CASE STUDY ANALYSIS

2008 MUMBAI ATTACKS AT TAJ HOTEL

Submitted to: Submitted by:

Prof. Maheshwari Prateek Kumar
20BSP1670
Section E
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ABOUT TAJ HOTELS:
Taj Hotels is a chain of luxury hotels and a subsidiary of the Indian Hotels
Company Limited, headquartered at Express Towers, Nariman Point in
Mumbai.
• Founder – Jamshedji Tata, Tata Group
• Founded – 1903
• Parent company – Indian Hotels Company Limited, Tata Group

SYNOPSIS OF THE CASE:

On the 26th of Nov 2008. A group of 10 terrorists attacked the city Mumbai.
They broke up into teams to attack on different locations. One of the locations
was the iconic beautiful Taj Mahal palace hotel. On that day more than 500
Guests were registered at the hotel. Another 500 to 600 were attending
functions at banquet or sitting for dinner at the taj restaurant. There were around
600 staff members on duty at that night. The attack started around 9:30 pm.
Around 34 peoples got killed in that hotel where more than half of them were
the staff members. The speaker, Rohit Deshpande, aptly portrays the Hospitality
Culture at Taj Hotels, India, where the guests are equivalent to the God. The
video abridges the essence and ideology behind recruiting, training, and
motivation and incentive system at Taj Hotels where attitude is the priority.

COMMUNICATION OF THE SPEAKER – ROHIT DESHPANDE:

VERBAL-

 The choice of words was very powerful in his speech.

 He was trying to sympathise with the victims and wanted to convey the
severity of the incident that happened to the listeners.
 Eminent clarity in language, sound, pitch, and speed.
 Communication with audience was appropriate as he had full control on his
body, actions and expressions.

NON-VERBAL-

 Firm display of emotions and expressions with persuasion.

 Erect posture with limited movement on the stage.
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 Strong eye contact and ideal gaps and pauses in between to make strong
influence and impact on the audience.

HOW SITUATION WAS HANDLED:

The situation was handled intelligently and bravely by the staff. They
communicated to the guests in rooms to stay put and take out their key cards so
the room appeared vacant. Every staff knew the back routes, kitchen galleys,
hallways, entry and exit routes but they helped guests seek out of the hotel,
came back in, helped more guests to safely exit. Helped calm the guests by
serving drinks, beverages, food items etc. Telephone operator’s team stayed in-
tune with the guests and conveyed them to stay inside the room, pull key cards,
keep lights off and lock the doors.1600 out of 1700 people were evacuated
safely ,34 died out of which half were hotel staff. In conclusion the whole
situation was handled with extreme bravery.

BEHAVIOR OF EMPLOYEES:

 Cautious team-work and collaborative nature of all besieged employees and

guests.
 Thoughtful, calm, and composed response to the situation with the intent to
keep tension levels low.
 Well-mannered and communication towards their guests and staff.
 Displayed a culture of in-house integrity, service-orientation, customer-
centrism, and sacrifice.
 Ecstatic bravery, courage, and determination towards guests

CUSTOMER SERVICE AND LEADERSHIP ON BELOW:

The staff members of Taj showed customer service on a whole new level. To
show such bravery, when their lives were at stake, for the customers is laudable.
People-first attitude is the roots of the corporate culture. Detailed knowledge of
their guests, their likes and dislikes, personalities etc, reward and recognize
employees who demonstrate such leadership. Since operative level employees
are in the closest proximity of direct contact with customers, they also have a
greater understanding of customers. In this case, all young, low level staff
members displayed qualities of a leader. This is called leadership from below.

KEY LEARNINGS:
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 Importance of decision making: Learned that it is imperative to keep calm in
stressful situations. A calm mind leads to better decision making.
 Customer Centric- The customers must be the top priority for any business
especially in case of service industry it is very important to satisfy your
customer in order to retain and extract more value from them.
 Team work- The case has taught us how team work plays an important role
in the overall success of any Organization. Thus, it is very important that the
employees are given proper training before onboarding.
 Business ethics and values: All companies are reflected through the
behaviour of the employees. And strong values and ethics of the employees
help build a better brand name. This is exactly what we can see the Taj case.