Speaker 1: You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stinovic on Bloomberg Radio. All Right,
Speaker 1: I don't know about all of you, but men, am
Speaker 1: I I'm done big news flow as we just Charlie
Speaker 1: breaking down the earnings we just did with our TV colleagues,
Speaker 1: and I am ready for a nice night out on
Speaker 1: a restaurant, at a restaurant, I'm just gonna say. Will Gadara,
Speaker 1: founder of Hospitality Company, Thank You, also the author of
Speaker 1: the new book Unreasonable Hospitality, The Remarkable Power of giving
Speaker 1: People more than they expect. People who live in the
Speaker 1: New York City area or follow restaurants closely also know
Speaker 1: him as the former co owner of eleven Madison Park
Speaker 1: and of the Nomad and the co founder of the
Speaker 1: Welcome Conference. It's an annual hospitality symposium. Will joins us
Speaker 1: on Zoom from New York. Well, how are you. I'm
Speaker 1: doing really well, guys, Thank you for having me. Well,
Speaker 1: the way I'm going to connect this to Amazon is
Speaker 1: your book has the subtitle the Remarkable power of giving
Speaker 1: people more than they expect, which Amazon certainly has done
Speaker 1: and it needs to continue to do. If it wants
Speaker 1: to get back from this, Um, how do does that?
Speaker 1: How has that played out in your career? Well? Well,
Speaker 1: and I actually have a different way to to equate
Speaker 1: it to Amazon, if I may, because the book Unreasonable Hospitality,
Speaker 1: what what the thesis of it is is that the
Speaker 1: US was a manufacturing economy were now a service economy,
Speaker 1: and dramatically so. And I believe we're on the precipice
Speaker 1: of becoming a hospitality economy because when I look at
Speaker 1: what people missed the most over the course of the pandemic,
Speaker 1: it was connection. And as we go into the uncertain
Speaker 1: financial times ahead, I think when people tighten their purse strings,
Speaker 1: the things that they will choose to spend their money
Speaker 1: on are those that bring a sense of connection. Um.
Speaker 1: Jeff Bezos was unreasonable in pursuit of building Amazon, right,
Speaker 1: I mean, like what he did to bring that company
Speaker 1: to life like it required profound relentlessness. Um. This book
Speaker 1: is my step by step guide on how to be
Speaker 1: just as unreasonable, but not in pursuit of product, in
Speaker 1: pursuit of people. Um. Well, can we talk unreasonable? Um? Well,
Speaker 1: because when you think about hospitality, you think about sledding
Speaker 1: in Central Park are filling a private dining room with sand.
Speaker 1: Tell us about that. I have yet to have that.
Speaker 1: That's pretty super but tell me about that. Well. So
Speaker 1: that was our endeavoring to be unreasonable with hospitality. We
Speaker 1: were a fine dining restaurant, right, were unreasonable in pursuit
Speaker 1: of the food we served. But if we could take
Speaker 1: hospitality up to that same notch, it would be pretty incredible.
Speaker 1: And so we started a program was called the dream
Speaker 1: Weaver program, where anytime we overheard something at a table,
Speaker 1: we tried to grab onto that and turn it into
Speaker 1: an extraordinary experience. Um the ones you're referencing, Or one
Speaker 1: time we overheard a table of four talking about how
Speaker 1: their kids were seeing at snow for the first time
Speaker 1: they were. They were in New York on vocation from Spain,
Speaker 1: and so the dream Weavers found a store still up
Speaker 1: and selling sleds at eight o'clock in a Friday night.
Speaker 1: When they left, there was an suv outside with the
Speaker 1: sleds in the back. To take an essential part, I'll
Speaker 1: give you one more. A couple of came and console
Speaker 1: themselves because they had a beach vacation and their flight
Speaker 1: was canceled, And so we heard them talk about that
Speaker 1: when they made the reservation, And so we turned our
Speaker 1: private dining room into their own beach to put a
Speaker 1: bunch of sand on the ground, a little kittie pool
Speaker 1: filled with water they could rest their toes into while
Speaker 1: they drowned their sorrows over tropical may ties. You know,
Speaker 1: we did all of that because here's the deal. Like,
Speaker 1: people are more inclined to collect experiences than things these days.
Speaker 1: But I believe that an experience is not worth collecting
Speaker 1: unless you give people a story that helps them relive
Speaker 1: that experience over and over again. Um, you know the
Speaker 1: other the other well, I just don't know. I was
Speaker 1: going to say the other thing that, like I think
Speaker 1: about when you guys were talking about Amazon and Apple,
Speaker 1: honestly is Amazon and with their focus on efficiency with
Speaker 1: giving things to people quickly, that efficiency has come at
Speaker 1: the expense of relationship. It's been part of the digital
Speaker 1: transformation where I think people right now are actually even
Speaker 1: find waiting a little bit longer if they feel some
Speaker 1: sort of emotional connection to the brand that they're being
Speaker 1: served by. I think that is the stickiness, right There's
Speaker 1: a stickiness with Apple because people like the way the
Speaker 1: product makes them feel but there's nothing that can make
Speaker 1: people feel good in a more profound way than the hospitality.
Speaker 1: So this book is me saying to every business out there,
Speaker 1: you can make the choice to be in the hospitality industry.
