#6 Isadore Sharp (Founder of Four Seasons Hotel) Part 1

Welcome to Uncommon Excellence, the podcast where we learn from the best to become the best. I'm on a mission to uncover the timeless lessons of history's greatest entrepreneurs, founders and thinkers, so you don't have to spend years of your life figuring it out alone. The world's most successful people didn't follow the crowd. They thought differently. They made bold decisions and they built legacies that still shape our world today. But what exactly did they do? What can we learn from them? And most importantly, how can we apply these lessons to our own lives and careers? In each episode, I break down powerful insights from the playbooks of icons like Jeff Bezos, Steve Jobs and Walt Disney, translating their experiences into practical, actionable takeaways you can use right now. If you're someone who refuses to settle for average and wants to learn from the greatest minds of all time, and then this is the podcast for you. Let's get into the episode and start your journey towards Uncommon Excellence. The reason for success is no secret. It comes down to one single principle that transcends time, geography, religion and culture. It's the golden rule, the simple idea that if you treat people well the way you would like to be treated, they will do the same. I just read an excerpt from Isadore Sharpe and Four Seasons, the Story of a Business Philosophy, a book written by Isidore Sharp. And Isadore Sharp is the founder and owner of the Four Seasons Hotel. For those who don't know, the Four Seasons Hotel is one of the world's most luxurious hotels in the world. They have over 100 locations across the world and they range from Toronto to Paris to even Maui. They are worldwide, globally known in one of the biggest hotel services in the world. The Four Seasons Hotel has a net worth of $4 billion. And Isadore Sharp has a personal net worth of over half a billion dollars. His wife Rosalie said this about him. What sets Izzy apart is his innate humanity. He honestly believes that every person has potential and it is opportunity that makes the difference. Another thing that Isadore Sharpe says is so much of long term success is based on intangibles, beliefs and ideas, invisible concepts. I love what he says there because this idea of invisible ideas, concepts, beliefs is so true in the idea and the, the life of a founder, the life of a founder is built off of ideas. And it's not always a good thing, but it can be a good thing when you're, you're trying to build a concept, you're trying to be an innovator, and that's really what you want to focus on and what I love about Isadore Sharpe and kind of the philosophy. But behind Four Seasons is the golden rule, which is treat people well. Sharp built Four Seasons on a simple yet powerful principle. Treat others as you would like to be treated. When I was reading this book, that's something that stood out to me. Every single hotel he opens. And I, I got to the third hotel opening, which is what we're gonna get to in this podcast episode. But the whole idea behind it is treating others as you would like to be treated. This applies to both your employees and guests. So employees would be considered like Disney, right? Disney treated his employees well. He treated his guests well. And, and he called them guests and not customers. And so when you create a culture of respect and service, that's what sets Four Seasons apart. When you treat employees well, they turn into like they, they provide outstanding service for your guests. And so these are like the four pillars that Four Season relies on. This is their key to success in a way. And we'll unpack these as the episode goes on. But the four pillars is quality, service, culture, and brand. So quality is the relentless standards that set you apart. And Isidor Sharp refused to cut corners. He reminds me of a Mr. Beast, Steve's jobs, kind of weird mix. And he refused to cut corners, ensuring that every Four Seasons property met the highest standards. The crazy thing is you can do that in your own business as well. You can meet those high standards. And that's what I really took away from just these little four pillars that Four Season stands on, where you know, if you have high quality, high service, high culture, a good culture, a good brand, you have the keys to success, right? When you refuse to cut corners and you try to meet the highest standard, shooting for the stars is better because even if you fall up short, you're falling, you're falling up short way higher than everyone else's. And so that is what I love about Isadore Sharp. Just like Steve Jobs, he has that obsession with the craftsmanship at Apple. And companies that prioritize this quality are like Rolex and Ferrari. They create long term customer loyalty. And this allows you to have premium pricing by never compromising on that excellence. Right. Isadore Sharp is someone that is uncommon and his business, Four Seasons is excellent. That's what I'm focusing on in this podcast. Right? And service. The next pillar of Four Seasons is customer experience as a competitive advantage. So