Four SeasonsHotels and
Resorts
Las Vegas10 June 2000
Brand Inside
Brand Org!
And Now the Equivalent …
White Collar Revolution!
RR on “Assetless” [J.B.] Sara Lee
“The most profitable businesses in the future will act as knowledge brokers, linking insights into what’s available
with insights into the customer’s individual needs
and preferences.”
The “&-!!+#$% in the middle”*
Jim Clark on Healtheon/WebMD
* ’twixt docs, patients, insurers and providers; $275B of $400B in waste; source: Michael
Lewis, The New New Thing
Buzzsaw.com
Builders, Owners, Architects, Contractors, Suppliers
$4T industry
5,300 commercial bldg. projects’ specs on-line; +70 per day
These are …
L.A.D.T.I.R.S.*
*Life-and-death-total-industry-reinvention-struggles
Brand Inside
Brand Talent!
Issue Y2K
The Great War for Talent!
“When land was the scarce resource, nations battled
over it. The same is happening now for talented people.”
Stan Davis & Christopher Meyer, futureWEALTH
“The leaders of Great Groups love talent and know where to find it. They revel in the talent of others.” Warren Bennis & Patricia Ward Biederman
John Chambers
Gets It!
So Does Lucent!
Every resume or employment question that comes to Lucent via
the Web gets answered in 30 minutes or less. [24/7.]
Red Herring [06.00], on Lucent Director of
Recruitment Jim Baughman
“Our business needs a massive transfusion of talent. And talent, I believe, is most likely to be found among non-conformists, dissenters and rebels.” David Ogilvy
What Do We Do With Him?
“He grew his hair long, played guitar in a rock band, chased
girls, got into trouble. At age 17 he was flogged by his house
master, who described him as ‘the most difficult boy I’ve ever
had to deal with.’ ”
Elect Him Prime Minister
Tony Blair*
*talk/May 2000
Talent War Y2K!
–All out!/ Time consuming!–Never ending!/ Unwinnable!–Includes everybody!/ Everybody’s
game! (“We’re all in sales.”)–Expensive!–Cool!/ WOW!/ Fun!/ Creative!–Strategic!/ Core competence!
H.R. to H.E.D. ???
HumanEnablement Department
“Firms will not ‘manage the careers’ of their employees. They
will provide opportunities to enable the employee to develop
identity and adaptability and
thus be in charge of his or her own career.”
Tim Hall et al., “The New Protean Career Contract”
Talent = Brand
Brand Outside
Context:
No “Commodities”!
Quality Not Enough!
“While everything may be better, it is also increasingly
the same.”
Paul Goldberger on retail, “The Sameness of Things,” The New York Times
“The ‘surplus society’ has a surplus of similar companies, employing similar
people, with similar educational backgrounds, coming up with similar ideas, producing similar things, with similar prices and similar quality.”
Kjell Nordstrom and Jonas Ridderstrale, Funky Business
The “10X/10X Phenomenon”
10 Times Better/
10 Times Less Different
“Customer Satisfaction” to “Customer “Success”
“We’re getting better at [Six Sigma] every day. But we really
need to think about the customer’s profitability. Are customers’
bottom lines really benefiting from what we provide them?”
Bob Nardelli, GE Power Systems
[Old view: Out of service 9 days. 4 days are transport, which is client
responsibility.
New view: ALL 9 DAYS ARE OUR RESPONSIBILITY! Why? 9 days =
Client’s world.]
Source: Steve Kerr
Four Seasons Hotel Las Vegas
MY STAY HAS BEEN LOUSY!
YOUR PROBLEM: A GROTESQUE START. To wit: 1 hour, 7 minutes in an airport cab line @ 10:30 P.M.
(1:30 A.M. EDT)
Fact:
You are responsible, in my mind,
for … THE TURNKEY TRAVEL EXPERIENCE … and I don’t discriminate among
who provides what.
Brand Outside
Strategy 1:
Lead the Customer!
“Wealth in this new regime flows directly from innovation, not
optimization. That is, wealth is not gained by perfecting the known,
but by imperfectly seizing the unknown.”
Kevin Kelly, New Rules for the New Economy
Amen!
“The Age of the Never Satisfied
Customer”Regis McKenna
P.S.: I loved having a Printer in my Hyatt Regency Buffalo room the night before last. Hint: Fax
machines [in the room] are seriously Old Economy, a cute anachronism which demos that
you don’t get it.
An Office Away From Home …
Easy physical access to plugs and phone jacks [Marriott?]
Ergonomically correct chair & desk[Nobody?]
High speed phone access [Nobody?]
Multiple [preferably 3] phone linesPrinter [Hyatt]
Brand Outside
Strategy 2:
Use E-Commerce
to Re-invent the Business!
?????
$35,000,000.
Dell’s Web sales … daily
Tomorrow Today: Cisco!
90% of $14.4BSave $500M (service and tech
support)
C.Sat e >> C.Sat H
Welcome to
D.I.Y. Nation!“Changes in business processes will emphasize self service. Your costs as
a business go down and
perceived service goes up because customers are conducting it
themselves.” Ray Lane, Oracle
Anne Busquet/ American Express
Not: “Age of the Internet”
Is: “Age of Customer Control”
“In the network economy, the Website becomes the company’s primary interface to the customer.
