Restaurant management applied to almost anything…
I started my career in the restaurant business. This might sound a little grandiose since my first job was just washing dishes in the basement of Cafe 210 West in State College PA but I learned from that experience. I learned more throwing pizzas and waiting tables at Michelangelo’s Pizza in Moon Township outside of Pittsburgh, PA. I learned how to be a productive part of a team, supporting the overall goal of getting good food out to tables on clean plates timely.
I learned team dynamics and saw how practice and proper preparation (mise en place) could make me more successful. I saw a lot of different managers and owners working with the teams. Some were pushy and would yell at staff. Some were soft spoken but positive. There was everything in between as I trained and then worked as a manager at several different Chili’s restaurants. I interviewed, hired and fired thousands of people in that industry. I made some of my best friends along the way and had a great mentor, who I mentioned a few newsletters ago, who shaped my career in a positive way.
Restaurants provide a unique opportunity for learning that I would encourage everyone to experience early in their working life. The service industry is a microcosm that can be extrapolated out into almost any other industry. It is fast paced customer service in a high stress environment that requires constant adaptation. It is also strategic in the need to plan menus and orders based on historical data and current events. It requires meticulous execution of complex processes with a perishable product within tight timelines.
I applied these ideas to many of my other jobs after leaving the restaurant industry. I supported an HVAC install team who was good at making stuff, making it right and fast while adapting on the fly to current circumstances. This is very similar to a cook who has a basic set of tools and recipes to execute but has to deal with changes and customer requests while getting everything done, looking good and quickly.
I supported a team of customer-facing folks whose primary skill set was taking care of customers and translating from what they wanted into what we could do within our program parameters when at Honeywell. This was very much like a team of servers who had to effectively translate customer desires into what the kitchen could do.
I had to manage teams with widely varying levels of experience and drive. There were middle managers of varying skill and experience levels who needed to be motivated and mentored. Each manager had to be developed into an effective motivator and to become a mentor to others in their own right. As my role grew at ICF this became one of my primary responsibilities, mentoring other leaders.
In the restaurant business, everyone had to be kept motivated and pointed toward the goal, every day, of satisfying customers and convincing them to not only come back, but to tell their friends and family about their positive experience with the business. This is true of most successful businesses. Think about what you have done in your career, can you apply it to your current situation? Can you translate those lessons learned into what you are doing today? People are people, whether cooks or engineers, account managers or servers, directors or bar managers. The most important lesson a leader can learn is how to communicate with and motivate their team.