Four Seasons, they really transformed luxury hospitality by treating every guest with personal, personalized care. So similar to how Like Apple does their customer. They have a customer obsessed culture and it, it's fueled by their global dominance. And businesses like Zappos and Nordstrom, they've proven that exceptional service isn't just nice to have, but it's a powerful differentiator that turns customers into lifelong advocates. I love what Daniel Priestley says where he says, focus on your product, right? Focus on your product because your product is going to tell your customers who are already buying. So you don't want to focus on the future customers that you might have, but focus on your product because that product will help your current customers. And those current customers will be so impressed that they go out to other people and they start advocating for you, sharing all of your stuff with them. And that's really the key, right? With service you want to be so excellent in your product and what you do that it transforms just all of thinking in your hospitality and just what you do. And so the next pillar of Four Seasons that makes it successful is culture. You want to empower employees to create excellence. Sharp believe that if you, if you treat employees well, they will take care of customers. Just as Howard Schultz built Starbucks by fostering a people vers culture. Companies like Costco and Ritz Carl Carlton show that empowering employees leads to a better customer experience, stronger brand reputation and long term success. That's really what you want to focus on, right? You want a strong culture. You get your employees right, you get, you have a mission statement, you have all that. And that will spread like a virus, but not like a virus in a way, but that will spread to other people and they will want to share. You want a players. We, we were looking at this last week, right with Brad Jacobs. You want a players that believe in your work. I just watched Mr. Beast on the Diary of a CEO podcast and he said it's not fun working with people that don't want to work with you or just be there. They just want to make money and not work for you or they don't love what they're working on. And that's why when you have a culture of people that love what they are working on, you have those a players, then you can really take that and that levels up your business to the next step on the Four Seasons list of four pillars of success. And the next thing that you want to focus on is your brand trust is built. Built over decades and not just days. Four Seasons didn't just sell hotel rooms. It built a reputation for uncompromising luxury and service. And this is similar to how like Warren Buffett invests, invests only in brands with like, deep customer trust. And then there's Ionic brands, iconic brands where you have like Disney and they maintain their status by consistent, consistently delivering on their promises. And that, that's really the four main keys of four season success, right? You want to focus on brand culture, service and quality. You want to be relentless in your standards. You want to have great customer experience, you want to have a great culture. And ultimately that will lead to having a great brand and brand trust, brand reputation, and that's what you want to focus on. Let, let's get into kind of the early life of Isadore Sharp. Isadore Sharp is a very fascinating person. He grew up Jewish. His dad was an immigrant. He was born in 1931 in Toronto, Canada. He was, he kind of had a hard life growing up. Very scrappy type of a person. His dad was a skilled person in construction and basically he did anything to make money. He was willing to work any job. And I, this is crazy, but he even broke his shoulder once and then he shrugged it off and kept on working. That's insane. That that tells you though, if you read the context, is the context behind that is that his dad was looking for a job. He was just trying to do whatever he could to support his family. His mother. So his father was Max Sharp and his mother was Mary Sharp. She was more of a homemaker and she provided stability in their household. It was sad. They grew up in like a matriarchal type of a household. So their mom was very domineering and that was good for Isadore in a way. But Izzy, another name for Isadore, Izzy was very, you know, he, he didn't really like that his dad, he didn't really have much for his dad in terms of thoughts about that. He was, you know, he wished his dad would have stepped up a little bit more, but ultimately was fine how he grew up. And he grew up in a modest neighborhood and he learned from his dad the value of hard work and craft craftsmanship. And as a teenager he used to work alongside his father on these construction sites. And, and he gained hand, hands on experience. And that's kind of what propelled him into the construction business, where he ended up studying architecture at Ryerson Institute of Technology. And now, now it's actually called Toronto Metropolitan University. So tm tmu. And they developed, he developed an entrepreneurial mindset through the construction