Unreasonable Hospitality: The Remarkable Power of Giving People More Than They Expect
Authors: Will Guidara
Overview
In Unreasonable Hospitality, I share my journey in the world of restaurants, from busboy to owner, and offer practical lessons on how to transform customer service into a truly exceptional experience. This book is for anyone in a customer-facing role, not just in the hospitality industry, but across all sectors, who wants to make people feel seen, heard, and valued.
The core concept I introduce is unreasonable hospitality, a radical approach to service that focuses on generosity, warmth, and connection. I share the evolution of Eleven Madison Park (EMP) from a middling brasserie to a four-star, world-renowned restaurant, driven by a commitment to this philosophy. I detail how a focus on intentionality, creating a culture of collaboration, breaking the rules, and a relentless pursuit of excellence, all while empowering team members and celebrating their achievements, transformed the restaurant’s culture and guest experience.
I also explore the importance of setting clear expectations, building strong relationships with both staff and guests, and leveraging affirmation to boost morale and create a sense of community. I share personal anecdotes and insights from throughout my career, including lessons learned from mentors and industry leaders, to illustrate how these principles can be applied in any service industry.
The book provides practical tools and strategies for implementing unreasonable hospitality, such as the Rule of 95/5, the One-Inch Rule, and the concept of earning informality. I emphasize the importance of improvisational hospitality, creating unique and personal moments for every guest. Finally, I stress that caring for the well-being of your team is just as important as caring for your guests. By fostering a supportive, inclusive, and positive work environment where everyone feels valued and empowered, leaders can create a culture of hospitality that leads to extraordinary outcomes, including a thriving business and a deep sense of personal fulfillment.
Book Outline
1. Welcome to the Hospitality Economy
I introduce the concept of unreasonable hospitality and argue that it’s time for every one of us to start being unreasonable about hospitality. Exceptional service is about going above and beyond to offer hospitality so bespoke, so over-the-top, it can only be described as unreasonable. This approach has relevance across a wide range of service industries.
Key concept: Service is black and white; hospitality is color. “Black and white” means you’re doing your job with competence and efficiency; “color” means you make people feel great about the job you’re doing for them.
2. Making Magic in a World That Could Use More of It
My experience of being treated with care and generosity after my mother’s death taught me the remarkable power of a genuine welcome and the essential role of hospitality in marking both joyful and challenging moments in our lives. It showed me how a restaurant could create magic, and how deeply moving a simple act of service could be.
Key concept: People will forget what you do; they’ll forget what you said. But they’ll never forget how you made them feel.
3. The Extraordinary Power of Intention
Intentionality is about making thoughtful decisions with a clear purpose and desired outcome in mind. This focus on intentionality should be applied to both our professional and personal lives, starting with setting our priorities and non-negotiables.
Key concept: Intention means every decision, from the most obviously significant to the seemingly mundane, matters.
4. Lessons in Enlightened Hospitality
Working with purpose and going above and beyond to create memorable experiences for guests are crucial aspects of hospitality. Enthusiasm is infectious and helps foster a culture of care, while genuine leadership involves not just setting high standards but supporting the team with the tools and knowledge they need to succeed.
Key concept: All it takes for something extraordinary to happen is one person with enthusiasm.
5. Restaurant-Smart vs. Corporate-Smart
Restaurant-smart companies prioritize autonomy and creative latitude for their team, while corporate-smart companies prioritize back-end systems and controls. Finding a balance between these two approaches is essential for success in the hospitality industry. Control doesn’t have to stifle creativity, and sometimes, trusting the process means giving up short-term gains for long-term growth.
Key concept: Restaurant-smart vs. Corporate-smart
6. Pursuing a True Partnership
Pursuing a true partnership, where both the chef and restaurateur have equal say in the direction of the restaurant, is essential. It’s crucial to find a partner who shares a similar work ethic and passion, and to make decisions together to ensure what’s best for the restaurant as a whole.
Key concept: Run toward what you want, as opposed to away from what you don’t want.
7. Setting Expectations
Setting clear expectations, both internally for the team and externally for guests, is key to creating a successful restaurant. By communicating expectations clearly and setting a standard of excellence from the start, we created a culture of high standards at EMP.
