1st Time Managers

The Dos and Don’ts of First-Time Managers

MGMT-591: Leadership and Organizational Behavior

Professor Vickie Boone

August 2013

Introduction

The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company is one of the most recognizable luxury hotel brands in the world. The company got its name and its legacy from Swiss hotelier Cesar Ritz, whose reputation for service changed the luxury hotel business. In Europe Cesar became famous for the innovations he developed, and the management style used with his famed hotels The Ritz in Paris and The Carlton in London. He earned the nicknamed “King of Hoteliers” and”Hotelier to Kings”. Ritz also made a name for himself when he developed a chain of al-a-carte restaurants aboard a local shipping line named Ritz-Carlton. In 1911, Cesar and his wife Marie decided to expand the company into North America; thus, the first Ritz-Carlton opened in New York. Cesar Ritz died in 1918, but his wife Marie continued the expansion of the company. In 1927, Albert Keller established the Ritz-Carlton Investing Company and then bought and franchised the name. In 1927, The Ritz-Carlton Boston opened and five other properties subsequently followed. However, by 1940 only The Ritz-Carlton Boston was still in operation and that was only because the hotel’s wealthy owner was able to personally maintain its operation.

Up until the 1960s, the Ritz-Carlton Boston was essentially a private club for the very wealthy. One needed to be a recognized part of the “super elite” to be allowed to stay at the hotel. The credentials of every potential guest were scrutinized ruthlessly; and if the person was not considered high enough on the social register, they were not permitted to stay. At the time, the property was very authoritarian and formal with strict dress codes that all guests and staff had to comply with. Even the restaurants were monitored and screened to ensure that only qualified people patron there. Women were not permitted to lunch alone in The Café,...