I was part of a group from the Martin Prosperity Institute (MPI) at the University of Toronto, that had the opportunity & pleasure to tour the head office and the Toronto flag ship hotel on Avenue Road of the Four Seasons Hotel and Resort chain. I always like to see how a business functions behind the scenes.
Four Seasons is rated as one of the best employers in Canada and it shows. Both the president and COO Kathleen Taylor and VP Ellen Du Bellay, were quite open and candid about their challenges, mistakes (far and few in between) and successes (more numerous). It was stressed several times that they hire for attitude and train for skills. Rotations from hotel to hotel and country to country for middle managers are encouraged and this adds to the diversity of ideas and sharing of best practices from around the world. They have the lowest staff turnover rate in the hotel industry and the best break even-occupancy rates for luxury hotels.
During our morning-long meetings with senior management, middle management and front line hotel staff, many people rattled off industry-first practices (best practices) that were invented and fostered at Four Seasons. One manager estimated that the return rate of guests for Toronto is about 30-40% , which should help Four Season’s weather the current financial slowdown better then other hotel chains.
Just like Ford in Brazil, Four Seasons has a common cafeteria at head office where all employees eat and interact discussing ideas and challenges.
At the end of the hotel tour, when we were walking through housekeeping, one person in our group asked. What does housekeeping do with all the used soap and shampoos what are left in bathrooms every day? Without a moment of hesitation, one of the housekeeping staff who overheard the question, proudly volunteered the answer…I can answer that--we donate it to homeless shelters in Toronto Kudos to Four Seasons for promoting a culture of innovation that includes all staff and not just managers
The current issue of Harvard Business Review has an article called How to spot innovators and help them flourish (hat tip to Gray Hammond for alerting us)
Corporate Americabemoans a lack of innovative talent, but it methodically smothers creative spark, say the leadership consultants who wrote this paper. "Even when stellar external talent comes in, it is frequently drawn into the same anti-innovation culture that has been squelching internal talent," they write. Their research at Reuters, Pitney Bowes, Visa and other companies that foster creativity well suggests ways to identify true innovators and nurture their genius
As our economy increases the proportion of creative class workers and service class workers, we have to pay attention to a new set of forward-looking anticipatory skills and not just hindsight skills such as problem solving. These include sense-making, opportunity recognition, and overtly teaching lateral and critical thinking skills.
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