Key concept: To be the four-star restaurant for the next generation.
8. Breaking Rules and Building a Team
Building a strong team requires breaking rules, challenging established norms, and creating opportunities for collaboration. Hiring people with the right attitude and philosophy of hospitality is more important than technical skill; fostering a sense of ownership and empowering team members leads to better results.
Key concept: The way you do one thing is the way you do everything.
9. Working with Purpose, on Purpose
Creating a culture of collaboration means working with purpose and intention. By involving every team member in the strategic planning process, and by articulating a clear vision, we were able to tap into the collective wisdom and creativity of the entire staff.
Key concept: Language is how you give intention to your intuition and how you share your vision with others.
10. Creating a Culture of Collaboration
Building a culture of collaboration requires actively creating systems and processes that encourage teamwork and communication. It’s essential to identify and leverage the individual strengths of team members, and to push people to lead so that they can grow and develop.
Key concept: Multiple conflicting goals force you to innovate.
11. Pushing Toward Excellence
Pushing toward excellence means paying attention to even the smallest details and pursuing perfection in everything we do, both in terms of food and hospitality. It’s also important to find a balance between control and creativity, and to empower team members to take ownership of their work.
Key concept: Manage 95 percent of your business down to the penny; spend the last 5 percent “foolishly.”
12. Relationships Are Simple. Simple Is Hard.
Building strong relationships involves understanding that relationships are simple, but simple is hard. Turning toward tension, embracing conflict, and learning each person’s unique “tough love” language are essential for navigating the challenges that arise in high-pressure work environments.
Key concept: Don’t go to bed angry.
13. Leveraging Affirmation
Leveraging affirmation and sharing the spotlight with those who deserve it is crucial for building morale and team spirit. Actively seeking out and celebrating external validation and using every tool available to build and reinforce a positive culture are essential for long-term success.
Key concept: Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.
14. Restoring Balance
Maintaining balance and prioritizing the well-being of the team requires knowing when to slow down to speed up. Finding what rejuvenates and restores each individual, and providing regular opportunities for them to refill their own oxygen mask will build a stronger foundation for future success.
Key concept: Adversity is a terrible thing to waste.
15. The Best Offense Is Offense
In times of crisis, like the 2008 recession, the best way to survive is to focus on creating extraordinary experiences for guests and continuing to push forward with a creative mindset. Cutting expenses strategically and developing new revenue streams to keep the team engaged are also essential for success.
Key concept: The best offense is offense.
16. Earning Informality
Earning informality by being present and creating genuine connections with guests is an integral part of unreasonable hospitality. By being attentive and vulnerable, we were able to build deeper relationships and earn trust, making the fine dining experience feel more accessible and personal.
Key concept: Informality is something you earn.
17. Learning to Be Unreasonable
Learning to be unreasonable means setting ambitious goals, like becoming number one, and relentlessly pursuing them, even when the odds seem insurmountable. It’s about having the courage to believe in what’s possible, and by articulating that dream to the team, we set the stage for achieving it.
Key concept: I believe you can speak things into existence.
18. Improvisational Hospitality
Practicing improvisational hospitality requires paying close attention to every detail and interaction. By understanding the power of one-off, unique gestures, and recognizing opportunities for delight, we were able to create truly memorable experiences for our guests.
Key concept: It isn’t the lavishness of the gift that counts, but its pricelessness.
19. Scaling a Culture
Scaling a culture requires intentionally replicating successful practices and processes while continuously innovating and evolving. By prioritizing training and education, we were able to extend our unique culture of hospitality from EMP to new ventures, like The NoMad.
Key concept: Creativity is a practice.
20. Back to Basics
Returning to our core values of deliciousness and graciousness allowed us to regain focus and clarity of purpose. By simplifying the menu and returning to the concept of the meal as a dialogue, we were able to forge deeper connections with our guests and ultimately become the best restaurant in the world.
Key concept: To be the most delicious and gracious restaurant in the world.
