The Story of How One Bad Employee Harmed a Bank's Reputation (Told by the Ritz-Carlton's Founder)

On this episode of Our American Stories, Ritz-Carlton founder Horst Schulze reshaped how service and hospitality are defined in business. Here's Horst with a short story on how great service wins, excellence prevails, and bad service can ruin a business. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:10):
This is Lee Habib and this is Our American Stories,
the show where America is the star and the American people.
And to search for the Our American Stories podcast, go
to the iHeartRadio app, to Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
get your podcasts. Up next, a story by Horse Schultzi,

(00:31):
who is the co founder of the Rich Carlton Hotel
and knows more about customer's customers service and how to
really take care of business. When it comes to taking
care of customers, nobody, nobody is better. Here's Horse to
tell the story about what he taught a bank about
its own customer service. Here's Horse.

Speaker 2 (00:55):
You define yourself, if you know, and I'll forgive me
anybody who does it. But let me tell you. If you,
as a young man spike your hair a Colum Crean
and look like a bumb you're defining yourself as a bum. Period.
You know. Forgive me, but that's a fact. You define

(01:16):
yourself and it's up to you. But you define. I'm
not telling you what you have to do, but understand,
you define yourself every moment. I tell the story about
the bank in the book, and I lived in Chicago
and I knew the bank very well. The advertise I've
never been in the bank. But in the meantime I
was have started here in Atlanta. I was invited by them,

(01:40):
by that bank to talk to the three hundred manager.
And I'll forget it about customer service, costomer satisfaction service,
because the day before I still have my apartment that
was try to rent. And when the look at the
apartment go around again, I knew them well. They advertised

(02:01):
service all the time on the radio station I've sat
in my car. But the day before I thought, gee,
I've never been in that bag. Tomorrow somebody is bound
to say, have you been in our bank? And I'd
better be able to say yes. So I went to
that bank. Now, walking into this outside the building already magnificent,

(02:23):
stately and you walk in, I mean marble floor, marble pillars,
You can feel the money all around you. It is
very impressive, very wow. And all the way over there
a long counter to tell us and in front of
the maze. So I walk into the maze. Now what
is service? We have to establish here of what is service?

(02:45):
One more time? It starts with welcome, compliant to the visious,
and farewell that service. Welcome, comply, farewell. What's the expectation
of the customer when they're coming by anything? We must
understand that you or I or anybody has the same
subconscious expectation no matter what you buy, if it is

(03:10):
legal service or a bottle of order, or a car
or radio, you have the same subconscious expectations. You want
no defect, You want your product to be right. You
want timeliness. You don't want to wait for your bottle
of order. You wonder when you want it, and you
want the people who give it to you to be

(03:31):
nice to you. Those are the three things that so
if I know as an as a business, this is
what people expect from me. I build processes to deliver it.
So I'm in the enemies. No, not long, I'm timeliness.
Now I'm number one. I look left and somebody on

(03:55):
the ryon screams next. That was the first step of service.
I come to her teller was a woman. By the
way men are usually worse in service. Was a lady.
As I reached her teller, she looks down, finishes some transaction.
From one second or two, I see her face. I

(04:16):
don't know how see she doesn't know me. But when
she looked up. It was very clear that she hated me,
and she said, yes, yes, I said, just one change
fifty dollars. She exercised, and she said ten twenty forty
five to fifty. Next, and look at my product. My
change is a product, not defect. The timeliness was good,

(04:43):
but the individual service was non existent. What could she
have done? She could have said, the next gentlemen please
come to tell her. Welcome, sir, how may I help you?
Just want to change fifty dollars? That's my pleasure, ten
twenty forty five to fifty, have a wonderful day paying.

(05:03):
What happened to me, I was dissatisfied. Or there could
have been a third way of serving me. She could
have said, the next gentleman, please, when I come to
her teller. Ideally she would have called me welcome, mister Schultze.
Now in this case she would not my name. I
understand that, but that is the ideal service, personalized Welcome,

(05:25):
missus Shultzer, how may I help you? Just want to
change fifty dollars. Ideally she would have sent ten twenty
forty five and here are four coined five coins, because
I know you collect coins. Individualized to me. Now that
is great service. Then I would have moved immediate to
a level of trust and loyalty. But what should she do?

(05:50):
She did the first thing that I explained, she said next,
and she treated me as if she was angry that
I was there. So what did I do For the
next fifteen years? I used them for an examples as
lousy service. What happened here? She defined the bank, she

(06:16):
defined her fellow workers. That can't happen. You can't let
that happen in an organization that one employed defines you.
And I didn't say Susie mistreated me. I said that
bank as a poor bank.

Speaker 1 (06:35):
And thanks to Greg Hengler for the production and editing
on the storytelling, and a special thanks to Horse Schultzy
for sharing his wisdom with us. Excellence Wins, a no
nonsense guide to becoming the best in a world of
compromise is his book. By the way, we have a
bunch of stories by Horst on our website. Go to

(06:55):
Ouramerican Stories dot com and just type in his name.
Just put to Hrst and you'll get story after story,
including his life story, which is a stemliner and a
real beauty about the American dream and about excellence and
it's so hard to find these days. When you can

(07:16):
just be really good at something, it stands out the
story of how to treat people. Porse Schultze here on
Our American Stories. Liehibibe here the host of Our American Stories.
Every day on this show, we're bringing inspiring stories from

(07:38):
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