Friday, April 20, 2007

Studio News Experience

Aside from still working 6 days a week and 40+ hours a week, I have had an interesting week. My manager notified me that Studio News (an internal news company for Disney) would be taping a transaction done at one of our stores to broadcast on the news program for the week. Every hour, a cast member in a store is required to do a Magical Moment with a guest. A Magical Moment can be as simple as playing a game of tic-tac-toe with a child or playing a trivia game with a guest. This particular broadcast was to portray what a Magical Moment looks like at our different stores.

I had the chance to meet and get to know what the Studio News team does. Every week they do a new show of the happenings and events taking place in Walt Disney World. The broadcast is then shown on all Disney Cast Member televisions in break rooms and different cast rooms so cast members are aware of what is going on in and around the company. The broadcaster explained how his particular pitch was to tape different Magical Moments done within all the parks to show cast members the variety of different Magical Moments.

It was interesting to see how an internal news company compares with an external news company. Internal news companies still have to go out and interview different people and cover different events, but they get to stay within the company. Everyone all shares a common interset as well; they work for Disney. External news companies can be a little more challenging as journalists and broadcasters are required to interview and talk with strangers on events that might not even affect the journalists in any way.

This week's Disney Exploration Series in Guest Service talked about different leadership skills. It was extremely interesting because the information didn't simply apply to Disney, but life applications as well. For example, we did a hands-on activity on what we thought what traits good and bad leaders should possess. We also talked about different stages of leadership. For example, in Disney there are three different stages of leadership in any working field; entry level management, area management, and general management. As a person works their way up less technical skills are needed and more of an emotional and IQ are needed.

We did an activity at the end in which we worked in partners. One partner was an angered guest and the other was the manager. In front of the class we had to act out how we would solve the situation and then perform instant guest recovery to make up for the poor experience the guest had. I found this to be extremely interesting because it was situations we deal with every day.

Tuesday, April 10, 2007

Layout of Parks





All classes are cancelled again this week because of the peak spring break season. College program participants are all working 50 plus hours this week therefore they cancel classes for us because of the crazy hours we will be working. I am working 52 hours this week and 48 hours next week. Once the spring break peak season dies down classes will go back to normal along with our regular hours.

The layout of all the Walt Disney World theme parks are planned and purposeful. Three of the four theme parks are in the shape of a hub. A hub has a central point and then the rest of the locations branch out from that central hub making it very easy for guests to navigate through the park. The Magic Kingdom, EPCOT, and the Animal Kingdom are the three parks that have hubs at Walt Disney World. They each have a central point.

Magic Kingdom's central hub is Cinderellas Castle. Main Street U.S.A., Frontierland, Adventureland, Tomorrowland, Mickey's Toontown Fair, and Fantasyland are the six different parts of the park that branch out from Cinderella's Castle.

EPCOT's main central point is Innoventions, a walk-though tour of inventions of the future. This park is set up a little bit differently because all the attractions branch out from Innoventions as opposed to different lands. The World Showcase part of EPCOT is an "O" shaped layout around the World Showcase Lagoon.

Animal Kingdom's main hub is Discovery Island. Africa, Asia, Dinoland U.S.A., the Oasis, and Camp Minnie Mickey are the different lands that branch out from this central point.

Thursday, April 5, 2007

Fun Facts of the Week



Animal Kingdom Fun Facts

The Tree of Life is the Animal Kingdom's main icon. It is 145,000 feet tall and has over 100,000 leaves on the tree. The most interesting part about the icon is that is secretly contains over 325 animals carved into the trunk of the tree.

Disney's new Expedition Everest is a roller coaster in which guests try to escape from Mt. Everest. If you stand just before the Asian statue in one area of the park, the peaks of the mountain and the points of the statue line up exactly to match each other's points.

Sunday, April 1, 2007

"Slow" Week

These next 2 weeks...(April 2-16) are the two busiest weeks of the internship. We are told to be at our best at all times because not only area managers, but general managers will be walking around the park because of the high capacity of people that will be coming through. In fact, classes are even cancelled for this week because of the amount of hours. We will be working anywhere from 50-60 hours this week.

I've learned a lot during this internship program about service recovery. When guests are unsatisfied or unhappy with the quality or performance of Walt Disney World, it is required to implement service recovery. In other words, we need to make up for their unsatisfaction. It can be anywhere from a free popcorn to a free night in a resort depending on the circumstance. Although I experience minor service recoveries such as free popcorn everyday, this past week I experienced a more severe service recovery situation.

A guest had purchased about 12 items from the Star Tours (Tatooine Traders) store. The guest had taken advantage of the service of having it shipped to their resort for free. Unfortunately, the guest's items were lost on the way over. We had to find every single item that was in the guest's bag in the store and make up the same package for them. The guest's bag was then delivered personally to their room. Although the guest's experience was a little tedious, they received want they wanted and Disney went above and beyond.

This week should prove to be a real test as the numbers of people in the park are going to be extremely high and extremely busy. I am hoping to exhibit my best guest service skills possible this week.

Fun Fact of the Week to come...