Speaker 1: And the book is where I kind of explain how
Speaker 1: to do that. Well. Well, late in the book, when
Speaker 1: you're talking about leadership, and there are a lot of
Speaker 1: leadership lessons in here. You you write about one of
Speaker 1: the biggest mistakes that you made of your career and
Speaker 1: you use that as sort of a story to talk
Speaker 1: about how leaders need to say their story. Um, share
Speaker 1: that with us. Yeah, So, you know, one of the
Speaker 1: struggles I have as a leader is the balance between
Speaker 1: control and trust. I am a perfectionist. You don't. You
Speaker 1: don't accomplish what we did without having a pretty resounding
Speaker 1: excellence reflex. And when you're when you're perfectionists, you try
Speaker 1: to control as many details as possible. But trust is
Speaker 1: where hospitality comes in, where you you empower your team
Speaker 1: to bring their most fully realized selves to the table.
Speaker 1: And we started a new menu and it was like
Speaker 1: really digging into the history of New York and the
Speaker 1: culture of the city. And I wanted every course to
Speaker 1: be explained in just the way that I wanted the
Speaker 1: guests to hear about them, and I ended up giving
Speaker 1: the team like a script to follow, and the result
Speaker 1: was a completely inauthentic experience where the servers instead of
Speaker 1: becoming hospitality professionals, they were actors. And we got ripped
Speaker 1: in our first review where I mean the New York
Speaker 1: Times said it was the meal is like a stayer
Speaker 1: hosted by Presbyterians. And this is where you were going.
Speaker 1: Is too many leaders try to pretend that they didn't
Speaker 1: make a mistake in hopes that the world will forget
Speaker 1: that they made one, Whereas the best form of leadership
Speaker 1: is to stand up in front of your table when
Speaker 1: you lead them astray and to apologize for your missteps.
Speaker 1: Because the best way to run a great organization is
Speaker 1: to normalize a culture of feedback. And the best way
Speaker 1: to get people to be inclined to receive criticism from
Speaker 1: you is if you're just as willing to stand up
Speaker 1: and criticize yourself. You do say in your book, you
Speaker 1: know thirty minutes a day can completely transform your culture,
Speaker 1: or you at least think about it this way. How So,
Speaker 1: because I think what you talk about ends up very
Speaker 1: quickly becoming what the team thinks about UM. In restaurants
Speaker 1: every day the narrative, but we'll inspire the narrative, I
Speaker 1: think is perhaps how I'd articulated. You know, in restaurants,
Speaker 1: every day, right before we open our door, we have
Speaker 1: a thirty minute meeting with our team where and every
Speaker 1: restaurant does this, but many it's when you go over
Speaker 1: the new dishes, the new glasses of wine. You know,
Speaker 1: when health insurance enrollment is. I always used it as
Speaker 1: an opportunity not just to talk about the what, but
Speaker 1: the why, to share moments of inspiration, to invite the
Speaker 1: team to do the same, to make it a moment
Speaker 1: where we focused on why the work we were doing matter,
Speaker 1: the impact we could have, and why we should all
Speaker 1: be proud and encouraged to bring all of ourselves to it. UM.
Speaker 1: I believe that if every customer service organization, every bank branch,
Speaker 1: every rental car center, if they just spent thirty minutes
Speaker 1: or even fifteen minutes a day getting their team together
Speaker 1: and talking about the opportunity they collectively have to make
Speaker 1: a positive impact on people's lives. Customer service as we
Speaker 1: know it would be revel luctionized. I I mean, I
Speaker 1: would love to somebody who spends a lot of time
Speaker 1: on hold. You know, I think we all we all
Speaker 1: are it's very difficult to talk to a human. I mean,
Speaker 1: do you think the market incentives are aligned for this?
Speaker 1: Because think about what we just talked about leading into
Speaker 1: you what investors focus on right focusing on costant Amazon,
Speaker 1: They're focusing on top line growth or what the top
Speaker 1: line looks like. They're focusing on how many iPhones were sold.
Speaker 1: I mean, how how do you make that? Very briefly,
Speaker 1: will I talked about that and like how the markets
Speaker 1: not aligned necessarily? Well, I think the market is aligned
Speaker 1: because at the end of the day, it does come
Speaker 1: down to numbers. And I believe if you run this
Speaker 1: your business in this way, it translates to the numbers.
Speaker 1: I mean, listen, I'm sure the two of you have
Speaker 1: examples of places or times you've been somewhere where they've
Speaker 1: made you feel so good, and those are the places
Speaker 1: that you will go to over and over and over again.
Speaker 1: Does it require incremental um additional cost to bring a
Speaker 1: culture of hospitality to life? Do I believe? And does
Speaker 1: my experience prove out the thesis that those costs result
Speaker 1: in exponentially higher revenue. Yeah. Absolutely, and the profits go
Speaker 1: up dramatically because of that. Well, and I think that,
Speaker 1: And that's a great point to end on, right, because
Speaker 1: if you do this right, ultimately you want want some payoff.
Speaker 1: If you will, hey, well we gotta run. Good luck
Speaker 1: with the book Will Goodar, he's founder hospitality Company. Thank
Speaker 1: you his book Unreasonable Hospitality, so be sure to check
Speaker 1: that out.