Is Your Team Fired Up and Ready To Go?
Craig Cherry
Expert on customer loyalty, uses research to drive revenue. Speaker, Trainer, Coach, Managing Director and Founder of 'The Loyalty Zone'
Over the last two week’s I have been thinking about culture, teams, customer service and of course loyalty. Fundamentally - engagement.
Deciding what the culture of your company will look like is easy, right? Yet, ensuring the company culture is embraced, picked up, run with and demonstrated by every staff member, department and leader every day, every time, without fail - well that’s a whole other ball game.
Steve Wyn says, he cannot manage every employee in his many hotels and casinos, but he can create the culture.
I create the culture and my employees are driving the culture. It's about my people. If you have the right culture, then the problem on the 18th floor is solved. If a company doesn't have the culture, then you can have all the security you want but it does not mean a thing. I wanted to create a culture of making employees responsible in terms of their self-esteem. This is the power that allows me to sleep well at night.
Steve tells a story about a bellman in one of his hotels. The bellman took luggage up to a hotel room for a couple. As always, the bellman asked the couple if he could explain the room's amenities and asked if they had all their luggage. The wife immediately said, "Oh Harry, I left your bag of medication on the bathroom counter at home." She was really freaking out. The bellman quietly said, “Ma’am don't worry, I will take care of this. Is anyone at your house?" The wife said, “Yes our housekeeper is watching our home in LA." The bellman told her his brother lives in LA, and he would have him pick up her husband's medication. "If you can give me your address and tell your housekeeper my brother, Jose, will pick up the medication tonight then I will meet him halfway and retrieve the bag when I get off." The bellman left the hotel, met his brother, and had the medication to the front desk at 3:45 AM.
Do you think this couple will ever stay at any other hotel when they visit Vegas?
Supervisors are required to have pre-shift meetings with their team.
One of the questions the supervisors always ask is, "Does anyone have a story of something good that happened yesterday to a customer?" Stories like the one from his bellman make other employees go out and find their own story.
Steve says, it helps to have the family of staff.
Now I have thousands of employees who are going out of their way to find a customer service story. Our hotel managers film the best customer service stories and share them with all the other employees. It's not the hand-woven carpets, original art, or chandlers that make us. It's caring for our employees, which makes them care about our guests. It's knowing that if any one of them has a family problem or emergency that we will give them the time off needed. We are here for our staff.
That's why Wynn was voted the best Vegas company to work for.
What is the culture in your company? Is it one where team members are simply clocking in, going through the motions, and can't wait to leave? Or is the culture one of engagement, where team members are inspired to create their own customer service story?
The Japanese, believe Chorei, is the secret to productivity. Effective morning routines determine how productive your day will be and have created a system where people can be productive together.
Chorei (朝礼; ちょうれい) is the Japanese term for morning assembly. Many institutions asked their people to have a meeting in the morning before starting the day. These include elementary to high schools, restaurants, businesses and companies.
Other than chorei, there are also chuurei (昼礼; ちゅうれい) or afternoon assembly, and yurei (夜礼; ゆうれい) or evening assembly. The general purpose is similar: reporting, bonding, and raising motivation.
The Purpose of Chorei
- To get everyone on the same length about current prioritized tasks
- To share important updates and information with all employees at once
- To bridge smooth coordination among different departments
- To be reminded of the company's value
- To boost employees' morale and spirit for work
At the Loyalty Zone we also have a version of the daily team set up, we call it Getting In The Zone and we implement this practice into all client on job training.
It’s a quick, simple practice that engages every team member throughout the company prior to their shift every day and ensures everyone is in the zone.
What does it mean to be in the zone?
Getting in the zone is simple but not easy to create. Most of the time when people walk into the office, factory, shop floor, they are anything but fired up. It might take an hour before the energy really kicks in and before their best comes out.
Getting in the zone is about being present; leaving your problems at the door; being clear about your goals for the day; staying motivated for the entire time; going above and beyond for every single customer; driving performance; creating enthusiasm amongst the team and your customers.
If it were easy, then everyone would be doing it.
By intentionally getting your team fired up, ready to go everyday you will stand out from most businesses who just leave performance to chance.
So how does getting in the zone improve business? Read my previous article Get in the Zone: Growing Your Business the Smart Way to understand why it makes perfect business sense to implement and repeat this powerful practice.
4 Ways to Set Your Team up for Success
Setting your team up for success doesn’t happen overnight.
It’s a daily occurrence of the team working together and being clear about the goals you want to accomplish.
A manager or owner of a business is motivated to see the business succeed.
Other people that work within the business may not be as motivated or driven like you, and that’s ok, but it doesn’t mean they don’t want to do a good job.
As a leader, it’s your role to manage and guide and your team so they are motivated and productive in their roles.
What are you doing to make sure your team is fired up and ready to go?
Does your team have the correct information and tools to do a good job? Or are they set up to do a poor job?
A sports team does not show up to play and expect to win games if the coach has not set the expectations for the team. Sure, the goal is winning but there is so much behind winning the game. Ultimately the team needs to work together towards accomplishing the goal.
I work across many different businesses including hospitality venues. We teach their leaders to gather the team before each shift starts to check in and see how the team is going.
We don’t know what is going on their lives, but we can check-in and see how they are going and set the expectations before they start serving.
Setting your team up to succeed starts by asking these 4 key questions:
- What are the goals you want to achieve today?
- What are you going to do to achieve those goals?
- What are you going to do to deliver a 10 out of 10?
- Are you fired up and ready to go? They repeat this part, we finish on energy.
The question the leader should ask themselves, when doing this is ‘Are all of my team fired up and ready to deliver the best possible experience to the customer?
Asking these questions gets your people ready and in the right mindset to serve.
For many of my clients, their teams cannot start their shift without asking at least these 4 key questions. Their staff say they find it beneficial to be set up and ready to go, they have the correct tools to perform their roles successfully and are clear about the goals to be achieved.
Give it a try. I’d love to know how this works in your teams or if you do something similar.
Warm Regards,
Craig Cherry
Managing Director | The Loyalty Zone
Net Promoter (NPS) Certified Associate
Mobile: +61 (0) 400 542 017
Email: [email protected]
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