It’s a hard enough challenge in any industry, but in the snow sports industry, with its variable seasons, seasonal workforces and the intensity of work in-season, developing strong middle level managers with core values that will drive them to succeed at higher levels within the industry can seem near impossible.

Not anymore. At the prodding of the Ginn Group (owners of Burke Mountain, where massive changes are underway), a group of educators from nearby Lyndon State College, industry insiders and management consultants put together and held the Resort Industry Leadership Institute (RILI), thought to be the industry’s first-ever management development program. (Full disclosure: SAM was also a primary sponsor of the event.)

The Institute, held over three days in June at Lyndon State, brought together middle managers, designated “management coaches” and even a few unemployed ski industry folks looking to better themselves. The hope of the facilitators was to give these managers the tools they needed to perform better in their current and future positions. The results seem to be a home run for all concerned.

“I have attended a number of leadership programs all over, and the quality of the materials and presenters at this one was as good as or better than any I have ever been to,” says Peter Delaney, vice president of guest relations at Smuggler’s Notch, who served as a coach at RILI. “No one has ever really approached this topic specific to the ski industry and our needs.”

That could be because this industry sees itself as unique and impervious to basic management training, says event coordinator and management consultant Nicole Voth. “We are different, or at least we like to think so,” she adds. “We like application; hard-core application. I was aware of that as we put this together.”

The three days put all the participants in a college setting—including dorm rooms; and don’t think that wasn’t fun. According to one facilitator, “There was beer in some dorm rooms.” And the program was varied. It included a video presentation on leadership by NSAA chairman and Vail CEO Bill Jensen (who was unable to attend in person at the last moment), a management presentation from Pat Corso of the Mount Washington Hotel and Bretton Woods, and hands-on, brains-active work sessions led by co-organizers Cathy DeLeo, chair of Resource and Ski Management at Lyndon, and Voth.

Jensen’s honest presentation resonated in the room. Jensen talked about leadership in honest terms; about the importance of being a coach and not a quarterback, and the importance of doing good for your company more often than doing negative. “He was incredible,” says Voth. “I’ve known him a long time, and I heard him say things I’ve never heard before.”


Doing a 360
Given the industry’s penchant for tangible results, DeLeo and Voth worked hard to make the event not just relevant, but transformational—to have a clear impact on the participants and send them away changed in a meaningful way. With that motive, they built “360 performance reviews” into the event. By collecting input from peers and employees above and below on the organization chart, a 360 provides a rather complete profile of how others throughout an organization view an individual’s performance as a manager.

A 360 review can be a risk in the eyes of some, says DeLeo, because it can expose some difficult-to-hear information. But once the participants experienced them, Voth says, all felt the criticism (both positive and negative) was immensely valuable.

“People got feedback they had not gotten in years,” DeLeo says. (How many employees feel they can be frank with the boss and still have any future with the company?) But managers saw the benefit immediately. “It’s a gift to yourself,” says Voth. “When you look in a mirror or have a mirror held up for you, anything you see, even if it’s not all positive, helps you better yourself.”

The participants saw, too, that the act of taking a 360 “bumps you up in the eyes of all around you,” Voth adds. The manager who is willing to look at his or her warts along with his or her beauty marks gains respect—and makes employees willing to accept feedback themselves. And feedback is precisely what the employees who report to RILI attendees should expect to receive. The co-leaders encouraged participants to take the concept home with them, and the high marks attendees gave the 360 process make it likely they’ll do just that.


Lessons All Around
While DeLeo and Voth at first sought to convince top managers in the industry to attend the event, resorts for the most part chose to send middle managers or others they were looking to move up. The co-leaders worried that this would reduce the event’s impact, but it proved to be a benefit. The group, both women agreed, had the perfect dynamic. And an unanticipated plus was that many who attended regarded it as a privilege. “They felt like, ‘wow, my boss wants to invest in me this way and that’s a good thing,’” says DeLeo.

The ripple effect of the Institute continues to spread. Each participant was assigned to a coach, who was asked to keep his or her players working together into the future. That seems to be happening. Two months after the event, Delaney said his group had already held a conference call and was pondering how to meet again. All participants seemed to be working hard to apply what they learned. That could key some positive improvements not only in resorts with new ownership (and there are more than a few of those in the East this year) but in the industry as a whole.

“It’s like a chain,” says Voth. “If you shake the top, the bottom spins the most. Anything we do to improve ourselves has a ripple effect.” For managers seeking a tangible benefit, here it is: “If you have good and happy managers you’re going to have a good and happy staff, and that can only mean a happy customer,” says Delaney.

And what of the upper management leaders the organizers had hoped would attend? Those who served as coaches felt they learned a lot, too. “We reached out to some higher-level people and asked them to coach because we needed them, but also as a way to get them here and to learn when they might not have,” says Voth. “And it worked.”

As for the CEO types who didn’t participate, Voth says, “From our coaches we heard it loud and clear: I wish my boss was here!” Separately, Delaney said almost the same thing. “One of my biggest take-aways was this—my boss needs to be here,” he declared.

Bosses (and others) will have their chance; the next RILI is planned for June 3-5, 2008, once again at Lyndon State. For information, contact Cathy DeLeo at (802) 626-6475, or send an e-mail to Catherine.Deleo@lsc.vsc.edu.