Case Study:  Magnums Butlers International

Magnums Butlers International (MBI) is a world leader in luxury butler service training for professional private butlers, hotel butlers and luxury yacht stewards and stewardesses.  Established in 1987 as Magnums Butlers by Josephine Ive, it is now the second longest running butler school in the world.

While expanding into the training of luxury yacht stewards and stewardesses, the Professional Yachting Association required MBI to have a Quality Management System (QMS) to ISO9001, and Shar Dean, Business Manager for MBI, was given the task of setting up a QMS.  Shar decided that the QMS was to be set up within a very tight three month timeframe.  Shar had no idea what a QMS was all about, and determined from the outset that she needed to establish a sound rapport with a specialist in Quality Assurance.  She was given names from other managers in her business network, and commenced discussion with two of these.  Her instinctive feeling led her to Jim Joyce, the lead consultant with Best Practice Business Systems.  With Jim she felt an instant rapport and at ease for the first time since given the task.

This was no ordinary situation.  Josephine was permanently overseas for the duration of the consultancy and Shar, who concentrated on the financial operation of the organisation, had only a limited knowledge of the management side.  The relationship between Josephine, Shar and Jim was of vital importance.  There had to be a huge amount of trust.  There was a lot of hard work and some challenges, with the candle burning till late in the evening.   The result of all this work was that the QMS was certified as meeting the requirements of ISO9001:2008 four days less than two months after the work commenced.  All can look back on the work with a huge amount of pleasure and achievement.

The Quality Management System is now the backbone of the organisation, focussing on achieving what their customers want and need.