Class Acts. Rachel Sherman

in the computer or something.” These guests cared more about the design and décor of the hotel and that the service be efficient rather than personalized. Some of them also mentioned a sense of surveillance or intrusion associated with recognition; one woman told me of a friend who was shocked when hotel staff knew something about her that she felt they could have found out only by listening in on her private conversations. Nonetheless, most of these women also said they would notice if the staff failed to provide this kind of attention, indicating that recognition was still part of their expectation of luxury service.³² (I discuss these guests further in chapter 6.)

       “They Go Out of Their Way”:Anticipation and Legitimation of Needs

      In Robert Altman's 2001 film Gosford Park, Helen Mirren's character, the head housekeeper in an English country mansion in the 1930s, says to a young lady's maid: “What gift do you think a good servant has that separates him from the others? It's the gift of anticipation. I'm a good servant. I'm better than good; I'm the best. I'm the perfect servant. I know when they'll be hungry, and the food is ready. I know when they'll be tired, and the bed is turned down. I know it before they know it themselves.”

      Workers in the luxury hotel are likewise expected to anticipate guests’ needs, a process in which the definition of “needs” expands to include what might otherwise be considered “desires.” The Ritz-Carlton's credo, for example, includes the commitment to fulfill even the guest's “unexpressed wishes and needs.” The general manager of the Peninsula Beverly Hills, Ali Kasikci, told a reporter, “Waiting for customers to tell you what they need is like driving your car by looking in the rearview mirror.”³³ Workers must be on the lookout for needs the guest might not articulate or even be aware of. Concierges, for example, stood armed with umbrellas for guests who were on their way out and might not know that it was raining. Antonio, a guest services manager at the Luxury Garden, advised me always to offer soup to guests who mentioned they were not feeling well, thereby actually creating a need rather than anticipating an existing need. Needs anticipation may also include withholding information or refraining from taking some kind of action; for example, I was cautioned not to tell a guest that he had been upgraded when the person he was traveling with had not been.

      Needs anticipation also entails reading the guest's demeanor, picking up subtle cues to predict her needs and desires. Sydney, a guest services manager at the Luxury Garden, told me, “You have to know what they want that they aren't telling you, because if you don't they won't like what you get them.” When a guest asks the concierge to recommend a restaurant, the concierge must (in addition to asking the guest about his tastes, of course) take into account factors such as where he is from, how old he is, and how sophisticated he appears, in order to increase the chances of making an appropriate choice. If the guest is older and appears unschooled in upscale dining, he may receive a reservation at a chain steakhouse; if a visitor from New York requests information on local entertainment, the concierge will not recommend the traveling version of the latest Broadway hit. In employee training sessions at the Luxury Garden, Alice, the human resources manager, encouraged workers to use visual clues to offer the guests something they might need. On one occasion she role-played a woman massaging her neck and seeming tired and another guest arriving with a crying baby, then asked what we would do to meet the needs they were not expressing verbally (the answers: offer the tired guest a place to sit down and give the mother a private space even if her room is not ready).

      Guests appreciate needs anticipation. One visitor to the Luxury Garden wrote on a comment card: “Housekeeper apparently saw cold medicine next to the rollaway bed for our 10 year old daughter and thoughtfully left an extra box of tissues! Great attention to detail!!” Herbert, a businessman in food manufacturing, recounted approvingly that after hearing that his young son was going to a baseball game, workers at an upscale hotel left cookies, milk, and a baseball hat in the room for him. Shirley, a leisure traveler, was amazed when tea was delivered unexpectedly upon her arrival at one fancy hotel:

      We'd checked into our room, and there was a knock on the door, and they brought chamomile tea and cookies. It was just those sorts of things, those unanticipated, delightful little things. You didn't even know you wanted chamomile tea, and it was the perfect thing…. I think it's a combination of anticipating your needs but doing it in a way that's sort of invisible, that doesn't draw attention to itself, that it sort of magically happens without you seeing how it happens, but it's as if they knew what you were thinking two seconds before you thought of it.

      Although these practices are known in the industry as needs anticipation, these examples demonstrate that the process also creates desires, by providing things “you didn't even know you wanted,” and then codes them as needs.

      Workers also recognize clients by responding to the individual needs and problems they express. Managers in training sessions and in industry literature stress that the guest must be able to get whatever she wants, including having prescriptions picked up, salon shampoo delivered to the room, and a cell phone retrieved from the restaurant where she had lunch. But more extreme examples abound. At one Four Seasons property, for instance, the maitre d’ lent his tuxedo to a guest who did not have one for a black tie event, and even had the trousers altered for him.³⁴ As I have mentioned, on two separate occasions, Max, the Luxury Garden concierge, convinced the manager of a local department store to open early for guests with urgent needs for clothing. Another concierge, Alec, literally lent the shoes off his feet to a guest whose own shoes had been misplaced by the housekeeping department. When a group of incoming guests at the Royal Court wanted to rent two new-model Mercedes SUVs, front desk workers found a rental agency that could provide them, though it entailed having the vehicles delivered from several hundred miles away. At the same hotel, I was asked to find a gauze bandage for a woman who had recently undergone knee surgery and then to assist her in dressing her leaky wound.

      In both hotels, my coworkers and I were asked to perform many services for guests. A partial list, culled from my field notes, illustrates the broad range: “Find doctor; find live crab, feathers, balloons; find white truffles; take shoes to be fixed; take luggage to be fixed; find gown; reserve spa for six, rental van, all-day limo; obtain video of local performance; arrange babysitting; get cell phones, Japanese furniture, cigars; find sheet music; find blue roses; find jade jewelry; plan out-of-town day trip; find pediatrician; give directions to local farmer's market; find out about tea set used in hotel's restaurant; arrange for local golf; get kosher takeout menu; find Greek Orthodox church; arrange camera equipment rental; open package arriving for departed guest and send back to him; arrange for spa, watsu treatment, shiatsu; get symphony tickets; find yoga clothes, particular designer furniture; find computer equipment; find map store; arrange helicopter tour; find and make appointment with German-speaking dentist; get shoelaces; find tailor; make hotel reservations in New Orleans; get coat left at restaurant and send to guest; get birthday cake for tonight; find Catholic church; place T-shirts and welcome packages in incoming guests’ rooms; get ginger root for tea; send champagne to incoming guests on behalf of a friend; find out about lobby furniture; find out about duvet cover in room; find artificial orchids; get baseball tickets; mail knife; put rose petals on bed; find lost child.”

      The list for one especially demanding Luxury Garden guest, Dr. Kramer, compiled over several visits, included “get electronics; get cotton jogging clothes; make hotel reservation; make copies; get stapler; get sushi; fix e-mail access; find battery for cell phone; get luggage fixed; get rental car exchanged; find access to Internet for his computer; fix luggage; get temps; get more temps; find Indian food; change room; fix cell phone; find CDs; get newspaper; give message to models waiting for him in lobby; find cell phone help; rent convertible; find directions to state park; make laptop work.”

      Recognition work also entails that the worker legitimate these needs by responding sympathetically. Workers are expected to show concern about any situation the guest finds difficult, from a missed flight to a cloudy day. This standard extends to moments when the guest is dissatisfied with the hotel service itself. Alice, the Luxury Garden human resources manager, emphasized five elements of responding to guest complaints, the second of which was “apologize first.” She said that when she studied guest complaints, most guests claimed, “All I wanted was someone to