Essential Questions
1. What is ‘unreasonable hospitality,’ and how can it transform a business?
Unreasonable hospitality is about exceeding expectations and creating a sense of belonging for both guests and team members. It involves going above and beyond, doing more than what’s considered “reasonable” in the traditional sense. This approach prioritizes genuine human connection, warmth, and making people feel seen, valued, and welcome, as opposed to transactional, purely efficient service. At Eleven Madison Park, it transformed the guest experience from one that was technically excellent but lacked emotional resonance to one that consistently created moments of magic and delight.
2. What role does intentionality play in creating an exceptional customer experience?
Intentionality involves approaching every decision, both big and small, with a clear sense of purpose and a desired outcome. This approach demands presence and focus, setting non-negotiables and refusing to let distractions derail the larger goals. Whether choosing ingredients for a dish or polishing silverware, every action taken with intentionality contributes to a culture of excellence and an enhanced guest experience. It’s about having a clear vision and ensuring every detail, no matter how seemingly small, aligns with that vision.
3. How do you build a thriving organizational culture, or ‘cultural bonfire’?
Building a strong, cohesive, high-performing team involves not just hiring skilled individuals, but fostering a culture where people feel valued, empowered, and part of something bigger than themselves. This means breaking down traditional hierarchical structures, empowering employees to take ownership, and encouraging collaboration and open communication. Building a cultural bonfire means igniting a shared passion and encouraging “try-hard” enthusiasm, making it cool to care deeply about the work. It’s about creating a supportive environment where people feel safe to express their creativity and pursue excellence without fear of being mocked or undermined.
4. How do you effectively scale a strong organizational culture as a company grows?
Scaling a culture, particularly in a rapidly growing organization, involves more than just replicating existing systems and procedures. It necessitates a thorough understanding and articulation of the core values and non-negotiables that define the unique culture. This can be accomplished by creating a clear mission statement, defining operational principles and practices, and developing tools, like the Field Manual at EMP, that ensure consistent implementation of these values across all locations. It’s about hiring people who are passionate about embodying the culture and empowering them to transmit that passion to new team members. Most importantly, it’s about continually adapting and evolving to ensure the culture remains relevant and resilient.
Key Takeaways
1. The Rule of 95/5: Balance Efficiency and Extravagance
The Rule of 95/5 emphasizes the importance of balancing meticulous cost management with strategic investment in extraordinary experiences. By diligently managing the majority of expenses, businesses can free up resources to invest in the “5%” – the seemingly small details that create a disproportionately large impact on the customer experience, transforming it from ordinary to unforgettable.
Practical Application:
In product design, applying the Rule of 95/5 might mean meticulously optimizing the core functionality and user interface of an app (the 95%), then investing in a seemingly small but delightful feature, like a personalized onboarding experience or a unique animation, that sets the product apart and creates an emotional connection with users (the 5%).
2. Perception is Reality
In any customer-facing interaction, prioritizing how a user perceives reality is more important than how it may be defined or measured objectively. Even if an engineer believes they have the “correct” answer, if a user experiences difficulty or has a different understanding, it’s the engineer’s responsibility to address that perception. Ultimately, customer satisfaction and retention depend on aligning with the user’s perspective, not on insisting on being “right.”
Practical Application:
In an AI context, this principle encourages a focus on user experience. Rather than solely prioritizing algorithm optimization, AI engineers should focus on how users perceive and interact with the technology. If an AI-powered tool is difficult to use, even if it’s highly effective, user adoption will be low. Prioritizing intuitive design and user feedback can ensure the technology is truly valuable and beneficial to its intended audience.
3. Promote Before They’re Ready
Providing opportunities for growth, mentorship, and leadership, even before someone is demonstrably “ready,” can have a transformative effect on both individuals and the team as a whole. People rise to the occasion when given new responsibilities and challenges, often exceeding expectations when empowered and trusted. This approach not only helps develop future leaders but also demonstrates a commitment to the development of the team, which boosts morale and encourages everyone to work harder.
Practical Application:
Imagine leading a team of engineers on a complex project. You could promote a junior engineer with limited experience in a particular area to lead a component of the project, providing them with mentorship and support. This approach not only invests in the development of future leaders, but also shows the team that you trust their potential and are willing to provide them with opportunities for growth.
