Developing an Eye for Detail
“It’s the little details that are vital. Little things make big things happen.” ~John Wooden
The Grand Cypress Resort, a 5-Star Hyatt Hotel, is committed to providing their customers with high quality results. When I was training to be a first-time property manager there the term having an eye for detail was new for me.
I remember being in the office with two of my fellow project managers, both with several more years of experience than I, as we reviewed published photos of the resort. They were brutal in their discussion of the photos. They criticized the flawed shape of the tree rings, the uneven quality of turf grass, along with all the tiny flaws they could find. At first, I thought they were just being negative, but they really were not. As project managers of a 5-star resort our job was to produce visual perfection for the guests staying at the resort, which in turn contributed to a high-quality guest experience worthy of a 5-Star property.
Because leadership can be found in the details, I started an accelerated leadership class on “Developing an Eye for Detail.” I have discovered most employees don’t learn this skill until the job in front of them requires it. Some leaders fail to teach their staff to recognize issues with detail and get frustrated when they miss them. For most employees it is a matter of having them adjust their eyes from viewing big to small and that’s where the needed training comes in.
There are many reasons to train staff to have an eye for detail, but here are my top three:
Because you want your staff to see and fix the flaws before the customer sees them. If a customer notices an issue before our staff does, we have let it go too long. In the class we make it clear what needs to be addressed and when. Staff are trained in what to look for and how to fix it to a standard of excellence, and then they are empowered to take care of it.
Because you want excellent visual consistency across the entire property. I need my leadership to match quality of work across all our 1000 acres. We have our standard of excellence in place, we talk about it often, do training classes, and then discuss it again in our weekly team meetings. When everyone knows and understands the expectations, accountability increases and people embrace the high standards. We need all our leaders to see and coach the standards.
While some organizations wait for work orders to come into their department before they respond, I want our team to be pro-active and address it before anyone notices it or asks us to fix it. When I first started working on a college campus, we got work orders asking us to mow the grass. Ugh, that had to change, and it did. We became pro-active, performing to our standards, before anyone else noticed the need.
Because having an eye for detail will tremendously aid in determining a teams’ priorities. Once we all know that having litter on the grounds is not our standard it becomes a top priority. We begin to see it and when we see it, we address it then – not later in the week. If there is a bed of shrubs behind a building that needs some fresh mulch, maybe it can wait a few days, weeks or even months because it is not as high a priority as loose litter. Alignment in priorities and outcomes happens when leaders spend time with their team teaching them to have an eye for detail.
“It’s attention to detail that makes the difference between average and stunning.” ~Francis Atterbury
Go develop your eye for detail this week!
Jeff