The user interface becomes the marketing materials, store front,
store interior, sales staff and post-sales support all rolled into one.”
Jakob Nielsen, Designing Web Usability
“Where does the Internet rank in priority?
It’s No. 1, 2, 3, and 4.” Jack Welch
“Banking is
necessary. Banks are not.”
Dick Kovacevich, Norwest/ Wells
Q: Will 90% of business meetings disappear in the
next 5 to 15 years?
A: It’s not a stupid question.
Brand Outside
Strategy 3:
Women Rule!
?????????
Home Furnishings … 94%Vacations … 92%
Houses … 91%Bank Account … 89%
Health Care … 75%Etc.
$3.3T + $1.5T = $4.8T*
* Larger than Japan!
48% working wives > 50%80% checks
61% bills53% stock (mutual fund boom)
43% > $500K95% financial decisions/
29% single handed
Yeow!
1970 … 1%
2002 … 50%
OPPORTUNITY
NO. 1!
Read This Book …
EVEolution: The Eight Truths of Marketing to Women
Faith Popcorn & Lys Marigold
“Men and women don’t think the same way, don’t communicate the same
way, don’t buy for the same reasons.
“He simply wants the transaction to take place. She’s interested in creating a relationship. Every place women go,
they make connections.”
EVEolution: Truth No. 1
Connecting Your Female Consumers to Each
Other Connects Them to Your Brand
“The ‘Connection Proclivity’ in women starts early. When asked,
‘How was school today?’ a girl usually tells her mother every
detail of what happened, while a boy might grunt, ‘Fine.’ ”
EVEolution
Weight Watchers International “Model”
“What if ExxonMobil or Shell dipped into their credit card database to help commuting women
interview and make a choice of car pool partners?”
“What if American Express made a concerted effort to connect up female empty-nesters
through on-line and off-line programs, geared to help women re-enter the workforce with today’s
skills?”
EVEolution
27 March 2000: email to TP from Shelley Rae Norbeck
“I make 1/3rd more money than my husband does. I have as much financial
‘pull’ in the relationship as he does. I’d say this is also true of most of my women
friends. Someone should wake up, smell the coffee and kiss our asses long enough
to sell us something! We have money to
spend and nobody wants it!”
Who “Gets It”?
Nobody??Wyndham??
Speaking of Enormous
[Missed] [Huge] Opportunities ...
74/55
“At each stage of their lives, the needs and desires of the baby
boomers have become the dominant concerns of American business and popular culture. If you can anticipate
the movement of the baby-boom generation’s life-span migration, you
can see the future.”Ken Dychtwald, Age Wave
Aging/“Elderly”
2X growth rate$$$$$$$$$$$$
“I’m in charge!”
Good source: Ken Dychtwald, Age Wave
Priorities: Aging/“Elderly”
Experiences … Convenience … Comfort
… Access … Respect!
Brand Outside
Strategy 4:
Design Rules!
“Design is treated like a religion at BMW.”
Fortune (10/98)
Design as Soul
“We don’t have a good language to talk about this kind of thing. In most people’s
vocabularies, design means veneer. … But to me, nothing could be further from the
meaning of design. Design is the fundamental soul of a
man-made creation.”Steve Jobs
“My favorite word is grace –
whether it’s amazing grace,
saving grace, grace under fire,
Grace Kelly. How we live contributes to beauty – whether it’s how we treat other people or
the environment.”
Celeste Cooper, designer
Please …
FRESH AIR!
Brand Outside
Strategy 5:
It’s the Experience!
“Experiences are as distinct from services as services are from
goods.”Joseph Pine & James Gilmore, The
Experience Economy: Work Is Theater & Every Business a Stage
“The [Starbucks] Fix” Is on …
“We have identified a ‘third place.’ And I really believe that sets us apart. The third place is
that place that’s not work or home. It’s the place our
customers come for refuge.”Nancy Orsolini, District Manager
Experience: “Rebel Lifestyle!”
“What we sell is the ability for a 43-year-old accountant to dress in black leather, ride through small towns and have people be afraid
of him.”
Harley exec, quoted in Results-based Leadership
“The deepest human need is
the ... NEED TO BE APPRECIATED.”
William James
“It was much later that I realized Dad’s secret. He gained respect by giving it. He talked and listened to the fourth-
grade kids in Spring Valley who shined shoes the same way he talked and listened to a bishop or a college
president. He was seriously interested in who you were and what you had to
say.”
Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot, Respect
Oxymoron: Respect from an Airline!
I can cope with delays. I cannot cope with lies … especially Sins
of Omission.
IT IS DISRESPECTFUL TO ME AS A HUMAN BEING!
5:47 “Amber light, back to you in a coupla minutes”
6:00 NO WORD YET6:08 “Be about ten minutes …
I know it’s hot in here …
it’s not our fault”GAP = 21 MINUTES
[All’s NOT well that “ends well”][21 minute “gap” SUCKS]
The Ultimate “Win”/Compliment
“It’s good to be home.”
