Use Ritz Carlton’s “Wow” Story Approach to Remind Employees of the Importance of their Work and…

Ritz Carlton is probably the best example of an employer who consistently uses storytelling to inspire and remind employees what excellence looks  like.

In this excerpt from the program Ritz Carlton’s Diana Oreck and I did at the ERE Conference  titled Strengthening Your Talent Acquisition, Onboarding, and Employee Engagement Strategy Through Storytelling, Diana shares an example of the wonderful “Wow” Stories Ritz Carlton managers share during their daily line-ups. Each week, two of the daily line-ups include such stories.

Sharing stories of customer service excellence as well as other stories that illustrate employee excellence accomplishes several important objectives.

1. They provide inspiration – When people hear stories of excellence, it inspires them to be their best.
2. They recognize and demonstrate appreciation for greatness — Recognition and appreciation are two of the most powerful human motivators. Sharing stories of employees doing great things addresses both human needs.
3. They communicate your Behavioral Vision in a clear and compelling way – Your Behavioral Vision consists of the employee behaviors that make your Vision, your Mission, your Brand Promise, and your business goals possible. When you share stories of excellent customer service in action, you reinforce your vision of what great customer service looks like. When you share stories of employees engaging in behaviors that make your Vision, Mission, Brand Promise and business goals possible, you create a clear “Line of Sight” between their actions and performance and your business goals. This helps them understand exactly how they can contribute the most effectively to your organization’s success.
4. They increase the likelihood such greatness will be repeated — Because what gets  noticed and appreciated gets repeated, sharing Wow Stories increases the odds that other employees will engage in such behaviors.
5. They foster pride — Employees–especially A Players–want to be proud of where they work. Sharing “Wow” Stories helps remind people they are part of a great team.
6. They keep employees connected to a sense of meaning and purpose – By sharing stories of employees doing great things and the impact of what they do, it helps them infuse their daily work with a sense of meaning and purpose. This is HUGE both in terms of employee engagement and in employee resilience. Employees are far more resilient, they have a far greater capacity to deal with stress and challenge, when they feel like what they do makes a difference in the world.

So you don’t have to scroll through the closing comments and questions again, here they are:

So…how will you use stories to connect your employees to the difference their work makes?

How will you share customer stories with your employees, so you infuse their work with greater meaning and purpose?

How will you capture and share stories that communicate your Behavioral Vision of what equals “Wow” customer service and expands your employees’ perspective on how to create  memorable, brand-building experiences?

Capture customer stories.

Share them.

Inspire your employees.

Build a stronger brand.