, of thenumber of separate interactions that custom-ers had with the airline and all the differentcomponents of the airline experience and,second, the crucial importance of each inter-action, each moment of truth, to guest satis-faction and organizational success. If oneconsiders any customer experience in thisway, identifying the potential and actual mo-ments of truth during the time that the typ-ical customer interacts with the organizationproviding that experience is relatively easy.From the visual appeal of the parking lot, tothe way in which the employees greet cus-tomers, to the cleanliness of the restrooms, tothe customer’s departure from the servicesetting –each of these and many other pointsduring the experience provide an opportu-nity to succeed or fail, to evoke a “wow” orproduce an “ow.” The goal should be to failno customer, and everyone in the organiza-tion should be engaged in watching out forfailures at the moments of truth. The bench-mark hospitality organizations know thecrucial nature of these contact points andstudy them continuously to ensure that they


are all well managed and that each momentof truth will be a positive one for the cus-tomer.

Planning the Service Experience

One way in which the outstanding hospital-ity organizations ensure the success of thesemoments is to plan every detail of the entireservice experience thoroughly. Once they haveidentified the key drivers of their guests,they plan the entire experience so they can besure that the key drivers are present, and thatall the details of the experience are under-stood, tested, and measured. Careful analy-sis of each contact point in the plan willreveal where problems might occur so theycan be anticipated and avoided. One methodof planning and analyzing the experience isto put a service diagram down on paper in asmuch or little detail as is helpful. A simpleflowchart of the activities associated with theservice experience might do. Or perhaps theorganization needs a detailed blueprint de-fining every component part and activity ofthe experience. Moments of truth at whichservice failure is most likely to occur can beidentified on the blueprint and early-warn-ing mechanisms included. Times can be at-tached to the activities to serve as measure-ment standards. Another approach toplanning the experience is to use analyticalmodels, typically but not always computermodels, to simulate the guest experience.The organization can then analyze a widevariety of different situations that might oc-cur to see what impact each might have onthe customer. On a simpler level, role playsand structured scenario simulations can helpemployees practice handling different mo-ments of truth.

If studies show that service failures aremore likely at one moment of truth than theothers, the organization can use cause-and-effect analysis, possibly in the form of a fish-bone diagram, to analyze the causes of faultyservice outcomes. Let us say that hotel guestsare complaining about having to wait toolong for room-service meals. That problemwould become the spine of the fish in the

diagram. Then the general areas withinwhich problems might arise that could delaythe delivery of meals are attached as bones tothe spine. Four typical areas might be equip-ment, personnel, material, and procedure.All of the possible contributors to an equip-ment failure then become bones attached tothe equipment bone, and so on with each ofthe four areas. Using a technique called Pa-reto analysis, the percentages of late meal de-liveries associated with each cause are listednext to the cause in their order of impor-tance. The analysis might reveal that, say,90% of all late meal deliveries were causedby only three or four of three dozen possiblecauses. In this example, taken from life, theorganization determined that most late de-liveries happened because room service per-sonnel could not find an available elevatorpromptly. Further analysis of the “unavail-able elevator” fishbone revealed that becausenot enough sheets were being stored on eachfloor, housekeepers were making inordinateuse of the elevators to go floor to floor to findextra sheets. Fixing the sheets problem fixedthe room service problem. What at first ap-peared to be a personnel problem turned outto be a material problem.

The People Part

The plan of the service experience can bestudied and “fail-safed” in hopes of makingit work the way it’s supposed to work, everytime, flawlessly. But only the organization’speople can make it work; they are the oneswith whom customers usually interact at keypoints. All of the comments we have madeabout the importance of the organizationalculture are relevant to the people part of themoments of truth. In addition, organizationsobviously try to hire people who fit the cul-ture and have a desire to serve; they searchout employees who love people and enjoyhelping them. Having such employees helpsbecause so many moments of truth are cus-tomer/server interactions. These employeestypically start the day with a smile on theirfaces, and they pretty much stay that wayregardless of the vagaries of human nature

