How the Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company Is Redefining the Gold Standard

How the Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company Is Redefining the Gold Standard

From Chapter One of The New Gold Standard by Joseph A. Michelli

MANAGEMENT

The New Gold Standard: 5 Leadership Principles for Creating a Legendary Customer Experience Courtesy of the Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company represents a follow-up to my book The Starbucks Experience: 5 Principles for Turning Ordinary into Extraordinary. Where Starbucks leadership took an ordinary product like coffee and significantly added value by staging it in an environment of affordable luxury, Ritz-Carlton has elevated the luxury experience to a true art form.

The New Gold Standard is primarily intended to help managers, owners, and leaders understand the driving principles, processes, and practices that have generated unusual staff loyalty, world-class customer engagement, and significant brand equity for Ritz-Carlton. However, it also provides perspective on those same principles from the viewpoint of frontline workers (both customer facing and non–customer facing), customers, and other stakeholders. Whether you wish to attract, hire, and retain the "right" employees, are interested in producing transformational customer experiences, or are looking for ways to maintain the relevance of your product and service offerings, The New Gold Standard shares the wisdom of Ritz-Carlton leadership.

Ritz-Carlton leaders are responsible for stewarding an icon in the luxury market, through a constant quest for excellence, to continue its success in a changing global economy and with changing customer needs. Even in areas of international growth, succession planning, finding the best location for your business, or determining meaningful quality enhancements, Ritz-Carlton offers a rich tapestry of leadership successes and breakdowns that can help you shorten your path to greater success.

So what is at the essence of this iconic company? What is the Ritz-Carlton experience? While the answer reflects some variability based on the source you ask, there is a striking consistency of opinion.

For Robert E. Watson, managing director of Protravel International, Inc., the experience is characterized as "service value. What sets Ritz-Carlton apart is its service. Ritz-Carlton partners with us in the travel industry to get the most for our client. If we don't perform the service together, if we don't get that little extra something for the client, if we don't come up with that nugget, that little bit of something new, what would a client need us for? People