TP to Concierge @ ???????????
Four Seasons Chicago
A League of Their Own!
WashingtonChicagoLondon
BostonPhiladelphia
Other B.I.P.s
Hotel Plaza Athenee Gidleigh Park [B.I.U.]
R.C. Laguna Niguel, rm21XXR.C. McQuarrie(?) St/Sydney
The Oberoi/New DelhiRaffles
The Oriental/BangkokCiragan Palace Hotel/Kempinski-Istanbul, rm258
L’Hotel/ParisHotel Hana Maui
Las Brisas/AcapulcoHay Adams, rooms overlooking the White House
(“Best Caesar Salad,” night chef only)One Devonshire Gardens/Glasgow
Almost anything in the Preferred Hotels & Resorts Worldwide
Some W.I.P.s
The Breakers[A league of its own!]
Hotel del CoronadoThe Windsor [Melbourne]Brown’s [great High Tea,
but hopelessly creaky & cranky]
Hotel Plaza Athenee
Really Know Me!![And, subsequently, I know their staff.]
Love My Kids!! [Roller blade from street to elevator]Fuss over Susan as much as me!!!
[And know her last name is Sargent!] Get the “little” preferences right.
[USA Today, water for tea] [You supposedly do]NOT PRETENTIOUS OR PRECIOUS!
[But, still, serve their full share of blue hairs.]
The Good Old [Calmer] Days …
The Kidney Stone Moment!
BOBOS In Paradise/David Brooks
“It’s been easy to distinguish between the bourgeois world of capitalism and the bohemian world of counterculture. The bourgeois were the square, practical ones. The bohemians were the free spirits who flouted conventions. But now it was impossible to tell an espresso-sipping
artist from a cappuccino-gulping banker. It became clear that I was observing a cultural
consequence of the information age. …
The people who thrive in this period are the ones who can turn ideas and emotions into products.
These are highly educated folk who have one foot in the bohemian world of creativity and another foot in the bourgeois realm of worldly success. The members of the new information elite are bourgeois bohemians. Or, to take the first two
letters of each word, they are Bobos. These Bobos define our age. They are the new elite. Their hybrid culture is the atmosphere we all
breathe. Their status codes now govern social life.”
Criticism No. 1:
Billy C. doesn’t phase me, but …
I am [frequently] intimidated by the 4S.
Wish List
Calm but not lifelessFriendly but not cloyingUnderstated elegance
“Comfy” [physical, mental]FRESH AIR!
The Right to Be Left AloneWIRED! [Brown’s]
Responsive/Magical Moments [e.g. roller blades in London]
24 hr room service [PCS @ Philly]24 hour health club access [rare!]
Brand Outside
BRAND POWER!
Brand It! Now, More Than Ever!
“The increasing difficulty in differentiating between products and
the speed with which competitors take
up innovations will assist in the rise and rise of the brand.”
Gillian Law and Nick Grant, Management [New Zealand]
06.08.00
Colonial Williamsburg
Scott Bedbury/ Nike, Starbucks
“A Great Brand taps into emotions. Emotions drive most, if not all, of our decisions. A brand reaches out with a powerful connecting experience. It’s an
emotional connecting point that transcends the product.
“A Great Brand is a story that’s never completely told. A brand is a metaphorical story that
connects with something very deep - a fundamental appreciation of mythology.
Stories create the emotional context people need to locate themselves in a larger experience.”
“We are in the twilight of a society based on data. As information and intelligence become the domain of computers, society will place more value on the one human ability that cannot be automated: emotion.
Imagination, myth, ritual - the language of emotion - will affect everything from our purchasing decisions
to how we work with others. Companies will thrive on the basis of their stories and
myths. Companies will need to understand that their products are less important than their stories.”
Rolf Jensen, Copenhagen Institute for Future Studies
Brand = You Must Care!
“Success means never letting the competition define you. Instead you have to define
yourself based on a point of view you care deeply about.”
Tom Chappell, Tom’s of Maine
“Create a Cause, not a ‘business.’ ”
Gary Hamel, Fortune (06.00), on re-inventing a company (Exemplar #1:
Charles Schwab)
Top Threats to the 4S Brand
Complacency! (Success Kills!)
Growth/Bureaucracy! (An EVP S.O.U.B.?)
Failure to reinforce the CultureTalent Drain (Pay the price!!)
Niche ChallengersChanging “Demographics”
(Bobos, Women, Gen X)
The Web (the DEATH of business meetings)
Message …
Personal service firms are exceedingly fragile
And exceedingly stuck in their ways
Brand Leadership
Passion Rules!
Brand Leadership!
“A key – perhaps the key – to leadership is the effective
communication of a story.”
Howard Gardner Leading Minds: An Anatomy of Leadership
“Leadership is a performance. You have to be
conscious of your behavior, because everybody else is.”
Carly Fiorina
Brand Leadership:ENTHUSIASM RULES!
“I am a dispenser of enthusiasm”/ Ben
Zander
Ann Richards’ Dogma
Show up!
Know your message!
PUT YOURSELF AT RISK EVERY DAY!
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