The Ritz-Charlton Hotel
The Ritz-Charlton Hotel
1. “Service” can be an elusive concept. What is the essence of The Ritz-Carlton experience? What is The Ritz-Carlton selling?
“We are not in the hotel business. The hotel business is about selling rooms, selling food, selling the bar. We do those things incidentally, but our business is service… Service is our profession.”, so Horst Schulze, founding president and COO of Ritz-Carlton Hotel, about the exceptional customer service philosophy of the company. The Ritz-Carlton focuses on taking care of their customers and employees, which was the reason to create “The Gold Standards” of customer service. These standards include the Three Steps of Service, the Motto, the Employee Promise, the Credo and the Twenty Basics and each employee and manager, everybody, whom makes that company running, has to know them and adopt them. By understanding the standards every employee should be able to deliver the highest level of service and with it satisfy the customer. Because this is what the company sells – service, and “This business is created for one reason – to make money.”
The Credo of “The Gold Standards” says: “The Ritz-Carlton experience enlivens the senses, instills well-being, and fulfills even the unexpressed wishes and needs of our guests.” This is the main belief of The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company. The customer’s satisfaction – achieved by delivering the highest level of service. “No one in the world knows more about what our customers what than we do.” By the long time of Ritz-Carlton experience they know the wishes of their customers and they make them happened in a way that they are satisfied. And the customer would come back to hotel soon and ask again for service.
2. How does The Ritz-Carlton create “Ladies and Gentleman” in only 7 days?
Main goal of Ritz-Carlton Hotel is to satisfy the high expectations of the customer established on highly motivated and skilled employees. The hotel-opening process, named “The 7 Day Countdown”, is based on converting new hired people to Ritz-Carlton employees in seven days by skills training and focusing them on the company values and culture.
Day One is dedicated to the staff orientation. The new employees learn more about the company’s history, philosophy and values. Discussing values happens on the beginning of the pre-opening process, because a person changes the behavior only from a significant emotional experience and starting a new job is exactly this kind of experience, which makes them ready for everything new, so Leonardo Inghilleri, SVP of Human Resources of Ritz-Carlton Hotel.
Day Two is focused on the departmental vision sessions. The second day is made for the employees to learn more about their new departments and about each other. Asking questions by the management about what the employees like and dislike, which are the future tasks and goals of their team, where they would like to be in a year – typical problem areas for every new employee – getting the answers from the employees and discussing them all together. This is the other big step of the company after Day One to make sure that these are the right employees with the right attitude to work for Ritz-Carlton.
Day Three through Seven is