from an early age. And he combined what he knew in construction knowledge, but also his like, business skills. He. There, there was a story in the book where he's talking to this construction guy who's like this investor or construction guy that's really far up in the chain. And he's talking to him and he starts talking, talking to him about his construction business. And the guy was like, hey, you should get into business someday. Like, you're really quick, good with numbers. And so he kind of considers that and ends up doing that later. And so he opened his first hotel, which was a small motel in Toronto in 1960. And he eventually, that eventually led to the founding of the Four Seasons Hotel and Resort. And I want to go off of this story from his early life, which really taught him a lot of lessons. But Izzy was tasked with assembling and installing a staircase while working with his dad. And so they were at this construction site and he was building these stairs, he was like filling them with concrete and he's building these stairs for this house. His dad watched him and by the time he finished, his dad was like, that's wrong. And this is after he had been watching him. He gave him a sledgehammer and said, you're gonna need to fix this, break it and make it better. You need to fix this. One stair was too long, one was too short. And he finally realized and it was really painful and, but a really good learning experience. And so he was frustrated at first and he wondered why his dad hadn't told him earlier. But his dad explained that learning from mistakes is the best teacher. And it, it's easier to, to just be told what to do, but it's more valuable to have that hands on experience and getting, learning and getting and learning from mistakes. And this lesson really stuck with Izzy and he, he, he reinforced the importance of patience, craftsmanship and int. Attention to detail. So you really want to focus what you're working on and don't, you know, obviously don't make the same mistake twice. And something that's really interesting is the beginning of Four Seasons, the Four Seasons Hotel. So in 1961, Isadore Sharp opened the first Four Seasons Hotel in Toronto, Canada. So this is that motel and it, it isn't anywhere like the luxury brand that we know it is today. Instead, it was a modest 125 room hotel, motor hotel, a motel that, that's crazy. 125 room, that's not a whole lot. And it was kind of built in this rundown area of the city of Toronto. And Sharp wasn't from the hotel business industry so he wasn't, you know, he didn't really know much about customer service, hospitality, what does that all look like? But he did see an opportunity and the opportunity was to create a hotel that treated every guest with care, no matter the price point. So it didn't matter if it was a motel or if it was a luxury hotel. Right. And so the thing that he wanted to work on was that he wanted to work on and offer exceptional service. He wanted people to feel valued, something that wasn't heard of in that market at that time. There was no such thing as exceptional service, uncommon service, excellent service, you know, proving that experience mattered more than, you know, this extravagance, luxury, you know, way of living. He wanted kind of simple and elegant and, and this customer first approach kind of set the foundation for Four Seasons golden rule of philosophy, which we've been talking about so much in this podcast episode up until this point, which is treat others as you would like to be treated. That is one of the biggest takeaways you can get from this book. And I also found this on his website. That's something he prides himself insane. And you know, despite its humble beginnings, the first Four Seasons was its success. And it allowed Sharp to really kind of refine his vision and gradually expand into the world's most respected luxury hotel brand. And I want to go through three different ideas that really helped him take the this vision, the first Four Seasons Motel, into a luxury hotel. And these three things I think will change how you view your business or just anything. And this will really help you in any walk of life, wherever you're at. This will help you see that whether you're in business or in your job, you're going to really these ideas, these three ideas will really change your life. So one, excellence doesn't require permission. Israel Sharp, he had no background in hotels, but yet he revolute, he revolutionized the whole industry and he revolutionized, he revolutionized hospitality. How is that possible? Well, let's look at other people, right? We look at entrepreneurs like Elon Musk. He entered the car industry without experience. He entered the space industry without experience. Where is he now? Where is he now? The richest man in the world, you know, worth over $300 billion. Sam Walton, he built Walmart despite having retail. Retail knowledge or just anything. And what is the underlying lesson behind all this? You don't need credentials, you don't need to have that college degree, you don't need to have that, those, any credentials to create something that is