Page 97 - The New Gold Standard

Select—Don’t Hire
an involved interviewing process. Tony Mira, a general man-
ager at Ritz-Carlton, comments that despite his 28-year history
in the hotel industry with extensive leadership experience, “It
took 14 interviews for me to get this job, which is common for a
general manager position at Ritz-Carlton. Four of them were
with the owners of the hotel. But 10 interviews were with Ritz-
Carlton staff, starting with two initial interviews at the corporate
office, including the vice president of human resources who is
in charge of talent management. You can’t help but feel special,
whether you are a leader or a frontline employee, when people
take so much time to get to know you and afterward deem you
acceptable.”
That pride in being selected also serves as a motivator to live
up to the trust that has been placed in the individual upon being
hired. Adam Hassan, boiler operator in the engineering depart-
ment, explains,“When people take so much time to select you, you
really want to prove that they made the right choice. So if I see
anything unusual, I take care of it. I don’t have my boss telling me
to go do it; I go do it on my own because I don’t want to let the
guests or the other Ladies and Gentlemen down. If I turn my head
on a broken lamp, I am not living up to the standard of a service
professional. Everybody here does the same thing: They walk in
the hallway and if they see a piece of paper, they bend down and
pick it up. That comes from the heart; it comes freely, because
they have chosen us as if we owned the place.”
The hiring process not only serves as an opportunity to find
people to perform necessary functions for a business but ulti-
mately also sets the tone for the pride people take in their work.
By creating layers of evaluation, new hires feel that leadership
has invested in getting to know them. Further, they realize that
leadership wants to ensure that those who join the company can
meet or exceed the standards of those who have come before
them. Ultimately, staff members feel a responsibility to live up to
the trust placed in them through their offer of employment . . .
and they even become recruiters themselves.

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