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they encounter that might annoy, anger orprovoke less guest-oriented people. Employ-ees must of course be trained well and con-tinuously in their job skills, interpersonal re-lationship building, and problem-solvingtechniques. The organization must also cre-ate a job environment that promotes fun, sothat both the employees and the guests havean enjoyable experience. The benchmarkhospitality organizations understand the sta-tistical relationship between positive guestexperiences and positive guest-contact em-ployee attitudes. If employees are not feelingand acting positive, guests probably won’teither. Finally, these organizations workhard to reward people for service excellence.The benchmark hospitality organizationsfind excuses to celebrate success; they knowthat such celebration rewards, reinforces,and promotes guest service excellence.

The Importance of Measurement

In addition to planning or blueprinting theexperience and effectively hiring, training,and rewarding the employees who providethe experience, the benchmark hospitality or-ganizations also seek to define specific, fair,and appropriate measures of what guests ex-pect at the different moments of truth. Theyunderstand that what gets measured getsmanaged. Organizational studies may revealthat guests want the phone answered in nomore than three rings, won’t wait patientlyin line for more than fifteen minutes, andexpect eye contact and a smile from employ-ees coming within ten feet of them. Theseguest expectations then become specific mea-surable goals or targets that employees canuse to manage themselves. If the phone isn’tanswered in three rings or the line wait ex-ceeds 15 minutes, then a service failure issignaled that prompts remedial action by theemployee without waiting for the guest tocomplain or a manager to intervene. Becausethe organization has taught employees whatand how to measure, they know they shouldoffer an apology, a coupon for a free dessert,or a room upgrade in the hotel if a standardis not met. Attention to measurement tells

everyone that meeting or exceeding stan-dards is an important determinant in thesuccess of the guest experience, so everyoneneeds to pay attention to it.

Measuring what is happening to the cus-tomer in every step of service delivery iscritical in understanding where the problemsare and whether the solutions being tried areactually fixing the problem. Saying to a ser-vice provider, “I want you to do a better jobof satisfying customers because your cus-tomers seem unhappy” doesn’t give muchguidance. To tell employees in measurableterms what guest expectations are and howwell they are being met can be extremelyhelpful. Indeed, in the best circumstanceswhen the measures of guest expectations andemployee performance are clear, fair, andcompletely understood by employees, theywill be able to measure for themselves how wellthey are doing. Self-management throughself-measurement is a fundamental premisefor the W. Edwards Deming quality-circlemovement that anchored the quality-im-provement literature and efforts in total-quality management.

All organizations use measurements andstandards to some extent. Understandingthat you can’t manage what you can’t ordon’t measure, the benchmark hospitality or-ganizations measure all aspects of servicedelivery conscientiously and consistently.

Preparing for Failure

A final point when managing moments oftruth is to be prepared for failures, because theyare going to happen no matter how good theplan and the people, and because every fail-ure is a moment of truth. The motto shouldbe, “Fix failures fast and fairly.” The guestcontact employee who knows that a failurehas occurred, that a service standard has notbeen met (whether the guest noticed or not),should be able to fix the problem fast andfairly without senior manager involvement.No organization wants to fail, and all orga-nizations want to recover when they do fail.But the benchmark hospitality organizationsknow that they can end up much better or


worse off than they were before the momentof truth, depending upon how successfullythey can recover from failure

Here is an example of an organizationalprocedure designed to help customers avoidfailure at a potential moment of truth: find-ing the car in a crowded parking lot. Speed-parking is often used at theme parks, wherea lot of cars are arriving across a broad timewindow. Under the direction of a parkingattendant, the cars line up and park in suc-cessive spaces. Each row is filled before carsgo to the next row. This parking method isfast; it keeps all cars facing the same way andin line to park in the next available space. Ifa departing family shows up lost and uncer-tain as to where their car might be, Disneyhas a way to handle the problem. When cus-tomers first stream into the parking area, theDisney parking attendant writes down thetime each row is filled. To help a family thatcan’t find the car, the attendant pulls out thelist of what sections were parked at whattimes. The attendant asks the family aboutwhat time they arrived at the parking area,then uses the list to locate the car. In thisway, Disney prevents a customer-causedfailure that could have ruined the day’s ex-perience.

