The first step on your way to someplace new is to take a look around. Look both ways before crossing the street. Check your mirrors before pulling out of a parking space. Even fancy research papers start with a literature review of studies that have come before.
In theme parks, people looking to build something new often start by benchmarking what's already out there. A team designing a new park or attraction may go on a benchmarking tour to find the best (and, honestly, the worst) practices and products that they might want to include, copy or avoid in their project.
I follow several theme park designers and developers on social media, and my first hint that a new project might be in development comes when I see them posting photos from other theme parks. Sure, many people in the industry are fans first and enjoy visiting other parks when on their vacations. But many times those visits are work trips - an opportunity to benchmark colleagues and competitors in advance of developing a new project.
And when those new projects open, people turn out to benchmark them, as well. Disney CEO Bob Iger was seen this past week at Universal Orlando's new Epic Universe, for example.
Miral had announced its new Disney Abu Dhabi project, so this is no spoiler. But when I saw Miral CEO Mohamed Abdalla Al Zaabi posting photos this week from visits to Disney in California, Paris and Shanghai, it got me thinking about benchmarking the best of Disney's theme parks around the world. If you were in Miral's position and had the ability to develop a new Disney theme park that pulled in the best of the best from around the world, what would you include in it?
I started thinking about what my dream Disney theme park all-star lineup might include. But before I got too far in that - which remains an excellent discussion topic, by the way - I realized that I should not start with the hardware. If I really were benchmarking an all-new theme park resort, I would not start by identifying the ride systems or even the IP that I would want in the park.
No, I would start with the "soft product," instead. If you want to build a truly world-class themed entertainment attraction, you must start with service. What is the level of service that you wish to emulate at your attraction, and how will recruit, train and support a team to provide that?
No matter what hard products you might choose for a new park, those will change over time. Disney's Hollywood Studios at the Walt Disney World Resort has no attractions left from when it opened in May 1989 as Disney-MGM Studios, for example. Even with enduring attractions, such as Disneyland's Matterhorn Bobsleds (the first tubular steel track roller coaster), become Ships of Theseus over the years, as parks replace their elements with more advanced and durable technology.
Individual soft products also may come and go, as a park changes its ticketing and service amenities. Obviously, people will come and go, too. But the culture that those people create can remain for years after individuals leave. Heck, just think about how people at Disney continue to cite Walt Disney, Marty Sklar, John Hench, and the crew that founded the Disney theme parks.
So if I were benchmarking a new theme park, I would start by visiting the parks that do best at customer service and hospitality. When visiting, I would not go first to the roller coasters and dark rides, but instead would just watch employees in the park. It's easy to find employees engaging with guests and leaving them smiling. But that's not what really makes a great theme park excel. Look to see who is keeping their lines moving swiftly. Look for who is defusing potential conflicts - maybe over kids too short to ride, or people lingering in pinch points. Look for employees who are clearing tables, picking up litter, fronting shelves, adjusting queues, or directing confused guests without anyone asking them to do so.
Go talk to those employees - when they get a moment, of course. Ask why they do what they do, and who taught them to do it. Then work your way up the chain to find the best leads, trainers, and managers in the park. Find what tools - pay, benefits, support, scheduling, training, communication - they use to help keep great workers in their park.
The best ride systems on Earth will fail if they do not have an ops team that can extract their potential. Wonderful placemaking will decay without proper landscape and maintenance professionals. The work of your world-class culinary department will be wasted without great front-of-house teams. Your buyers' sharp eyes might as well have been blind if your merchandise teams leave their shops untended. Even if you manage to overcome all of these challenges, none of that will matter if custodial cannot or will not keep your park immaculate.
As much as I love great concept art, show storyboards and ride designs, I know that the foundation of a great new theme park rests on none of these things. It rests upon people - a development team's ability to recruit, train, motivate and retain people that will, in turn, sustain that culture for generations.
People are the first benchmark in any new theme park attraction. If you have any dream or desire to work in this industry, remember that.
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I wholeheartedly agree that it's the people and culture that make a theme park. You can have the greatest, most unique attractions on the planet and if you have a bunch of disinterested, lazy employees operating and maintaining them, then that attitude and lack of enthusiasm is going to pass onto guests.
Years ago, there used to be an employee that worked at Kings Dominion who operated the Great Pumpkin Coaster - a tiny kiddie coaster in the Planet Snoopy section of the park. He was so pleasant and enthusiastic and great with the kids. His enthusiasm and friendliness undoubtedly rubbed off on guests on an attraction that helps develop the next generation of thrill seekers. Some might feel that this employee was a bit over the top, especially when compared to other ride operators that just went through the motions straight-faced, but when you're trying to groom the next generation of thrill seekers, getting those little one's excited to ride and feel comfortable can make or break the future of the park.
Ultimately, it comes down to training and leadership and identifying the basic requirements for dealing with guests, and how model employees are rewarded and recognized for going above and beyond. Some parks do competitions between different attractions to see who can get the most dispatches per hour, others use a flock of supervisors and senior staff to perform observations and occasional rotations through the ride ops positions to demonstrate what "model' observations should look like (and identify pain points/issues with procedures and crew), while other parks just let crews fend for themselves with some performing great and other miserably lacking guidance and supervision. I do think much of a park's culture comes down to employee loyalty, and that's an aspect of society that is being lost as it's becoming increasingly common for employees that work for a paycheck, not a company, and hold little regard or affection for employer - I do think that a lot of that is due to a lack of upward mobility available in most companies today (you get hired for a job and continue to perform that job with little opportunity to become a supervisor or manager because those staff are hired specifically for those roles), and the fact that theme parks employ so many temporary and part time staff that it's becoming increasingly difficult to instill loyalty within their employee base with constant turnover/attrition and an increasing percentage of part timers needed to fill gaps.
It's just a very different environment than a few decades ago during the last major theme park expansion (80s/90s) and the coaster wars (90s/00s). Theme parks need to use new strategies to staff their parks and perhaps reduce some of their reliance on manual labor, which is why we're seeing skilled labor (actors and performers) being reduced in front-facing roles because those represent the largest costs on the balance sheet and are seen as a luxury as opposed to a necessity to operating the park.
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I think you’re right. Once you’ve got a particular workplace culture it’s hard to manufacture a new one without simply just replacing everyone. Get that right and everything else will follow.