Today I want to give you a real world example of how big of a role employees play in your overall success or failure.
Now the example in question has nothing to do with a cleaning business, instead it involves a hotel I stayed at recently.
But that doesn’t change a thing, because “business is business” across the board. What I mean by that is this: Fundamental rules of success “know no boundaries”. So a hotel will depend on good employees JUST AS MUCH as your little cleaning business does.
To make a long story short, I’ve been on the road quite a bit lately (I’ll cover WHY in a later post). So this means I’ve been staying in hotels more than I ever have been in my life. And of all the ones I stayed in, one stood out. Not by just a little bit, but by a LOT.
Much like any other business, hotels tend to offer a very similar experience from one hotel to another. They give you a room for a night or two. So how a hotel STANDS OUT from their competitor across the street boils down to basically a few things.
- The appearance of the hotel on the inside and outside.
- Their services and amenities.
- How well the staff carries out their functions.
Now there is more to it than that, but what I just mentioned are three of the biggest details that matter. Now the key fact to keep in mind is that all three of these core functions are completely dependent on the STAFF THAT WORKS THERE.
The person who owns the hotel can’t do it all. It would be impossible. The owners role is to put a TEAM IN PLACE that carries out the VISION that he or she has. Given that even larger hotels don’t generally have many staff on at a given time, EVERY STAFF MEMBER IS IMPORTANT.
This means that everyone who is working on a given shift needs to be “pushing in the same direction” to get the best results. The top rated (and most profitable) companies KNOW THIS. The ‘best of the best” rake in the dough while others that provide the EXACT SAME TASK (a room for the night) struggle to make ends meet.
The hotel I stayed in STOOD OUT in every regard. The front desk personal greeted us with a big fat smile on her face, gave us some free complementarily water bottles and had our key cards ready when we arrived. Check in took FIVE SECONDS.
The room we had was CLEAN and WELL MAINTAINED. The grounds were spotless. The amenities such as the pool, restaurant and bar were neat, well taken care of and appealing visually. THIS WAS NO ACCIDENT. To get this to happen EACH EMPLOYEE that worked there DID THEIR JOB to a tee.
As we were checking in I even ran across the chef of the in-house restaurant who greeted me with a “hello” (and who later cooked a great meal for us). All in all, the place was outstanding. I praised the front desk staff upon checkout, indicating how pleased we were with our stay.
The person responded that they were happy to hear that and then told me that they were the THIRD HIGHEST RATED HOTEL IN THE COUNTRY for that particular chain. The person said that PROUDLY. This indicates whomever the owner is INSTILLS a deep sense of WHAT IT TAKES to be the best.
I’ll wrap this up by saying you can learn a lot by just “paying attention” to what the most successful companies do. It’s easy for a company to make “promises” in a brochure or letter, but it’s much harder for them to actually follow through on them.
The best of the best do so only because of their staff. So be sure to HIRE SLOW and take your time to find the GEMS. They are out there if you look hard enough. And, in case you were wondering, the hotel was the Hilton Garden Inn located in Florence South Carolina. I highly recommend you stay there if given the chance.