A moment of truth in the food servicebusiness is the moment when the guest looksat the food as it is served; is it what the guestordered? If not, a service failure occurs. HardRock Cafe prevents failure at this moment oftruth by hiring an extra person to stand at theend of the food preparation line to match theorder with what’s on the plate, to catch dis-crepancies before the customer ever sees theorder. Even though the traditional job de-scription for wait staff includes this checkingresponsibility, the extra person reduces thepossibility of error even further.

The wait for service and the customer’sreaction to it comprise a moment of truth inmany service organizations. If the wait is solong as to annoy the customer, a service fail-ure results. The Opryland Hotel in Nashvillecross-trains some of its employees so thatthey can be called upon in peak demandtimes when the front desk is extra busy. If the

lines get too long for the regular front deskteam, this “swat team” staffs extra comput-ers to reduce the wait for the incoming ordeparting customers.

When the customers themselves make amistake that could lead to an unsatisfactoryservice experience, a moment of truth occurs.Leading organizations prepare for these mo-ments so they can help to correct them withsensitivity. That way customers leave feelinggood about their overall experience and ap-preciating how the organization’s personnelhelped them redeem themselves. We havealready shown how speed-parking can helpcustomers find lost cars. Imagine how de-pressed you would feel if the parking atten-dant guides you and your large family toyour lost car on a hot day, then you find thatyou have lost your car keys and are lockedout of your car. Disney has a way to handlethis problem. Its parking attendant, preparedfor this moment and perhaps even lookingforward to it because it provides an oppor-tunity to wow you, calls the park’s “AutoPatrol” to your rescue. In seconds, they makeyou a new set of keys for free! Even thoughkey problems are not its fault, the customer-oriented organization believes that the cus-tomer needs to be wrong with dignity.Benchmark hospitality organizations knowthat customers who are angry at themselvesmay transfer some of that anger to the orga-nization. To overcome this very human ten-dency, these organizations even find ways tofix problems they didn’t create so that angry,frustrated people leave feeling good becausea bad experience has not been allowed toovershadow or cancel out all the good. Byproviding this high level of customer service,the organization earns the gratitude and fu-ture patronage of customers and enhances itsreputation. Any organization that seriouslyreflects on what really happens to its custom-ers when they storm out of the store becauseof a poorly handled purchase transaction,leave an auto dealership unhappy becausethey can’t get their defective tires replaced,or write an angry letter to the computer man-ufacturer because their power supply keepscutting off, should spend some time consid-

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ering the lessons that hospitality organiza-tions have already learned well. Unhappycustomers don’t come back, and worse yet,they may set up a web site and tell the entireworld about their unsatisfactory experience.

CONCLUSION

These three points—make every decisionwith the customer in mind, build a strongservice culture, and manage the moments oftruth—are a large part of what makes thebest guest service organizations the best, andthey can be keys to improving any organiza-tion that serves the customer. Give custom-ers what they want instead of what you thinkthey should want, build a culture where ev-eryone believes in providing service excel-lence, and then manage every moment oftruth so as to provide the best possible expe-rience for customers. They will then be atleast satisfied and possibly “wowed.” Theywill return again and again to spend theirmoney with you instead of with your com-petitors. These are the competitive advan-tages of outstanding hospitality organiza-tions, and they work very hard to sustainthem.

These three keys can become competi-tive advantages to organizations in just

about any field. Whether a customer is seek-ing to buy a car, refrigerator, shirt, or house,or get a loan or flu shot, set up a bank ac-count, or open a stock market account, theselessons can be applied. Too many organiza-tions set themselves up for their own conve-nience, listen to their engineers instead oftheir customers, and hope quality controlcatches all their mistakes. They should in-stead be seeking to implement these key les-sons from hospitality and trying to listenmore systematically to their customers to un-derstand what they really expect from theproduct or service. Then, they can organizethemselves to deliver this product or serviceas seamlessly and effectively as possible.

