Magical Magic Kingdom Team

I can’t believe I just met the Magic Kingdom gals a week ago. Standing in line at Space Mountain this morning, I was reflecting on our first definition for “team” during Day 2’s workshop as a “group of individuals working together to achieve a common objective” that James pointed out could apply to the folks I was standing next to in line. What changed during the course of the past week that transformed Team Magic Kingdom from simply a group of GWU students working together to complete the course to the high performing team that I’ve so enjoyed being part of and am so sad to leave behind? 

Putting the fun in fundamentals

I should have known better than to expect a typical corporate training workshop from Disney. Through the YES program and our team projects, we not only learned Disney’s team-building process and principles, we lived it. In the end, I got so much more out of the experience. The dedication, talent, positivity and respectfulness of fellow teammates elevated the lessons to a whole different level, and I’m so grateful to you all. I learned as much from each of you as I did from the program itself and am happy to have a wonderful bunch of new friends.

The Disney Culture of Teamwork

The take away from our Disney workshops that resonated most with me is the concept of innovation through collaboration.  It is very interesting to me that we loss Walt Disney in 1966 and his vision is still being employed today.  Disney is ever evolving, but their culture’s foundation remains consistent.  “Whatever we accomplish belongs to our entire group, a tribute to our combined effort.”  “Togetherness. For me means teamwork.”  These two quotes from Walt Disney embody what is great about Disney.  Teamwork is integral to the success of Disney.  It takes each and every one of Disney’s 72,000 cast members to provide guests with the magical experience.  From guiding guest to a certain ride or attraction to picking up the trash that falls to the ground… each cast member is dedicated to that vision that Walt Disney set forth so many years ago.

- Marc

Exploring the Magic of Disney - as a Team

Each of us made the decision to apply and participate in this experience because we were driven by different motivating factors. But for all of us, there was a curiosity factor involved as well. We were not completely sure what all the these seven days of magic would entail J, and what our exact outcomes would be. But we decided to dive into the unknown anyway, because we were curious about exploring Disney’s service innovation principles.

Sharing this common platform within our theme park group as well as our class as a whole allowed us to operate and function effectively in our tasks and continue to push the door in our different tasks and assignments. For me, working with Team Hollywood enabled me to observe and participate in an environment where we were constantly thinking of new avenues and approaches to explore with our project. We were curious about guest utility of the MagicBand, so we decided to create a survey on this topic. Even simple curiosities such as wanting to know what the Riverside part of the Port Orleans hotel looked like were explored. We decided as a group take a walk over and have lunch.

One of my biggest takeaways was really understanding the emphasis of Walt Disney’s idea of fostering innovation through teamwork and collaboration. Even looking at the quote referenced above, he uses the term “we” instead of “I”. One of the most important parts to functioning as a team well is thinking and functioning as a unit. Over these 7 days our team was able to do so as we explored our curiosities together and experienced the magic of Disney.  - Brigit

Poto's Disney Guest Experience: The Importance of Cast Members

One of the concepts that intrigued me the most during the duration of our Innovations and Services course was the role in which Disney cast members’ play in the journey of the guest experience. The extensive application process and training that cast members undergo really contributes to the culture of Disney, because they learn who they are, what they create, and whom they create it for. They learn how valuable their role is to “Everything Disney”. Whether they are offstage behind the line of visibility, or onstage and within the line of interaction, each cast member plays an integral role in guest satisfaction.

I had two very memorable customer experiences during the duration of our stay in Disney. This week was the first time I heard about the concept of “Hidden Mickeys”. I had no idea that the Imagineers placed them all around the parks and resort. One of the highlights of my trip was the hidden Mickey that was placed in my room by housekeeping. Although I did not interact or cross paths with housekeeping (as I was always out of the room by the time they came through), they were able to make my week a bit more magical through creativity. As you can see in the picture below, I found a hidden Mickey made out of towels, strategically placed in the bed frame. In addition to this experience, I also found our last night to be truly magical. Thank you to Sharon and Stuart, we were able to enjoy a magical guest experience in a relaxed environment. Watching the sunset while eating dinner by the water, and having a VIP view and the ability to avoid the crowd during the Illumination Show were just a few of the highlights. The experience was greatly enhanced by our waitress, who made sure everyone was comfortable, happy, and enjoying the food. These two cast members really demonstrated how vital both offstage and onstage roles can be to the Guest Experience at Disney, reiterating the concept that Disney drives home: no matter what the role is, every cast member plays an integral part in the Disney Experience.

A video of our last night and the ambiance and experience that we had the opportunity to be a part of

Hidden Mickeys appearing on lights via the lens of the 3D glasses we received at dinner.

A picture of the Hidden Mickey that housekeeping strategically placed in our room

-Poto

The Emotional Customer Experience

The customer experience is a subjective thing and an emotional journey.  Qualifying it as positive or negative can be daunting because individuals prioritize factors in different ways. For example, when comparing two guests we interviewed based them having similar experiences of having issues entering the park with their MagicBand.  Both linked their tickets during pre-arrival and experienced about a 15 minute wait to enter the park. When each was asked about their overall customer experience at Disney and how it relates to MyMagic+, we received two different answers.  Guest 1 still viewed their customer experience as favorable despite their magical experience being derailed for about 15 minutes when attempting to the enter the park.  In the case of guest 2, when asked the same question, they felt their overall magical experience was ruined due to having to wait while the Disney cast members linked their ticket to their MagicBand.  This situation illustrates that the customer experience is both subjective and emotional.

- Marc

Strategy - Leadership and Teamwork

We are builders of the cities of tomorrow and we want to erect an even more impressive skyline than what we see here how. How do we get there? This is the quintessential question asked in any business arena.

On our first workshop on Tuesday, the 26th this was subject matter we covered during the second half of the training on that day. From Disney's perspective strategy is about leadership and teamwork and I can definitely agree with that.  My agreement with this is because of a an exercise that our facilitator Leah organized for us, which quickly got us to the heart of this matter in a hurry. We did a few things before the exercise got under way:

Number 1 - Our group was broken in to three distinct business divisions.

Number 2 - We were assigned a company name and told to put together a strategy for three business 

                    tasks.

Number 3 - Finally we were given the time frame in which those tasked needed to be finished.  

Halfway through the exercise Leah switched some people from one team to another to add a level of complexity to the exercise and even highlighted further the importance of strong leadership and teamwork. Those two things have to be in place if in order for your strategy to work. Leadership that is not strong leads to teams that are not effective. Two great lessons learned in a relatively short amount of time!

Rasul