How the Savannah Bananas Find Customer Service Rockstars
Everyone you hire contributes to your culture in some way. A big difference between finding future rock stars and posers is finding out what investment the candidate made to learn about your organization.
Jesse Cole is the founder of Fans First Entertainment, the parent company of the Savannah Bananas, a world-famous baseball circus that travels around the country entertaining fans unlike any other baseball team ever has. Cole is the Walt Disney of sports entertainment. What he gets his employees and ballplayers to do is extraordinary. Jesse spoke at the 2019 Customer Service Revolution Conference, and I have spoken to their organization, attended their games, and was blown away by the experience. Everyone there delivers, from parking lot attendants to ticket takers and food vendors to the players.
What investment are your potential hires making in the interview process?
Working for the Savannah Bananas is not for everyone or most of the human population. Jesse’s amazing culture comprises what most leaders think are the most difficult workers to manage: millennials and Gen Zers.
So how does Jesse find the rare individual who can maintain the incredible reputation the Savannah Bananas has created and what fans have come to expect? “For us, it all boils down to authenticity. We lead the entire recruitment/application process being genuine in who we are and what we stand for and allow space along the way for candidates to make the decision themselves if they’d like to be part of the organization,” says Cole. “In fact, I’d argue that we more often try to ‘scare’ candidates away by sharing with them that our fast-paced and ever-changing environment isn’t for everyone.”
The Savannah Bananas has projects and assignments they ask candidates to complete after each phase of the interview process that isn’t particularly challenging or time-consuming. “The ‘wrong’ person fails to see the value in the project and will either submit a lackluster version or will self-eliminate entirely. The right candidates get even more fired up about the opportunity because those extra steps continue to show how different we are from other organizations,” explains Cole.
Cover Letter Videos and Future Resume Videos
Part of Jesse Cole’s employee interview process is to have all the candidates submit two videos: a cover letter and a future resume. “Video cover letters are huge for us because we can immediately see personality and enthusiasm from a person. Do they lift us up? Do they bring energy?” Cole shares. “For us, both the video cover letter and future resume are tests on our core beliefs of the Fans First Way. These core beliefs are: Always Be Caring, Different, Enthusiastic, Fun, Growing, and Hungry. The ‘Always Be’ is important because if we don’t see some of these traits from their first video introduction to us, we know it will be hard to get that out of them as a future employee.”
In a video cover letter, Cole’s team can spot enthusiasm and fun immediately. With a future resume, they can see traits like growth and hunger. Cole says, “What do they want to do in the next five years? Ten years? Do they want to be in the same position, or do they want to grow more and make a bigger difference?”
This also allows Cole’s team to see the candidates’ creativity. How are they filming the video cover letter? What are they wearing? Where are they? Is it something normal or is it different? This is another one of their core values.
The future resume video also shows how the candidate aligns with Savannah Bananas’ core values. How is the layout? What projects do they share that they will work on? How much fun do they have with it, or is it basic and boring? “Within a few seconds on the video, we can tell if we want to hang out with that person. All of our positions are outward-facing, and we work with our fans regularly, so this is important. If we don’t want to hang out with them if they don’t bring energy and lift us up, why would our fans want to be around them either?” says Cole.
“Once they’ve made it through the entire interview process, we bring them out to the stadium to make an official offer and to introduce them to the entire team. By this time, they are fully aware an offer will be extended in person, and if we’ve done our job right, they’re ready to accept on the spot. Then we cue up the champagne toast,” explains Cole.
Our Inaugural EXEA Class
Creating a hiring and interview process like the Savannah Bananas ensures that you find the right candidates for your culture. The DiJulius Group’s EXEAcademy is your guide to building your ideal culture.
The week of January 19th, we kicked off our first Employee Experience eXecutive Academy (EXEA). Like our Customer eXperience Executive Academy (CXEA), which is in its 11th year, EXEA is a 12-month part-time intensive leadership course akin to an executive master’s program, designed to empower leaders, HR teams, and people managers to master the art of creating an exceptional workplace culture. The EXEA is a rolling admission; our next class is March 11-13.
Get Ready For The 2025 Livestream Workshops!
March 10: Create Non-negotiable Standards
June 9: Become a Zero-Risk Organization
September 8: Create a Recruiting Experience
December 1: Create an Onboarding Experience
Are you ready to revolutionize how your organization delivers customer and employee experiences?
Join John DiJulius and Dave Murray of The DiJulius Group for the Experience Revolution Livestream Workshop Series.
This four-part series dives into essential strategies for creating a zero-risk organization, improving recruiting and onboarding experiences, and establishing non-negotiable service standards.
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Become a Certified Experience Executive in 2025
Transforming Leaders – Transforming Experiences – Transforming Cultures
Our Experience Academy courses have been designed to certify people for a new level of leadership, benefiting their career and your organization.
- The Customer Experience Executive Academy enables you to assess an organization’s current state of service and work to build systems to consistently deliver world-class experiences.
- The Employee Experience Executive Academy enables you to assess your current culture and build systems to hire, onboard, train and retain the best employees.
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