An old saying in hospitality is true inany industry: If you don’t give customerswhat they want, your competitors will. Thisis a hard lesson for many in the more tradi-tional business sectors to really believe, butthe successes of the benchmark hospitalityorganizations provide a convincing argu-ment that emulating what they do is worth atry.

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SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY

For more on making decisions with the cus-tomer in mind and treating customers likeguests, see Robert C. Ford and Cherrill P.Heaton, Managing the Guest Experience in Hos-pitality (Albany, NY: Delmar Publishers,2000); and Leonard L. Berry, Discovering theSoul of Service: The Nine Drivers of SustainableBusiness Success (New York: The Free Press,1999). The information about the Amex da-tabase and relationship marketing is fromBusiness Week, 5 September 1994, 61. Formore on organizational cultures, see EdgarH. Schein, Organizational Culture and Leader-ship: A Dynamic View (San Francisco: Jossey–Bass, 1992).

The story of the SAS purser and thesnowstorm is from Karl Albrecht, At Ameri-ca’s Service: How Your Company Can Join theCustomer Service Revolution (New York:Warner Books, 1988), 124–125. The story ofthe British Airways baggage handler and theyellow and black tags is from Alan G. Rob-inson and Sam Stern, Corporate Creativity:How Innovation and Improvement ActuallyHappen (San Francisco: Berrett–Koehler Pub-lishers, 1997), 9–11. The Southwest AirlinesCulture Committee and the Walk a Mile inMy Shoes program are described in KevinFreiberg and Jackie Freiberg, Nuts! SouthwestAirlines’ Crazy Recipe for Business and PersonalSuccess (Austin, TX: Bard Press, 1996), 166–172.

The Bill Marriott, Jr., story illustratingthe importance of the leader in defining andsustaining the organizational culture is fromAlbrecht, At America’s Service, 130. The WaltDisney “pollen” quote appeared in Walt Dis-ney: Famous Quotes, printed for Walt DisneyTheme Parks and Resorts, 1994.

For more on empowering employees, seeRobert C. Ford and Myron D. Fottler, “Em-powerment: A Matter of Degree,” Academy ofManagement Executive 9 (1995), 21–28. A com-pelling discussion of the link between em-ployee satisfaction and customer ratings ofservice quality can be found in BenjaminSchneider and David E. Bowen, “The ServiceOrganization: Human Resources Manage-ment Is Crucial,” Organizational Dynamics 21(1993), 39–52. The relationship between em-ployee satisfaction, guest satisfaction, andprofits is discussed in James L. Heskett, W.Earl Sasser, Jr., and Leonard A. Schlesinger,The Service Profit Chain: How Leading Compa-nies Link Profit and Growth to Loyalty, Satisfac-tion, and Value (New York: Free Press, 1997).To read more about service failure, see Ste-phen S. Tax and Stephen W. Brown, “Recov-ering and Learning from Service Failure,”Sloan Management Review 39 (1998), 75–88.

Jan Carlzon’s Moments of Truth (NewYork: Ballinger, 1987) provides a detailed ex-planation of that concept and how Carlzonused it to rejuvenate SAS. For informationabout planning and blueprinting to help en-sure the success of the service experience, seeG. Lynn Shostack and Jane Kingman–Brund-age, “How to Design a Service,” in Carole A.Congram and Margaret L. Friedman (Eds.),The AMA Handbook of Marketing for the ServiceIndustry (American Marketing Association,1991), 243–261. Flowcharting the service ex-perience and the fishbone technique forproblem solving are described in D. DarylWyckoff, “New Tools for Achieving ServiceQuality,” Cornell Hotel and Restaurant Admin-istration Quarterly 25 (1984), 78–91.

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Ford 2001-Lessons From Hospitality That Can Serve Anyone

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