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	What Was The Year That Is? - By J. Ragsdale Hendrie

Preach it, brother! Preach it!

J.R. has nailed it. As a longtime hospitality pro I have said many of these same things perhaps 10,000 times in some form or another over the past 10 years. It comes down to this: the only way a business can truly distinguish itself is through service. Simple to say. Difficult to do. A restaurant or hotel can slap on a new coat of paint, have its lobby colors "done" to convey warmth, or hold yet another mandatory "through the eyes of the guest" staff training with those firecrackers down in HR, upgrade its mini bars with Madagascar Vanilla Coffee, etc. The truth is if we don't collectively pull our heads out of our butts (are you listening VPs, GMs ?) as it pertains to hiring and more importantly, retaining our front line in-the-trenches service professionals who possess a genuine desire to be in service, otherwise all these upgrades and plasma TVs, and Bolivian tapas are reduced to mere window dressing draped over altars of mediocrity. Anyone with a decent track record and enough years under his or her belt will tell you (if you'll listen, that is) that for every one comment card you recieve lauding the virtues of your towels, you will have 10 that name an actual human being who found some small way to wow a guest. Wake up execs and try to remember why you ever got in this business in the first place. Was it to hold meetings that feature spreadsheets? Have you looked at your staff's faces lately? How many are texting under the table? How many are just nodding during a gap in your droning? Think back to when you were part of the big turn in the ballroom, or that massive room turn when GM check out and AT&T was right behind them and everyone from F&B to Valet to Engineering was rowing in the same direction to get it done. Try to pinpoint exactly when you became a bonus hound and then calculate the real cost of the big sell-out (turnover, theft, disinterested staff, luke warm comment cards, a management team with resumes floating in the wind like snowflakes just waiting for a chance to escape the grind that has been created throughout this industry.) But we can change it if we just stop and realize that a smile, a positive word, a pat on the back (instead of an e-mail), maybe a beer and a chat with that new guy may go a lot farther than you think. Does anyone out there remember the last time an Exec related a funny story about some battle that they fought long ago? or perhaps put an arm around your shoulder (is that legal?) to let you know that your back-to-back double shift is much appreciated? This is a people business, so let's try acting like people. Let's invest more time into our people and their professional development and less on the trail mix in the mini bar.

2008-01-07 Franco D\'Amico

Reanalysize and reengineering of our mind to proactive

Past is only can referral for future. How we tune correct way.
Especially our hospitality industry's services sequence are sensitive. Direct effect to our new guest, regular guest, non-decide guest, etc. Therefore we have to do properly our last several years experiences, win or fail. We have had win and fail experience, however we are human being, we never control about our behavior and positive attitude sometimes.
Therefore we have to do accordingly our SOP, standard operation procedure with our heart.
These are ;
a. What are quality of customer services all about?

Assist our staff with their general services knowledge. Help them become knowledgeable of the role operating plays in business today. In the same way we ensure our staff know how to operate their operations, make sure they know at least as much about how about customers services operate. Remember, our service may be our organizations most valuable asset. Protect it by investing in knowledge about the field of service industry.

b. An efficient services exists only in peoples minds

Its very easy to overlook a fundamental fact about services: people bring perfect services to life not companies. Services are intangible, arent to be found in the factory or in the studio, and much less on the balance sheet but in the minds of consumers, employees, suppliers, and others stakeholders. In a senses, a service is a public object and the stronger services are those whose stakeholders fell a real sense of ownerships: thats our services

c. Sense
But distinctive services require something more. They have to be powered up to deliver a full sensory and emotional experience. It is not enough to present a product or service visually in an ad. It pays to attach a sound, such as music or powerful words and symbols. The combination of visual and audio stimuli delivers a 2+2 = 5 impact. It pays even more to trigger other sensory channels taste, touch, smell to enhance the total impact.

d. Company Activity Alignment
we must have organizational alignment, or we cant achieve an integrated services. For long-term success, we must create a company filled with leaders leading from the services role and employees executing upon it. This requires a whole new way of thinking, from getting leaders to be services champion, to setting up employee compensation systems rewarding services based behavior, hiring based on services, organizing company processes and designing products and services to reflect the on behalf of hotel. This is not one-time event or program. It takes an ongoing commitment and effort from leaders at all levels to align organization to execute on the consistent and commitment services.

e. Communication Tools
we have to tell the world who we are. The Services based communications delivers the services tools verbally and visually, via logos, ad campaigns, collateral, taglines, brand characters, colors, public relations, direct mail and Websites. Effective communication of services messages will turbo-charge our marketing efforts, ensuring the message rings true to the customer and that every communication conveys the same overall message and feeling. And if we kick off our services in a big way, via enthusiastic communications to employees and clear, compelling communications to customers, we will have better luck at sustaining our services efforts.

A distinctive consumer experience that matches the services promise requires consistent quality of services delivery. To make this happen, the services leader must identify and prioritize key touch points into guidelines that mobilize and inspire the people who are delivering the services experience.
For a hotel company that kept one eye focused on customers, the other focused on employees, the essential word was care, to help the team realize the key to customer satisfaction. One senior person told me, This business is simple, for the key to delighting the customer who pays is by delighting the employee who works. Part of the thinking was that if they teach employees how it feels to experience care, they will be more familiar and comfortable with what it takes to provide care.
We live in a world where trust has become a scare source yet, at the same time, people must deal with more uncertainty and make more choices than ever before. I think theres a role here for excellent services to play.

f. Quality of Customer Services are a consumers guarantee of quality.
Services began as a straightforward guarantee of quality and consistency and for this, naturally, consumers were prepared to pay a premium. As services representative put it, services were the first piece of consumer protection we knew where to go when we had a complaint. History shows that unformatted services production leads to a deterioration in quality; in services planners were forced to introduce production marks to prevent manufacturers from cutting corners.

g. Strong and commitment services can stimulate innovation.
A strong service is like a north star for a companys research and development efforts it guides the imagination of the organization in commercially useful direction.

I really appreciate to you because of depend on your article I will follow and I can acknowledge of my opinion and facts.

With kind regards,

Honey Thazin Aung
Director of Human Resources
Dusit Inya Lake Resort, 37 Kaba Aye Pagoda Road,Yangon, Myanmar
Phone +95 (1) 662866| Fax +95 (1) 665537| E-mail honey.ta@dusit.com|
www.dusit.com or www.globalhotelalliance.com

2008-01-22 Honey Thazin Aung

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