He started in the industry at the age of 14, washing dishes (by hand!) in a small restaurant on Cape Cod. He went on to earn a degree in Hotel Administration from Cornell University. Bill has managed hotels, institutions and clubs and owned full service restaurants. He has had the keys in his hand, his name on the loans and the payrolls to meet.

Bill is a sought-after consultant in the areas of concept development and organizational effectiveness and is a prolific author. In addition to over a dozen well-regarded books focused on the hospitality industry, he writes two weekly e-mail newsletters, offers several subscription series and contributes regularly to trade magazines.

Case studies of Bill's clients

You must know how to create and sustain a highly effective organization that can deliver on your marketing promises and administer your control systems ... or you might as well sell out now and pursue that career in auto parts!

It gets complicated ...

If all you had to do was make pizza, you would probably do fine. But you know you can't do it alone. Like it or not, you are the leader of an organization, a role that few have any real training in. Even with a college degree in this business, nobody ever taught me much about people. "You are a supervisor now. Go supervise."

Like you, I got very good at kicking butt, taking names and working long hours -- 120 hours a week in one job! But even then, I knew I wasn't getting the results I wanted, work wasn't much fun ... and I was killing myself in the process.

Everything changed when I first applied the principles you will learn in the School of Leadership. For example, when I took over as Foodservice Director for the US Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, the foodservice department was the primary source of athletes’ complaints about being in training -- we generated all the hate mail! In less than two months, foodservice was the overwhelming source of athlete compliments ... with the same staff!

But it got better ...

Within six months, patronage had doubled, food cost dropped nearly 25%, my cost per meal dropped by 20% and turnover went from 300% to 25% ... with no increase in wages.

At the same time, I honestly put in about half the hours I had ever put into a foodservice job in my life ... and honestly got twice the results that I had ever achieved in my life. If I was willing to work less, I could have gotten more done. Go figure.

I don’t care who you are or how long you have been in the hospitality business, I personally guarantee that you will make more money, improve your service levels, reduce your turnover -- and actually have time for a fulfilling personal life -- when you come to a new, deeper understanding of what makes people tick.

If this sounds like your idea of a good time, you are a perfect candidate for the School of Leadership.

If you major in Leadership ...

You will understand how the work climate affects performance and perception. In my experience, once you create a positive climate, 80% of the problems you are dealing with now won't even show up. (Well, perhaps they will, but nobody will notice!) Problems will just look like something minor to handle ... and your crew will just handle it.

You will learn how to create a culture of service that attracts business like a magnet. You will be able to move beyond techniques and scripting. Instead, you will see how to tap your staff's natural ability to deliver exceptional service ... because they WANT to.

You will understand why people don't leave COMPANIES, they leave MANAGERS ... and how to be the sort of leader that attracts and retains the best of the best -- eager workers who will stay longer and perform better.

You will see that the same climate that causes your guests to want to return more often is the same environment that makes your staff want to stay around longer. The direct costs of losing each hourly employee can be as much as $4000 -- and HOW many people did you lose last year? (The cost is 3-4 times higher for turnover among managers.) You can quickly meet our bottom line promise just by improving your retention rate.

Lower turnover means ...

• you can spend less time filling shifts and more time running the business
• you will be staffed with more experienced workers
• your crew will require less supervision and be more productive
• you can get more done with fewer workers
• you can pay your staff more and actually reduce your total payroll!

Finally, you will see how to improve the quality of your relationships -- not just with your customers and your crew, but with your mate, your children, your parents and everyone else you come in contact with.

Developing this personal quality is, in the words of the ad, priceless.

Next: So many choices ... what do I do now?