The Ten Laws of Guest Service

1)  Nothing is more important than the guest happiness. 

We all become masters of reading body language and non-verbal signals.
As soon as we feel as guest is not really happy we jump in and start improving things.
We never give up on a guest until they are absolutely happy.

2)  No Attitude.  No Pretense.

Flaunting your knowledge can make guest feel uncomfortable and inferior.
You never know what a guest knows that you don't 

3)  Never let them see you bleed.

4)  Wipe the word 'NO' out of your vocabulary.

Focus on what you can do, not on what you can't do.
Make it happen, if it's not against the law, if it does not hurt the company and if you're not inconveniencing another guest - just do it, we will back you up. 
Use the word actually. 

5)  Every Moment we are either 'adding to' or 'taking away from' the guest experience.

It’s show time all the time. 
Every action, posture, facial expression and word sends a message. Control the message and you can control the perception of our business. You can never be sure what the guest sees or hears while you're in the building or close to it.
Every single action must be geared towards the guest happiness. From how we walk, to how we speak, to how we answer the phone. 

6)   Get their 'story' and they are yours forever.

The more we know about our guests, the better we can discover what makes them happy and comfortable.
You can either send or receive—never both.  When you perform, emote, gossip, or talk about yourself you are sending information and there is no way you can really understand and connect with the nuances of our guests.

7)   Be real, be knowledgeable and never fake it.

No matter what you have been trained to do there is always a time when you need to drop the act and just be real with the guest.
NEVER assume that you know more than our guests, you will be constantly surprised by how much our guests have been around and they know what's what.
If you are not 100% sure of any piece of information, find out. There is nothing wrong with saying “Please allow me to check".

8)  Always refer to our guests in a professional and respectful way (especially when they are not around).

NO one is that good of an actor—you cannot possibly bad mouth a guest in the back and come out, look them in the eye and take genuinely good care of them.
"Healthy guests", "Challenging guests", ”Interesting guests", "Critical guests".
Always refer to them as "the lady" or "the gentlemen"—never "that guy" or "that man". 
Never share details from one guest to another—never.
Never refer to the guest by their last name only (i.e. "you seat Smith and I'll get Jones").

9)  Never pretend that a guest does not exist.  (This is really hard to do.)

No matter how busy you are, no matter whose guest it is, our guest knows when you see them.  Do not pretend that you do not!
ALWAYS yield the right of way to the guest, stop, move out of their way and smile at them.
Do not underestimate the power of a guest's perception—dozens of people will hear about their experience if it’s good or bad, but especially if it's bad.
Correlation: Never ask a question that you know the answer to (i.e. "do you want more water?")

10) If the guest is unhappy it is YOUR fault.

All that matters is whether or not the guest is happy and how they feel about what we have done for them.
If you give them a great product and they hate it, you have made an error.
If you have given them an odd product that they absolutely love, you are on target. 
The only mark of success is the happiness (not short term, but long-term happiness) of the guest.