world class, something that people respect, something that quality and service and your culture and people that Go there and your product, you, you don't need credentials to create something like that. You just need vision, discipline and a relentless focus on being excellent. And that is a huge lesson because we look at Elon Musk, richest man in the world. Sam Walton, the owner of Walmart started that. He had no retail knowledge and he was able to build Walmart. I think he started it when he was 45 and he was able to build it into a billion, whatever it's worth now, billions of billions of dollars of worth and value for everyone. And the thing is, excellence does not require permission. You do not need permission from other people. People don't need to give you credentials or say, hey, you gotta, you know, gotta make sure you go here, you gotta get school here or you have to, yeah, you have to go to school here, get your college degree or you have to take these courses or lessons, you just do it, but focus on being excellent, you know, Excellence doesn't require permission. And the second biggest thing is small beginnings can lead to a global impact. This is insane. Four Seasons started as a simple mid price hotel in a rough area. Think about that. They didn't start in anywhere luxurious. They didn't start as a luxury luxurious hotel, just a mid priced hotel. Simple in a hard, rough area of Toronto, but yet it evolved into a global leader in luxury hospitality. How does this relate to other companies? Right, well, Nike started in a truck, a trunk. Nike started with Phil Knight. Going out to other people, you know, handing them shoes, saying, hey, do you want to try this? Can, can you try this? I'll have you run in this shoe for free. I'm give you this deal like just selling his own shoes. Apple started in a garage. Starbucks started as a single shop. So reinforcing the idea that excellence is built one step at a time, this all reinforces that idea. And so again, small beginnings can lead to global impact. No matter who you are, no matter what you do, you can have a small beginning and lead to a global impact. If you know what to do and you focus on being excellent and you do things well, right? You focus on one thing, put your head down and you work your tail off until you get that thing done or until you are the best in the world at it. That's being excellent, that's being diligent, that's having a vision right now. The next thing that I really took away from Isadore Sharpe is long term thinking versus short term gains. And Sharp didn't chase immediate like luxury status. He didn't have that right. Small beginnings to can lead to a global impact. He focused on building a strong foundation of service and quality. This aligns with other entrepreneurs and founders like Warren Buffett or Jeff Bezos. They believed in playing the long game rather than just chasing quick wins. There's a term in, I believe, cryptocurrency where if you hold something for a long, for a long time, it's called long term gains. And if you hold something for short term, it's called short term gains. And that's basically what this is, right? Long term thinking versus the short term gains. Are you thinking about this long like a legacy? Are you wanting to leave a legacy that can leave it, leave a global impact, right? Or are you thinking more about the short term? I just want to make a quick buck here, quick buck there and go on with my life and keep doing that. It really comes down to that. And he focused on the long term thinking he wanted a great foundation of service and quality. That's not hard to do. You can start from, again, a small beginning. You can start from something small. You don't have to have a lot of money to perfect your product. And kind of advancing into the story, you know, everyone that Sharpe went to because he needed to build his hotel and he needed financing, so he needed an investor. And everybody that he went to doubted him except this one gang, this one guy named Cecil Forsyth. And he was basically the first investor to believe in. Into Isadore. He. He believed in Israel. And what that means is he gave him the money is or started making the hotel. It turns out he didn't have enough money. Isador came back to him and he was like, all right, I'll give you some more money. And that really kick started the success of the Four Seasons Hotel. Without that, we wouldn't have that. It was just that one guy, right? And this relates back to Disney. Disney faced doubt and rejection. We went through this in our first three episodes of Uncommon Excellence. He faced doubt and rejection from his family, to investors, to people he worked with, even his own brother and his wife. That's insane. You know, that's insane. He faced doubt and rejection from almost everyone in his life when trying to finance Disneyland. Eventually his brother came to its senses, thankfully, and gave him the money or gave him some money and helped him. And Isadore Sharp is experiencing the same exact thing when pitching his vision for four Seasons, right? He pitches it to this one investor, this investor says no. He does