Walt Disney World Management Structure Reorganisation

News Updates about the Port Orleans Resorts.
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The Sassagoula Sentinel
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Joined: April 6th, 2011, 11:32 am

Walt Disney World Management Structure Reorganisation

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According to the Orlando Sentinel, Walt Disney World is embarking on (yet another) reorganisation of its management infrastructure. The changes broadly relate to the organisation of management reporting structures, with departments now organised more by physical location rather than thematically. Reporter Sandra Pedicini writes:
"The reorganization will give general managers and executives authority over geographic locations – say, the Magic Kingdom's Frontierland – rather than traditional categories such as merchandise or food and beverage. The philosophy is to take a more holistic approach to management, focusing on the overall guest experience, Disney said."
Of particular interest to Port Orleans aficionados will be the element of the plan to assign each hotel its own individual General Manager, rather than the previous practice of one person overseeing several resorts. This may result in Port Orleans Riverside and Port Orleans French Quarter becoming somewhat more autonomous than they have been in the past.

As I understand it at present, the current Port Orleans General Manager, Suzette Noble, will retain overall control of the Riverside resort, while a new General Manager (still to be announced) will be brought in to oversee French Quarter. There will also be some shake-ups in the way the various lines of business are managed, such as Recreation now coming under the overall local control of each resort's Guest Services manager (previously Recreation was a combined team) and the Food & Beverage managers at each resort will now incorporate Merchandise into their remit. Both resorts will also gain their own Executive Housekeepers, rather than having one large team covering both resorts. Whether or not this will alter the current policy of cast member roles sometimes being shared between the two resorts is still unclear, but Disney have announced that there will be no lay-offs as a result of these changes.

It seems unlikely that there will be any significant impact on the overall guest experience, at least in the short term, but perhaps giving French Quarter its own autonomy may result in more facilities being provided directly for guests staying there, rather than everything being shared with Riverside? And it surely can't escape the notice of an incoming General Manager that French Quarter is the only Disney Moderate Resort that doesn't currently operate its own table service restaurant in addition to a food court.

More changes will no doubt become apparent over the coming weeks, but to me this all vaguely smacks of someone in an executive position at Walt Disney World with too much time on their hands looking to "make their mark". Let's wait and see what happens, it could be an interesting year...
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