Last year, the leadership team at Wequassett Resort and Golf Club in Cape Cod decided it was time to take the resort to the next level. Forbes Travel Guide is the industry leader in service standards and best practices. As a reigning four-star property, Wequassett enlisted Forbes Executive Trainers to help to bring its team to the five-star level—there currently are only 67 five-star properties in the United States.
Program Details
Wequassett put together an aggressive training plan to help start the journey. The organization began by mixing more than 500 Forbes standards into its orientation and department-specific training. The Training team built micro-learning videos and daily informational sheets for every employee. Weekly department meetings were conducted to go over Forbes-specific standards the resort was falling short on.
To help identify areas for improvement, Wequassett invested in three full audits to be conducted by Forbes professional inspectors. These audits were strategically placed throughout the season. The inspectors produced extensive reports that included every name, place, and description of the experience after their two-day stay at the resort. These reports have become an invaluable learning tool. Wequassett built training and role-play sessions around the feedback gained from these reports to get the team running at a five-star level.
Wequassett also invited Forbes Executive Trainers to the property for seven days of hands-on training with the staff. The trainers pushed the teams to go above the normal expectations. These training days were built strategically in between audits, so the organization received real-time feedback of what was working and what the teams needed further assistance with.
Results
One of the areas Wequassett had the most opportunity to improve was In-Room Dining. In the first audit, Wequassett scored 71.43 percent; after continuous training, it improved to 81.82 percent on its second audit and a five-star score of 89.50 percent on its final audit.
The second area of improvement was the overall facility score; Wequassett saw similar growth happen with its Housekeeping and Engineering teams’ response after specific training. The organization scored 74.60 percent on the facility score on its first audit; improved to 83.58 percent on the second audit; and earned an 85.29 percent on its last audit. The overall score also showed great improvement, moving steadily upward from 81.92 percent in May to 87.50 percent in June and 90.70—a five-star rating—in September 2014.
In addition, Wequassett’s Guest Satisfaction Index (worth 9 percent of the Performance Index) had a strong year. Scores with regard to the “attitude of staff” and “level of personal service received” skyrocketed during Wequassett’s most demanding time of business. The resort scored 97.65 percent for attitude and 95.67 percent for personal service, an increase of 1.6 points over the previous year’s high GSI scores.
