The Taj Way - Harward Case Study

On 26th November 2008, a group of 10 terrorists attacked about a dozen locations in Mumbai, India, including one of the most iconic buildings in the city, more than 100 years old Taj Mahal Palace Hotel in South Bombay. 

For two nights and three days, the Taj was under siege, held by men with automatic weapons, plastic explosives, grenades and backpacks.

Before attack-

More than 500 guests were registered at the hotel. Another 500-600 were attending functions in banquet halls or sitting down to dinner in hotels or restaurants. Among them were the global board of directors and senior management team of Unilever who had gathered along with their spouses to honour incoming and outgoing CEOs.

 How it happened- 

Shortly after 9 pm, an explosion rocked the Leopold Cafe just around the corner, less than 200 meters from the Taj. Two young men pulled out automatic weapons and began firing crowds at the Gateway of India and along the street in front of the Taj. In the ensuing chaos, two heavily armed terrorists circumvented the metal detectors and entered the lobby. They were soon joined by the two attackers from the Leopold who broke through a back door. They were banging the doors and warning the guests to come out or they will shoot. It was a kind of war situation. 

Few things about the employees -

There were 600 staff members on duty at night, many of them were of 20-30 years old. Some of them had only been working for a few years at the hotel. Many of them were fathers, mothers or the sole breadwinners in their families with children at home, waiting for them. All 600 of these employees knew all the back routes that mean they knew the exits. They knew the entrances, they knew the hallways etc. In other words, they knew how to get out and how to get out fast.

The truth of the matter is that nobody ran away but stayed. In fact, some of them not only stayed but they hopped guests out and came back in to help more guests. They were calming frightened guests and assisting in the rescue. Members of the hotels' team of telephone operators originally evacuated, voluntarily returned to their stations and stayed on all night. They became the hub of communication at that point. They were calling every single guest to assist the next move.

Malika (then 24 yrs old), the banquet manager, and other staff kept their composure and managed the 65 guests of Unilever to get out through the window using ledge.

The kitchen brigade decided to form a human chain to escort guests, in the darkness, down the stairs. But when the terrorists realized the plan, they gunned down 5-6 chefs but no guests were harmed. 

Out of the 1700 people that night, over 1600 escaped safely and only 34 people died, which includes 17 staff members. 

How did this happen? What explains it? 

Ratan Tata said that there were no manuals having instructions for what should be done in terror attacks. So it was all staffs' call to stay and help guests to reach safety. In short, he couldn't explain why they decided to do that.

Some say it must be the national culture of India. Value system - a guest is to be treated like God. ( Atithi Devo Bhava )

Some say it's corporate culture. Tata Group has a long history in India and it follows a very benevolent human resource policies in India. It defines the family of integrity in their business dealings. 

Some say it's the industry culture. Employees are trained to serve customers. 

Some true facts -

1) Recruitment -The Taj group prefers to recruit employees straight out of high schools, not from the major cities like Bombay or Delhi. They recruit from comparatively small towns like Haldia, Chandigarh, Nashik, Tiruchirappalli, Coimbatore, Mysore etc. 

They recruit graduating students for attitude not grades. They ask their headmasters or the teachers, who are the students that you teach who have the most respect for older people. 

2) Training - They train their frontline staffs to be the ambassadors for the brand of the company. They train their Taj Hotel employees to be ambassadors for the customers/guests. They call them guest ambassadors. They believe frontline employees should be the voice of the clients/customers/guests.

3) Reward and Recognition campaign - If the Employee does something to delight customers and the guest writes a note, within 48 hours that employee is recognized. So they don't wait for festivals like Diwali, Holy, Christmas. It happens in 48 hours. 

They won the International Hermes Award for innovation in human resource management for this RnR program. 

Learning - Building a customer /guest-centric corporate culture. 

Rethinking the contract between employer and employee.

These Taj employees behaved like ordinary heroes. That was indeed the Taj Way.