Page 222 - Harnessing the Management Secrets of Disney in Your Company

Give Details Top Billing 203

he ordered the ride lengthened immediately. Moreover, he made it clear that
carelessness toward details would not be tolerated, for such an attitude might
cause guests to start doubting Disney’s trustworthiness, the heart and soul of
his management philosophy and personal credo.
Meticulous attention to detail is also characteristic of the Disney animated
films. In Snow White, for example, viewers don’t see drops of water just drip-
ping from a bar of soap, in itself an unusual level of detail in animated films.
Instead, they see glistening bubbles that actually twinkle in the candlelight.
Creating such film magic required a staff of skilled animators, of course,
and here, too, Walt refused to leave anything to chance. To make sure that he
would always have a sufficient number of talented artists to meet his demand-
ing standards, Walt began in-house training courses and eventually made a
deal that brought teachers from an art school to work with his animators.
In fact, no corner of the organization escaped Walt’s obsession with
perfection. Thoroughly convinced that no detail was too small to be ignored
in order to provide his guests with an exceptional experience, the boss made
his touch apparent everywhere. He determined that garbage cans should be
spaced exactly 25 feet apart all around Disneyland. He ordered that the highest-
quality paint be used on rides and buildings, going so far as to specify that
real gold or silver be used for any gilding or silvering. He even hired someone
whose job it was to patrol Disneyland twice a month to make certain that all
the colors in the park were in harmony!
The master entertainer instinctively knew that the whole package—col-
ors, sounds, smells—had an impact on how guests received the show.
If this holistic, integrated approach to entertainment seems excessive, one
need only think of a promising restaurant experience that went awry because
of one disagreeable factor. Perhaps the food was first-class, the service pleasant,
and the decor attractive, but the background music assailed a diner’s ears and
made it impossible to enjoy the meal. One jarring element can undermine a
host of favorable impressions in a restaurant or anywhere else, and Walt Disney
wasn’t about to risk such a misstep.
That’s why street cleaners at Walt Disney World are given extra training
at Disney University to ensure that they respond in a positive and helpful
fashion to questions from departing guests. It might seem strange to train
street cleaners in customer service, but the company learned a few years back
that these employees receive the greatest number of unstructured questions
from park guests. An exhausted couple with three hungry children in tow
might ask where they can get a quick, inexpensive dinner, for instance. To