Last Saturday night was date night with my wife. My wife’s only criteria for a great date night is that we spend the time talking. That’s why I don’t get to see many movies. But it does give us a chance to spend an evening walking around the parks.
We spent the evening at Sea World Orlando. We’ve had annual passes since our anniversary two years ago and we decided to take advantage of another visit before they expired. The crowds were some of the strongest we have ever seen in the park. Part of that was due to some groups holding events at the park, and part of that was because of an annual autism event they host, which many in this community appreciate. All of their lots were filled to capacity, and parking was occurring along lawns and berms. We were really there to just enjoy the time with each other and have dinner. My preference was eating at Sea Fire Inn. I like the setting, and sometimes we enjoy the dueling piano performances, which were not listed to found when we were there that day. But we found that to be closed so we journeyed onto Voyagers, another buffet line experience found along the WaterFront at Sea World. It was close to 7 p.m. and the park was scheduled to close at 8 p.m.—astonishing since there were so many guests.
Just so you know, this is not a travel blog or a restaurant review. This is actually a great case study about what makes a restaurant good, better, or best. In the category of buffeteria eateries at theme parks this is probably a better choice than one you would find at most. The facility was fairly new. The food was fairly tasty, and the portions were sizeable. The price was not unreasonable, comparatively, for an Orlando park.
Even the people were working at their assigned task. And those I spoke with were either friendly or respectful. So what’s not to like? Well, out of four potential buffet lines, only one was opened. And there were some 50 people in line to purchase meals. My wait time from entering to the restaurant to the moment I sat down to eat
was more than 30 minutes.
Now the real question was why? Well it wasn’t due to a shortage of employees. There were some 15 of them from what I could tell, and that didn’t include any cooks or dishwashers that were in the back of the house. I had a good half hour to study the problem and it came to one conclusion—-the individual assigned to the task of preparing the main dishes was working alone. Unless you wanted some pizza (handled by another young person who frankly prepared pizza for less than 10 percent of the guests), this individual was responsible for taking your request, for preparing the dish and for providing it to you. There was no room to set out many entrees and let you choose one. Entrees were prepared by one person one at a time. And heaven forbid she ran out of Parmesan cheese for the pasta dish. She herself had to go get some more from the fridge. For that matter, she had to change out any of the other pans of food set out to be dished up.
She wasn’t working like there was no tomorrow. But she was no slouch either. She was very capable and focused on her work. But she needed help. And there were others who could have helped. One such example were the cashiers. There were three cashiers out there and no line for paying. The manager spent her time with the cashier. In 30 minutes of watching this one server, no one seemed to ask her if she needed any help, much less identified something that needed to be done and went to bat to support her.
Fortunately, for the wait involved, the guests seemed fairly patient, although I did see one example to the contrary. Toward the end of the buffet line I saw a bowl sitting with three watermelon slices eaten. I imagine that someone hungry had finished it long before they got to the end of the buffet line and decided to just leave it there rather than take it to the cashier and pay.
By the way, when I finally reached this server, the dish I was interested in was no longer available. They had run out. And no one had anticipated this so that more could be prepared.
I wish I could have interviewed everyone working there. I think the response would have been: “Well, that’s not my job. I’m supposed to be doing ____” And for the most part they were doing their assigned tasks. But doing their assigned tasks is not their real job. Their real job is to get guests great food at a great price in a timely manner. That’s different than doing a particular task like filling drinks or working the fryer. When one is focused on a result they work differently.
Great organizations focus on resultsÑnot tasks. What’s the difference?
Tasks are as follows:
• I do the dishes
• I cook the pizza
• I run the cash register
• I clean bathrooms and take out the trash
Results are as follows:
• Create great food
• Get Guests served as quickly as possible
• Keeping things as clean as possible
• Find ways to lower costs without impacting the above
When focused on results, employees assigned to tasks would be observing the line and then saying the following:
“Hey Luisa, if you could juggle desserts and salads, I’ll go over and support Barb in getting more people their dishes”
Or,
“Barb, as soon as I have these pizzas in the oven, I’ll run back into the kitchen to get you some more marinara sauce.”
Or,
“Could we get someone to close out or cash out on their register so that we could get someone over to help Barb?”
By the way I found the manager with the three on the register. Politely, I informed her that obtaining my food was a 30-minute event, and asked her why she only has one assigned to handling the main dishes. Politely, but defensively, she remarked that there should be more, that she would look into it, and get back with me. By the time I left upon completing my meal, she still didn’t return with a response. She may have been preoccupied with helping cashiers cash out. But clearly in her absence from the serving line, no one was focused on getting meals to guests sooner.
Again, I wondered what results she was responsible for attaining. How did they measure the length of time it took guests to get their meals. For instance, Disney hands you the red cards on the lanyard when you enter the queue for an attraction. This supports monitoring the length of time waiting to board an attraction.
The point of this is that critical to focusing on results is that you measure them. We often refer to this as a scorecard. Everyone must have not only access to the results, but must have them in a fairly immediate manner. Imagine playing a baseball or basketball game where only the coach knew the score. There were no scoreboard. You wouldn’t know the result until after the game was over.
Successful organizations are not only results-focused, they are measuring those results all the time. And the end result is improvement to the organization along the lines of those results. That I believe is the difference between better and best organizations. It’s the focus that every member of a team has on attaining the correct results on a continual basis.
I saw this play out the other day when I had a business group at Universal Studios Orlando. They could tell that something was better about the experience at Disney when they visited two days previous, but they couldn’t put their finger on it. We had just visited the Jaws attraction. Our guide, a young lady with enormous energy, was exciting and fun. The attraction, especially if you had not visited it before, was executed well. One individual who had never been on it shrieked when Jaws popped out at the end as a dead carcass. But it still wasn’t the best. It wasn’t Disney.
Together we analyzed it. The ride was fine. The pilot was fine. But her microphone was way too hot. Listening to her became painful toward the end of the ride. Worse, there were only four boats operating. There were some 100 guests in line. Our wait was short because we were staying at the Royal Pacific Resort, which allowed guests staying on the property to go to the front of the line. But the others were sitting for long periods waiting for the next boat to arrive. Unlike the Jungle Cruise which has several boats in tow ready for the next guest, there was nearly a five-minute gap between one boat and another. There was no sense of ownership on the part of the employees. They didn’t seem the least preoccupied with getting their boats back to the dock to be reloaded. I wondered what results they were focused on. I wondered if they chatted among themselves during the day about how to make the experience better. The sum total of the experience was still better than having gone to a Six Flags park, but it was not the best experience, like being at Disney.
That’s not to say that Disney is the best at everything. I was at the French Market Restaurant at Disneyland, and was frankly disappointed by the food, as well as how efficiently I was served. But Disneyland and Walt Disney World stand out as greater than most, most of the time, when its’ cast members are focused on attaining the following results:
• Being their personal bestÑthe friendliest, most knowledgeable, and attentive.
• Creating the best products and services possible, whether that’s a ride, a souvenir, or a meal
• Providing the finest setting possible
• Improving the processes that impact the guest experience
• Doing it at the best price possible.
What are your results? Are you result-focused or task-focused? Do you have a scorecard, and do all of your employees focus on attaining the results on that scorecard? It’s your opportunity to move from good to better, and from better to best. And that’s the magic behind the business.
