Legendary Founder of The Ritz Carlton: My Employees Are My Closest Neighbor

This is Lee Habib, and this is Our American Stories, the show where America is the star and the American people. And we love to hear your stories. You’re the hour in Our American Stories. Send them to OurAmericanStories.com. There are some of our favorites, and one of our favorite recurring types of stories to tell is the story of founders—of people who start things, who have the courage and the desire to do so. And it is no simple thing to do. And we don’t spend nearly enough time in this country talking about people who start things. Today, we’re going to tell the story of a legend and leader in the hotel world, Horst Shultzi, and how he reshaped how service and hospitality are defined in the business world that have become world-famous throughout the years. Chelsea worked for both Hilton Hotels and Hyatt Hotels Corporation before becoming one of the founding members of the luxury hotel chain The Rich Carlton in 1983. Cost is also a Christian and tries his best to live by his faith at home and at work. Here’s a story of how he deals with and thinks about his employees, his company, and the founding vision of The Rich Carlton.

We, particularly in our industry, we hire because our industry has over 100 percent turnover. They’re constantly open chops in a hotel, and these chops have to be filled. So what do we do, will we higher? And we said, “Finally, we’re not going to do that. We’re going to select. We’re going to suffer through the open chop until we have somebody who actually fits into it.” By the way, we went to the point it took an average of ten interviews before we filled the job, including dishwashers, but we didn’t fill them. And then, of course, so we selected. We created a profile around each job category and then hired against this profile. Below that was the talent really needed.

For this job.

So that was the selection. So we went into major, careful selecting. Kind of a funny example here is Dorman. Well, we found after we were working, and we interviewed our five top dormen, that they had all one thing in common:

Their hobby was gardening.

Now, wow. But in other words, they like to be outside and the do. But what would we have done in hiring somebody? We probably would have liked somebody that loves computer work in a room somewhere by himself, and we put me in as a Dorman and vice versa.

But so we did selection, and done.

Of course, orientation, and that was one of the keys again of our success. Absolutely. And I’m absolutely sellous about that.

That the orientation.

When I see orientation being done. And nearly every company is totally wrong.

What happens most of the time? Most of.

The time: the new employee—and let’s say it’s so hotel, it could be any, any business. The bid, the manager, the department had, makes a “we’re a team” speech, which is pretty pathetic. It happens everywhere. “We’re a team here.” And done. And done. What—what is a team? A team is a group of people who help each other toward a common goal, objective, vision. But that’s not being. The vision is not. The goal is not being given.

Just, “we’re a team.”

And so Bill, the new vadera. Now, after the team speech, the boss said, “Now, Bill, worked with Joe over here because Joe knows the ropes,” which is really funny because you’re not in a raw business. But somehow he knows ropes, and we turn them over. And Joe, the Vida, does their nine months and knows the rope, tells Bill, the new Vada, on the way to the kitchen, “This company is not good.”

That’s his orientation. What do we possibly expect from that employee?

It’s crazy. We did our orientation. We went so far as to the first day. Orientation has to happen the first day because that is when people are willing to change their behavior, because it’s the first day to work. Is a significant emotion event when you can impact behavior.

So, we didn’t do it the second day.

The first day, and so far that when we needed a certain job to be filled, and we found an ideal a candidate, we offered a job to the candidate, but he couldn’t come to work until the day of orientation, but we paid them. The first day had to be oriented; and the first day we talked about who we are, what is do we, how do we treat guests, how do we say hello?

Where are we going? What is the dream of this organization?

We invited them to be part of the dream, not part of the function. We hired them and oriented them to be part of a dream, the vision of the company, to be the leader in the in the service industry in the world—in our case.

Join this dream.

But we connected to the motive of the dream also, the first day. And here’s why we dream about that—because that will create respect for all of us. We connected ours to them. That creates opportunity for all of us. That creates armor for all of us; that creates we define ourselves that way together. That creates more income for all of us. So, that’s why you have to join this dream. Adam Smith, and wrote the book Besides Wealth of Nation, where he identified that people cannot relate or to orders and direction.

And what do we do?

We give orders and direction all they long. He said, “People can only relate to object, even motive, vision, and motive. Bank book.” There’s Adam Smith. And by the way, Aristartled wrote that in order to be fulfilled in life, you need purpose and belong. Well, the vision is a purpose that we give people. Why would we give him that?

Here’s why.

And they can buy in, right? Just given the direction you tell them why and paying the buy in, so it becomes a total different relationship as you will, and totally different buy in, and a total, again, total different alignment because they know why. They don’t know, don’t just know you because what does a, what do some posts say?

“Why should I do that?” The answer: “Because.”

Wow, that’s how we treat human beings—that we treat our neighbors. We cannot get away from the fact if I’m a Christian, I cannot get away from the fact I cannot dismiss my employees or my costmers of not being my neighbors.

Come on, it’s kind of pretty said.

I have to give it at least sometimes thoughts: that I have to supposed to love my neighbor myself, and that incidentally they are enable us.

And a great job on the storytelling by Greg Hengler, and a special thanks to Horace Shultzy for sharing the story of The Rich Carlton, at least one part: which is how to hire and motivate folks, and he tells a compelling story about how to do so. By the way, his book, Excellence Wins: A No Nonsense Guide to Becoming the Best in a World of Compromise, is a must-read for anybody leading anybody, anywhere, and it all starts with vision casting and motivating folks to do their best. And my goodness, the other thing, clearly, if you’ve ever been to a Rich Carlton, is service and service to others, and having the mission of the company and the enterprise serving the customer, and not the customer serving the enterprise. By the way, I love the quote from Adam Smith: “People cannot relate to orders and direction. They respond to vision and to motive.” And no finer words could be said to hear. Some of the other Horse Shelty pieces, by the way, go to OurAmericanStories.com, including the terrific one about his life story, an immigrant story coming from Germany to the United States, well, to pursue his dream. And The Rich Carlton was not only his dream, but the tens of thousands of employees who work there. The story of Horse Shelty here on Our American Stories.