Waterparks and Twitter

I am writing an article for this blog and to be possibly published about Twitter t usage by waterparks/Aquatic facilities.

Please take a moment to take this survey...

http://polls.linkedin.com/p/67163/osfqe

Aquatica 2010 additions

Aquatica announces new additions for 2010.Looks very impressive.

http://travel.latimes.com/daily-deal-blog/index.php/seaworld-aquatica-20-5871/

Flip your thinking

The language that we use everyday not only expresses what we are thinking but also influences how we think. This affects us in sometimes unintentionally adverse negative ways .
I say, pay close attention to what you say and wherever possible flip the meaning in some thought provoking ways to jolt yourself and others out of negative patterned behaviors.

In your self-talk, turning more powerful negative words to more neutral ones can actually help neutralize your experience. Instead of using words like ‘hate’ and ‘angry’ (as in, “I hate traffic! It makes me so angry!”), you can use words like ‘don’t like’ and ‘peeved'

Here are some examples,

• Thank god its Monday
• Make it the Joy-place not the workplace
• A stranger is a friend that you haven't met yet
  
• When someone says 'they' correct them by saying 'we'
• Feeling happy-If you can't make it then fake it
• My job would be so easy if i didn't have to deal with employees and customers
• Nobody goes to Walmart anymore, the lines are too long
• You'll be glad you did or sad you didn't
  
• its not how many hours you put in at work its about how much work you put into the hours

Please add your favorites that help flip flop around your thinking. I'll give you the credit and add your quote and name to this post. You never know it might make it into a book one day!

What would you do today?

What would you do today if tomorrow you knew you were going to get a visit from?

• The health department
• Your lifeguard auditor
• Your Owner to discuss the P&L statement
• Your mother
• A tour from a prospective large group

The answer is that you would probably,

1. Scramble all resources to clean all the pools ,check all the readings, read the pool code and inspect everything on your property to see if it meets code. Also you would make sure all your documentation is up to date.
2. Check all certifications, drill all your guards to make sure they are ready and give the day off to all those who are weak on their skills.
3. Pull all your data and make a spreadsheet to show all your revenues, cost of sales, payroll and other expenses versus budget as well as print graphs to show attendance, occupancy and comparisons.
4. Inspect every slide and ride tube so you know your mum will not get injured.
5. Clean and repair everything (C.A.R.E.) so you make your mum proud and the prospective group will be impressed and book with you.

You will also be out in the park the whole time supervising to make sure everything above gets done or you will be doing it all yourself!

Well the good news is that it’s highly unlikely that you’ll get a visit all in one day but the bad news is that it’s likely that you’ll get a visit from all of these folks at some point.

I don’t have the perfect answer to this question except to say that it is a good question to ask yourself everyday or week. This mindset can help you to be focused and after all any leader reading this knows all this information but very few (including me) are able to keep this focus and do these things consistently.

Ironically, to stay focused doesn’t require you to be manic and neurotic. We also condition ourselves and those we lead to do things to stay out of trouble and to avoid liability. The trick is to do things to gain honest pleasure and not to avoid pain. For example, when you’re in school and you do your homework project the same day its assigned to free yourself to play Xbox etc. or wait till the project is due and stay up late or claim forgetfulness the day it’s due.

It’s critical we condition ourselves and others to get pleasure from doing the right thing rather than doing things to avoid the pain of looking bad!

So, if you knew you were going to any of these visits tomorrow or next week, WHAT WOULD YOU DO TODAY?

You understand what you can explain

This is a topic that I find challenging personally.When it comes to jargon or complex issues I can often grasp the concept of the issue but struggle sometimes explaining it to others.

best put,

IF YOU CAN EXPLAIN IT THEN YOU UNDERSTAND IT. IF YOU UNDERSTAND IT THEN YOU CAN EXPLAIN IT.

I couldn't put it better than the article below.

Seth godin's article WWW.sethgodin.com

When smart people are hard to understand


If you're in a meeting with smart people and they start discussing a term or concept you don't understand, what do you do?
Do you know what recombinant DNA is? Analytics? Chapter 7? Fair use? RSS? The Long Tail?
If smart people in your industry are talking about an issue you don't know cold, it's very important that you don't just sit there and nod your head sagely. I think there are two constructive paths. The first is to ask. "Wait, I was with you until a second ago. What does that mean?" You'll be amazed at how smart and engaging this makes you seem if you say it at the right time.
The second approach is to write it down and not go to bed that night until you know the topic better than the person who brought it up. How else, precisely, are you going to become one of the smart people?

I was in a meeting once with the owners of the facility talking about workplace safety and after about 20 minutes one of the owners asked, what is an MSDS. Initially I was floored that an owner didn't know what that was but realized afterward that he knew what the paperwork was and its function but the terminology confused him.

How hard are you making your guest's work?

This morning I bought a 3 inch ring binder which was $10. When I got back to work I needed to label it and begun to take the sticker off the side. As I began to peel the sticker it came off in shreds leaving behind a gluey residue which I spent 10 minutes getting off the side panel .

This afternoon I needed a charger for my new cell phone and I was really concerned about buying one as it a special USB port and I didn’t want to buy the wrong one and waste time and money. I was relieved to find the package on display with the connector outside the clear package, available to test in to my phone prior to buying. It had been designed this way. The manufacturer had obviously thought about this from the customer standpoint or taken time to find out what customers didn’t like about buying a phone charger. Either way that had made the effort.The manufacturer of the 3 ring binder was more concerned about the cheapest paper and glue.

At Disney there is a slogan used when dealing with guest complaints. They say, ‘why are we making this guest work so hard, they’re supposed to be on vacation’. At the very least the concept when understood changes the mentality of the person providing service.

The purpose of this article is to ask yourself, ‘how hard are we making our guests work’ in regards to your products and procedures.

Ask your guests for their input. I guarantee you that it won’t be hundreds of the same suggestions that cause you to improve but probably one suggestion that makes it better for everybody.

3 simple questions for Leaders

Here are 3 very simple questions for leaders. Do..........

1. You add energy
2. You drain energy
3. You keep energy the same

or

1. You improve results
2. You decrease results
3. You keep getting the same results

When you feel overwhelmed just ask yourself the questions above to try to simplify the process.



I found these first 3 quotes in my notes and I can not give credit to the originator of this concept as it is lost in time. I added the part about results. The photo is from the very good Ocean Breeze waterpark blog.
http://thebigmonkeyvb.blogspot.com/