it to another one, this guy says no. Eventually, wouldn't you get discouraged or get down? No. That's not what these people think. They are uncommon in their thinking. They are unconventional in their thinking. And they take that to the next step and they take this to the next step. And once he gets financing, he kind of sets parameters where, you know, the Four Seasons, he wanted to have a standard of relaxed elegance. And he didn't want it to be too pretentious, so too fancy, too formal. But he also didn't want it to be informal where it was on the, you know, lighter end of informal. He wanted a elegant balance, a simplicity and a standard of relaxed elegance. I love that. I love that. That's a direct quote from the book. A standard of relaxed elegance. And so now we go into the second Four Seasons hotel opening ever. And it was called the Inn on the park. And this was opened in 1963. And this came after the first success of the Four Seasons Motor Hotel in downtown Toronto. And, you know, Isadore Sharp sets his sights on a more ambitious project. And this is going to be the luxury, more luxurious hotel that we are thinking of. Right. In 1963, he opened the second Four Seasons Hotel 2 called in on the park, located in a leafy suburban area of Toronto. And this wasn't the. The center of the city. This was a suburban area. And unlike the first property, it was more of a functional business hotel. The places it was located around and just the location of it, it made it more upscale. And Sharp wanted it to be a. He wanted it to have ability to expand on 16 acres. So they bought a 16 acre parcel of land and they wanted to be able to expand that. And so they ended up doing that and it was more upscale and it featured a ton of amenities. And one of them was a luxurious atmosphere with just the park setting and on the park was the name of it. And what was great is because just making a center like a plaza and then having greenery and plants and all that can really upgrade your hotel and really make it seem luxurious. And so he really focused on the scenic park setting. He also had really good dining, restaurants. He had a cafe that was like the best or no, they had a restaurant that was like the second best or the best in like Canada. They had like a, like a coffee stand that was like one of the best as well. They had like some crazy things there, but they try to focus on business and they wanted people that, you know, stayed there for a while. Like they wanted to stay there. Right. It's kind of like Disneyland where, you know, Disney wanted that to be somewhere that people plan their vacations. Around and not just go there to stay there so they, they can focus on a different attraction. Like that is the main attraction. And so this was, like, kind of revolutionary. Isadore Sharp, like, focused on, like, they had a pool, like a tennis court. And then this is crazy because you would never expect this, but they had the first ever gym in a hotel. And that was the first ever gym. And it later became the standard for almost every single hotel. Motels, you don't really see that, but every single hotel that you go in now, or at least the nicer ones, they're gonna have a gym of some sort in there, whether that's just weights or actually good equipment. And so this kind of marked the first major shift in Sharp's vision. And he realized that when you combine exceptional service with like an elegant environment, you can create a unique hotel experience that's like luxurious, um, not at the luxury level that Four Seasons would later become, but it was definitely a first step. This second hotel, May, was the first step toward making Four Seasons a premium, premium brand. And this is kind of similar to the Disneyland outline episode where the next thing I'm going to be focusing on is people, major people who influence Four Seasons in Isadore Sharp. And we did this in the Disneyland story, where in Disneyland he talks about, hey, this guy is really helpful. Joseph Fowler, the. The commander. He was like a navy guy and he worked on boats, and so he made the Mark Twain for Disneyland. That's kind of how this guy that I'm going to talk about, that's kind of the Joseph Fowler of the Disneyland story. But in this story, it's very pivotal, especially in the gym, the first ever gym in a hotel. And so this guy was named Lloyd Percival. He was a renowned Canadian fitness coach. And Four Seasons was based out of Canada. And so this guy that is door found, he found a renowned Canadian fitness coach and sports scientist. And he had been pioneering his work in athletic training and conditioning. And he actually trained people like Wayne Gretzky, who's a legendary hockey, hockey player. And he played like, a significant role in shaping isadore's vision. For four seasons, he also trained. Just fun fact, he trained 41 world champions in just five years. And these were like Olympic champions. They just really. They worked on, like, everything. And so when Isadore opened the Inn on the park, so this was the second hotel that we were just talking about, 1963, he introduced that revolutionary idea in the hotel industry