A young boy, all hyper energy, was in line with his family at Spaceship Earth. I walked along with him and asked if he was bored.

 "Uh huh,” he muttered

I pretended to think for a few seconds. “Hum", I said. "What if I had something you could do in line to make the time fly by."

"That would be cool," he replied, brimming with enthusiasm.

I’ll be right back," I left the line, and returned a minute later.

"Here, play with this, I explained as I showed him how to use the pan and broom to sweep the queue."

He refused, his family laughed, and I connected with my guests. 

It was a special day. Although it Easter Sunday at Epcot in 1987 and the busiest day so far that year, it wasn’t just the holiday that made it special. It was the running of the Future World 500.

I was one of the leads (similar to an hourly foreman) at Spaceship Earth (SSE) on this day and we were in heavy competition with the other Future World attractions (Universe of Energy, Horizons, World of Motion, CommuniCore, The Living Seas, Listen to the Land, Harvest Theaters, and Journey into Imagination).

The Future World 500 was a contest run by the Future World Attractions management team, led by full Supervisor Bill Bunting and his able staff. Each attraction was scored on their success at delivering the four Disney priorities:

• Maintaining a safe environment (Safety)
• Receiving guest compliments Courtesy)
• Presenting a clean, well maintained area, queue, ride, and exit area (Show)
• Delivering high rider-per-hour numbers (Efficiency)

The contest was intentionally run during the busy season and, although the number of guests in the park kept us on our toes, it created an added incentive to deliver our best Disney magic.

Utilizing young boys to sweep the queue failed as a contest winning strategy, but our SSE crew won the week and the trophy (see snap above with Ray Caron on the right and me on hte left in our SSE space themed costumes). The real winners, however, were the engaged attraction hosts and the resulting happy guests.

The Future World 500 was that inspirational. It motivated management, built attraction team spirit, created a friendly competition between the teams, and delivered stellar guest service. It’s also a model I’ve not seen many organizations apply.

Set up properly and run in in a friendly spirit, a competition delivers a safer experience while improving customer service ratings, selling more product, and motivating employees.

Although the departments and functional areas in your organization are likely very different from a Disney theme park, the principles behind the Future World 500 are easily translatable if you follow a few simple process steps.

1. Identify your different teams/locations/work functions that could be placed in competition
2. Using your priorities (if you don’t already have them, create them), determine ways the delivery of those priorities can be scored
3. Codify the scoring system
4. Select a name for your competition
5. Pick the best possible dates for the contest, ideally during a busy season because that is when there is the most opportunity to catch someone delivering great service, and where productivity is critical
6. Train your leaders, managers, supervisors on the points scoring system and its application
7. Announce, communicate, and explain the contest to your employees
8. Conduct the contest, continuing to champion it throughout the contest period
9. Tally the scores, announce the top three teams, and present  trophies or other awards as appropriate
10. Celebrate the entire organization for their combined effort
11. Evaluate the experience and the scoring to identify best practices and opportunities for future improvement.

Everyone, including you, your team, and your organization, can win with a Future World 500. Just don’t expect young boys to sweep the contest.