‘The Big Rocks’ theory is by far one of my favorite lessons in leadership, and it took me some time to really understand. I am sure that you must have heard about this story in some way shape or form before, but there is a difference between just hearing and understanding it, and truly believing in it.

My boss loved to tell me his lessons in leadership in vivid stories, some of them made sense right at the beginning, some of them needed lots of fine tuning, and some are better off never told again.

Regardless of how busy I thought I was in my role as housekeeping manager in a unionized property putting out the fires of the day to day while making everyone happy in being always responsive and helpful, my boss reminded me at the end of each day that I accomplished nothing, as I did not do anything to make anything better for the next day. He said that I was so focused on the small rocks that I could not possible take care of the big ones.

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As he noticed the confusion about his statement in my eyes, he went on to pull out a jar underneath his desk and put three boxes next to it. He opened up the first one, and took big rocks out of it and filled up the jar. Once the jar was completely filled with the big rocks  he asked me, if it was full. I nodded, and he opened up the second box, and poured much smaller rocks in the jar filling up the spaces between the big rocks. Once he filled the entire box into the jar, he asked me again, if the jar was full, and I confirmed. He then continued to open the third box and started filling sand into the jar of big and small rocks filling it up. He looked at me and told me that if I did not focus on the big rocks of my day that make a difference for the next day and the future of our department, and only get caught up putting out fires and being busy in operations, I can only bring small, unimportant rocks and sand to the table by the end of the day, as there would be no more space for the big rocks. On the contrary, however, if I would make sure to take care of the big rocks first, the small ones would fall into place.

While this story made sense, and I did understand the idea behind it, I did not truly understand. How should I not put out those fires and help my peers and employees with their challenges? If I would not take care of it, who would? My employees and the guest in return would suffer!

It took me over a year to realize that I was wrong, once you ensure that the big rocks are taking care of, everything else falls into place, and you won’t even have any fires anymore to put out!

So what are those big rocks in housekeeping? One of them is ensuring that the performance of your employees and with that the cleanliness of your guest rooms is up to standard, and the only way to achieve this is by standing up from your desk (and most managers don’t like the idea of this), leave your office, and go up to your guest rooms connecting with your housekeepers.

By just spending 30 to 60 minutes every day walking your rooms, and giving feedback to your housekeepers, you motivate to exceed expectations, and are able to measure performance improvement.

Getting up from your desk to walk the floors is a big rock! And it sounds easier than it is, as you will always find work for yourself, responding to and writing smart e-mails, picking up the phone, and just be available for everyone.

If you want to make a difference for the next day, you need to talk to your employees, and communicate effectively what they can do to get better the next day, and consequently hold them accountable to your hotel’s standards.

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