with a state of the art fitness club. And at the time, it wasn't Heard of, right. You know, a dedicated gym just for that. And so Sharp was influenced by Lloyd Percival and because he was one of his previous fitness former fitness coaches and Percival really believed that physical health and peak performances were essential. And this kind of introduced a new concept in hospitality where wellness and business actually worked really well together. And that became the standard and high, high end hotels. And the reason why this is a huge deal with Lloyd Percival introducing the gym is that the end on the Park Fitness Club was one of the most luxury and it was one of the first luxury hotel gyms in the world. And unlike a simple workout room, it was modeled after elite training facilities. And so it offered guests access to a, you know, a professional level of fitness resources. And what's crazy and what's just insane about this is without that, you know, this move really positioned Four Seasons as an innovator. This really showed like, hey, Four Seasons isn't just a luxury hotel brand. No, they're actually in the front lines trying to make changes that ripples throughout the world, but also throughout their industry. And it was actually really like. And much like how Walt Disney redefined entertainment with Disneyland, right. You know, that was an insane story if you haven't already listened to that episode, those three episodes, because those were great, right? You know, Walt Disney redefined all, all of entertainment history, right. The largest or the most watched TV show in history up until that point. The highest paid broadcaster in history for tv. Just insane records just with Disneyland. But that redefined the whole entertainment industry just with that in the amusement park industry. And this is the same as Four Seasons when they introduced a gym and into their hotel. And so not only that, but now we kind of transition into the third opening and the opening day of the third Four Seasons hotel, which is in London. And it's another in on the park and it's built in 1970. And this is kind of, this is revolutionary because of the opening of Four Seasons first international hotel. And this was in London. And it was a defining moment for Izzy man, Isadore Sharp. And after years of refining his vision in Canada, because at this point, you know, that's seven years from the last time he opened a hotel. You know, he's been able to like refine his vision and really make and hone his craft and kind of some opening day challenges and just things that he faced was it. It was. The London hotel was the most luxurious property that the Four Seasons owned yet. And it was actually designed to compete with other luxury hotels in the area. But some industry experts again doubted Sharp's approach. They question whether this Canadian newcomer could succeed in London. I mean, think about it. London is, if you've ever been there or if you ever want to go, it is filled with luxury hotels everywhere, top of the top. You know, you have to be luxury or at least tie in in order to survive in a city like that. You know, a lot of gdp, a lot of things there, just a lot of wealth flowing in and out from London. And so you have to be on your A game when you're going to a city like that and you want to make a luxury hotel. And the kind of the immediate aftermath or impact of the Four Seasons hotel was despite skepticism, the hotel actually gained a lot of attention for its revolutionary, revolutionary service model. And word spread that Four Seasons wasn't just another luxury hotel. It was actually something bigger, different and better. And there was actually a lot of success that came out of the end on the park in London. And it saw, it solidified Sharp's belief that exceptional service, not just big grand buildings, that exceptional service was the key to building a world class brand. And you know, just as Disney, you know, he had a ton of critics, he proved them all wrong when Disneyland, you know, attracted major and massive crowds. This is just like Sharp's London hotel. It, you know, defied expectations. You know, it proved everyone, it proved everyone wrong and proved that his vision was right for a customer first service driven luxury experience that could work on a global and international scale. And you know, as we've gone through this podcast episode, we've seen that, you know, Sharp and Israel Sharp's journey with Four Seasons isn't just about luxury for, you know, being luxurious, right? It's actually redefining hospitality through, you know, the four key pillars, which is service, culture and, you know, excellence and relentless attention to detail and your brand, you know, just from going from like a little motor hotel, it, it's little steps, small beginnings, right? You go from one step, which is a motor hotel, to the next step, which is in on the park in Toronto, a little bit better, better than the motel, but worse than in on the park in London. And then you take it to the next step. It's little, small steps that keep growing, right? And then the biggest thing though is your philosophy and