4. Improvisational Hospitality: Prepare to Improvise
While consistency and standardized processes are important for service businesses, the ability to improvise and respond to unique situations creatively can elevate the customer experience from good to great. This approach involves developing a toolkit of resources and strategies and empowering team members to use their judgment and make decisions in real-time to solve problems and create personalized moments of delight.
Practical Application:
Consider an AI chatbot designed to provide customer support. Instead of pre-programming every possible interaction, build a toolkit of resources and templates that the chatbot can use to respond to unique situations. This could include access to FAQs, product information, and sample responses. Empower the chatbot to “improvise” by selecting the most appropriate resources and tailoring the response to the specific customer interaction. This approach provides greater flexibility and personalization than a purely scripted chatbot interaction.
Suggested Deep Dive
Chapter: Improvisational Hospitality
The ideas discussed in this chapter are a novel addition to the hospitality literature, and they have far-reaching implications for AI product engineers interested in making their creations more human-centric and personalized.
Memorable Quotes
Welcome to the Hospitality Economy. 12
Service is black and white; hospitality is color.
Making Magic in a World That Could Use More of It. 16
People will forget what you do; they’ll forget what you said. But they’ll never forget how you made them feel.
The Extraordinary Power of Intention. 26
Intention means every decision, from the most obviously significant to the seemingly mundane, matters.
Building a Team. 84
Make it cool to care.
Pushing Toward Excellence. 120
The way you do one thing is the way you do everything.
Comparative Analysis
Unreasonable Hospitality stands out in the crowded field of business and hospitality literature by focusing on the often-overlooked power of genuine human connection. Unlike books that primarily emphasize efficiency and process optimization, like The Toyota Way, Guidara prioritizes building a culture of care and exceeding expectations. While works like Setting the Table by Danny Meyer touch upon similar themes of hospitality, Unreasonable Hospitality delves deeper into the practical application of these concepts, providing specific examples and actionable strategies. It also diverges from the purely operational focus of many management books, exploring the emotional intelligence required for effective leadership and the importance of fostering a positive and supportive work environment. This makes the book’s message relevant not only to those in the service industry, but also to leaders and managers across all sectors.
Reflection
Unreasonable Hospitality offers a compelling perspective on the transformative power of genuine care and attention in business. While Guidara’s focus is on the restaurant industry, the underlying principles are applicable to any customer-facing business, and particularly relevant in the current environment of increasing automation and digitization. In a world where AI and machine learning are transforming how businesses interact with customers, the emphasis on human connection becomes even more crucial. However, some might argue that the level of personalization and bespoke hospitality described in the book isn’t scalable for large businesses or applicable to industries with different operational constraints. Also, while “Unreasonable Hospitality” is presented as a fresh approach, some aspects, like the focus on creating memorable moments, are longstanding practices in luxury service industries. Despite this, the book offers a valuable framework for creating a culture of care and reimagining the customer experience, particularly in a world that could benefit from a little more human connection. It prompts readers to examine their own business practices and consider how they can leverage the power of unreasonable hospitality to build loyalty, strengthen relationships, and create a more human-centered approach to doing business.
Flashcards
What is Unreasonable Hospitality?
Going above and beyond to offer hospitality so bespoke, so over-the-top, it can only be described as unreasonable.
What is the Rule of 95/5?
Manage 95% of your business down to the penny; spend the last 5% ‘foolishly.’
What is the One-Inch Rule?
Focus on the last inch of every task or interaction.
What is a ‘Legend’ in the context of Unreasonable Hospitality?
Creating unique and personal moments that give people a story to tell.
What are the key principles of giving feedback?
Criticize the behavior, not the person. Praise in public; criticize in private. Praise with emotion; criticize without emotion.
How should you handle a guest’s complaint, even if you believe they are wrong?
Their perception is our reality.
What is intentionality?
It means making every decision, from the seemingly mundane to the obviously significant, with a clear sense of purpose and desired outcome.
Why are grace notes important?
A small, inexpensive act of hospitality can have a huge impact on the guest experience.