You Can't Make This Ship Up: Business Strategies, Life Lessons, and True Stories from Forty Years at Sea

by Paul Rutter

How would you manage and grow your business if you had to live with your team and clients? Paul Rutter is a customer-experience expert and has survived three decades of life at sea as a cruise director for the largest ships in the world. In You Can't Make This Ship Up , he recounts the hilarity of life on the high seas and the lessons he learned along the way. These lessons and life-defining moments are the perfect guide for sea and land-based businesses to thrive in a culture based around exceptional customer service.

176 pages, Paperback

Published October 31, 2021

Reviews

[Mark Fichman · Rating 5 out of 5]

A quick, fun and savvy read that satisfied on many levels.
I laughed, I learned, I felt.

We are all emotional beings to varying degrees. Paul describes how he identifies and processes customer emotions and focuses them through his very practical lens of business success. He invites the readers on board and has them standing to his side throughout the trip. Very engaging.

Paul gives us the inside poop on cruises with a keen eye on the business soup of success. His sense of humor is evenly paced and placed. A favorite line is regarding a loony idea to add water slides off the back of the ship: “…although that could help reduce the line at the buffet.”, Paul quips. One of many LOL moments. If he could have gone just a bit further with the Naked Bingo descriptions, ha ha.

The structure worked. Chaptered by titles that connote peoples experiences hidden within a particular set of business problems and solutions. Background and stories, people especially, real people and real business-impacting situations.

I must admit I developed a concern re: cruising due to COVID. Paul doesn't ignore it or brush it off. He frankly explains how the cruise industry took on the challenge and is actually ahead of the curve regarding health and safety. They have become leaders that others look to for guidance. From the reader’s perspective, including 9/11 and appropriately ending with COVID was both fitting and necessary.

Besides the basic setup of stories and life/business lessons I also received an easy and interesting education on ships’ processes, policies, controls and people which are applicable to probably every business that employs people. We learn Paul's position (and others on board) requires superior people skills and how mastering those 'soft' skills can be the difference when it comes to retaining customers.

[L.C. Tang · Rating 5 out of 5]

Always a delight to read a fellow crew member's life experience at sea. CD Paul Rutter pens his experience as a CD-Cruise Director. Interesting perspective to see through the lens of the CD being that I work alongside countless Cruise Directors during my career at sea. Well written. I like his dedication and that he mentions his memoir is his "Love Letter" to the cruise industry. I was certainly able to relate to many of the moments the CD shared and all the lessons he learned in management. His memoir makes me all the more nostalgic for the days as an Officer and entertaining all over the world. Thumbs up from this fellow Officer in the Entertainment Dept.

[Glenn M. Cook · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fun, quick read.

Fun and informative if you are a cruiser with Royal Caribbean. Makes you think about what happens behind the scenes

[Alison Walminski · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best books overall I’ve read in a long time. It has a great balance of funny stories and management advice. Much of the advice can really be applied to any business or organization, big or small. You don’t even have to be management, you can easily apply it to your own life, wherever you may work.
I found this book on a Royal Caribbean ship’s library and never got a chance to finish it while onboard. I was so pleased to have found it again years later to complete it. It’s a short and enjoyable read.
Highly recommend it.