keeping it sound throughout, right? Never changing it, but also, you know, proving your philosophy right? And his philosophy, his philosophy was customer experience guided by the golden rule, which is treat others like how you would want to be treated is the foundation of a world class business. So if you want to create A world class business foundation. Focus on customer experience. Believe in your vision even when others don't. You know, Sharp was doubted at every stage. And all it took was one person, Cecil Forsyth, to get it started. And this was just like Walt Disney and Disneyland, man. That was an incredible crazy story. I mean, that's insane when you think about Disney, man, you know, hundreds of millions of dollars just sitting on the table and potentially lost to this world. If no one had ever invested into him, if his brother hadn't invested into him, same with Cecil, right? There would be no such thing as Four Seasons Hotel. Never would be been a thing. What affected the whole, whole hotel industry. Billions of dollars gone to other places. You know, it's worth $4 billion today. That's insane. That's crazy and it's awesome, you know, and like I was pointing out earlier, excellence starts with the small things. You know, whether you're introducing, you know, whether Sharp is introducing one of the first hotel gyms or train, you know, staff, just, you know, the staff to anticipate like what the guests want and their needs, you know, Sharp understood that greatness is built on details. So believe in your vision even when others don't. There's going to be doubters, get through it. Excellence starts with the small things. Greatness is built on details. And then lastly, play the long game. You know, Sharp wasn't just chasing these quick wins, trying to get a hotel up to make a little bit of money, making another hotel to make a little bit more money. No, he was focused on details, vision in the long game. He wanted to build a legacy business, a world class business. And that's what he did. You know, Sharp wasn't just chasing quick wins, he was building a legacy. Much like all these founders and businesses and ideas that we continue to learn from nowadays with whether that's Steve Jobs and Apple, you know, you, you just go down the list and it, it's insane that people that think like this build a legacy. If you want to be a legacy builder, then you want to focus on playing the long game, you know, focusing on the details, believing in what you believe in, believe in your vision and ultimately the golden rule which is treat others how you would like to be treated. And that is the foundation of a world class business, you know, and so how does this apply to you? Right? Whether you're building something or you're leading a team or just, you know, striving to be the best at what you do, the lesson is clear from just this first part of this book. You know, service Quality and a commitment to excellence will set you apart. It's insane when you really think about this, right? Like you want, if you want to be excellent, you know, really focus on what sets you apart and be the best in the world at your job and what you do, that's really hard to do. Really hard to say. Easy to say and hard to do. That's why I meant easy to say, hard to do. Who are you going to be when you know, as Mike Tyson says, who are you going to be when someone punches you in the flight, in the face and you had a plan ready and it just disappears? You know, who are you? You know, are you trying to play for the short game or the long game? Are you taking, are you striving for excellence in the details or just the broader thing that you know and not the details that you don't think people will notice? Or do you not believe in your vision but you're still doing something anyways? These are things that you know. Isore Sharp has blessed us. He's blessed us with the insights through this book and I'm really grateful. I really love this book so far. It's a great book. Also, just like learning about like Four Seasons Hotel, I didn't really know much about it and just like reading about it is awesome. And just like, like I'm never going to start a hotel business, at least not that I know of. I might in the future, but I'm not going to start a hotel business. But just learning these basic ideas that help Tim succeed. If you ever want to start like a luxury type brand or just a world class business, this is the way to go. And I would definitely check this book out. It's called Four Seasons the Story of a Business Philosophy by Isadore Sharp. I'll leave a link down in the description and that's it for this episode. If you found these insights valuable, you know, share this podcast episode with someone else who is excellence just like you and me. I really want to provide value for everyone and so the more people I can provide value for, the more that I will feel better about, you know, just what I'm doing and just want to share more with you guys and so don't forget to follow for just more of these deep dives into the world's greatest entrepreneurs, businesses and ideas. Until next time, keep striving for uncommon excellence.