The History of Four Seasons Culture • Isadore Sharp • Founder and Chairman

Going back in history, it's easy to reconstruct the events of the past. You know, you could make notes and you can go back. So it's easy for me to go back and think about day one. But remember, when I'm referring to these events that got to where we are, they happen over a long period of time. You might have an idea, but in order to execute and get that to really be included in everything is a long process. So as I comment on these events of how we got to the culture and the issues, it's happened over many, many years.

And I've always been a believer that much of our lives are circumscribed by chance events, things that occur that open up your mind to an opportunity. As it happened to me when I got into this business, because as you know, I'm not a hotelier. My background is construction. I couldn't even get a job on the front desk here if I wanted to, because that's not my background. But I'm a builder by trade, and I was building a motel for a friend out in the outskirts of Toronto here.

In the course of finishing and having it just opened, an idea that I thought, 'Gee, if this is something that worked here in the middle of nowhere, wouldn't the idea, if it was so successful there, work better if it was downtown?' So that was the beginning of my idea of building. And over six years of many naysayers and skepticism, finally got it done, and that was opening the first Four Seasons Motor Hotel. It worked. If it didn't, I wouldn't be sitting here talking to you, I can guarantee you, because it was all done on borrowed money.

Tried a second, and that worked. That led on to a third, the Inn on the Park. And that's what changed my career path. And that's when I decided, 'Gee, maybe instead of this being my nighttime job of building and creating hotels, I'll make it my day job.' And that's what started me into the hotel business. And then I made a business deal with ITT to build what was then called The Four Seasons Sheraton in downtown Toronto, if you'll see it. It is now called the Sheraton Centre, which is a 1,600-room convention hotel.

And in my experience in that, compared to the Inn on the Park and the London, really gave me an insight into what I thought I could do better, and what I thought the company could do better. And that's when I decided that we would only operate medium-sized hotels of exceptional quality, and to try to be the best. Well, the first part of that's no big deal. You want to specialize, that's nothing special. Other people might do it. But to say to be the best, that was a stretch, because we only had seven hotels at that time. I didn't say we were. I said that was going to be our objective. And that's the way we set out to do it.

Well, then you got to think, 'Well, how do you want to be the best? How are you going to establish—' I mean, you're part of an industry that's enormous worldwide, and we're a small and nothing-name hotel. So I said, well, I knew it couldn't be beautiful buildings, because those buildings deteriorate. You don't always want to be having the best building. So I had to come up with something that was more intangible. So I decided we're going to try to make our service a distinguishing feature, something that people would recognize us for.

At that time, McDonald's was the first fast-food outlet and very successful. And I'd take our kids there, and they, you know, have those great French fries, etc. And I was always marveled at the kids who work behind the counter had such an upbeat attitude. They always had a smile. They were pleasant. They were always customer-friendly. So I knew the president of Canada, George Cohan. I said, 'George, would you mind? Could I attend your orientation program? Do you hire kids and you go through the propaganda of the company?' So I said, so I went and sat with all these 16, 15-year-old kids, listening to the propaganda and how they wave the flags and do all that. And then they showed a film, which was their main focus of the orientation program.

And the film had to be at least 15 years old or more, because you could tell from the clothing, the cars, everything. It was a motivational film, really gave people an inspiration—what the message they wanted to give. And it occurred to me, McDonald's at that time changed their ads on TV every month, spending millions of dollars on new advertising, talking to the public. But they had this same film over and over, talking to the most important constituents: their new staff. So it occurred to me, if you've got a message that really sticks, that really doesn't change, that's consistent, that's a good way to get a message across.

So when I said service is going to be our competitive advantage, that's going to be coming from the people who are going to work meeting the customers day in and day out. So to me, we had to create a good work environment, give the employees what they need. And that's when I thought of the Golden Rule. Because everybody's heard about it, everybody has probably said it one time or another. It's not new. And that is what I decided we would use—that as our, call it, statement for people to understand how we can create service and make it a distinguishing factor.

And that was the most difficult time in my business career from a personal point of view. Because—well, maybe back up—because I was so impressed when I was at McDonald's. I took all our senior people, all six of our senior people, to do what I did. I said, 'Look, you've got to see this. This is why I think we can make service.' And they were laughing and joking about it. And one of them said, 'You look—they're selling hamburgers and we're selling filet mignon.' I said, 'I know what we're selling. It's how we sell it.' So I knew we were gaps apart. What I was talking about made no sense to them.

So I knew that if the senior people in the company were only giving it lip service, this would never work. And when I said it was the most difficult time in my business career, because I had to split company with the most senior people in the company. Not—they were competent, they knew their job, they were hotelier people, they knew exactly how to do their job. But they didn't believe really that this would work. And we then hired, and that slowly took hold. So the idea of having something that is consistent and the message will be universally understood, has worked. And the Golden Rule has become the bedrock of the Four Seasons culture.

So it was a process, an execution, whereby people who believed in it and were prepared to commit to it. So that gets you to that point. Well, that was the beginning of creating a culture, a work ethic that gave our employees what they needed: respect, support, dignity, and the satisfaction of knowing their role really mattered, what they were doing counted. Whether it was a housekeeper, or somebody on the front desk, or somebody welcoming people to the front door, it was a common effort.