Page 78 - Harnessing the Management Secrets of Disney in Your Company

You Better Believe It 59

The Golden Rule meant to them personally. After much contemplation,
all but one team member was ready to move forward and adopt the strat-
egy. “We had to ask the most senior person in the company to leave,”
confessed Isadore, “because if you don’t have the senior people prepared
to abide by it, you can’t expect the people below them to abide by it . . .
because then they won’t be supported.”
Many companies today complain that they can’t get good people,
or that no one is willing to work for low wages, or that the wage pool
is undereducated. To those arguments, Isadore retorts “Nonsense.” He
believes that there isn’t a country, a city, or a village anywhere in the
world where you couldn’t bring together a group of people, give them an
opportunity to do their best in a work environment that supports them,
and fail to achieve a five-star level of service.
A great example of this truth is Four Seasons Istanbul. Isadore recounts
the following story, “In Istanbul, our partners there are Turkish. A few
years after the hotel was opened, I was having dinner with the owner and
his wife and she said, ‘Where did you get these people from?’ I said, ‘What
do you mean?’ She replied, ‘Where did you hire them from?’ I said, ‘We
brought a few in from other properties around the world, but 99 percent
are Turkish people.’ She said, ‘No, no they are not Turkish people.’ I said,
‘They are Turkish people, all living in Turkey.’ She said, ‘I have Turkish
people working for me and these are not Turkish people.’ I realized that
something was being lost in the translation. The general manager, Marcus,
was there, and I said, ‘Marcus, will you please explain in your native lan-
guage?’ He said, ‘These are local people who we’ve hired and trained.’ She
said, ‘But they are so different.’ I said, ‘They’re not different. All we are
doing is giving them a chance to be themselves.’ This happens over and
over again at many of our properties. That’s why Disney was successful. He
understood the importance of believing in people.”
Most employees do not set out to fail. They fail because management
does not train them, nurture them, and support them. Management is typi-
cally to blame for the failure of employees. When you have people with the
same vision working for a cause they believe in and can be proud of and,
if and only if, they are given the freedom to perform, the results are always
amazing. People simply cannot flourish under paranoid power-hungry
leaders who watch their comings and goings like a perched hawk. At Four
Seasons, all employees are treated according to Golden Rule tradition.
(Continued)