Page 274 - The New Gold Standard

PRINCIPLE 5: LEA VE A LASTING FOOTPRINT
them if they would buy the food. Now we have monthly picnics
for the homeless. Ritz-Carlton donates the food, and our volun-
teers cook and serve it. We do a major Thanksgiving meal at a
church each year and serve between 1,000 to 1,500 homeless that
day alone. I can’t stress the importance enough, though, that this
doesn’t happen just once a year. This continues—starving con-
tinues—all year long. We do something big every month. We
also take sheets, linens, and other items every month to the shel-
ters . . . sometimes two or three times a month.”
True leadership involves not only serving owners and guests
but developing staff members who can teach the managers how
to increase the permanent impact of the business. Ronald sums
up what is possible from a true community-based company: “Be-
cause of my affiliation with Ritz-Carlton, I’m able to help more
people. I couldn’t afford all this food on my own. I couldn’t
touch as many lives. One young man who works at the restau-
rant in our hotel is helping me coach basketball downtown, and
others come down to the gym to help. I used to see things go in
the dumpster—pillows and linens—and I said, hey, there are
people who can use that! One Thanksgiving, the culinary de-
partment prepared food for a large group that cancelled. Man-
agement was going to try to use the food to feed our employees,
but I talked to the chef, and he said as long as the food hadn’t
been served, it wasn’t considered leftovers. So we loaded the food
into a van and took it down to the Mission. If there weren’t
a Ritz-Carlton, where would I personally be? If there weren’t a
Ritz-Carlton, where would the community be?”
Ronald’s questions pose a lingering challenge for all business
leaders. What are the opportunities awaiting you to uplift the
lives of those inside and outside your business? What is your last-
ing footprint?

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