New Year and all that

As we come to the end of 2013, it's been a very education year.  I've learned the following things:
1. That I am just starting this journey of becoming a true business person.  It is like a crash course MBA.
2. That I understand the need for decisiveness and the need for proper discussions with conflicting views.
3. That I do not think about people enough, and yet people contribute so much (if not all) of the success of a business.
4. That being in the hot seat ie the Managing Director, is the toughest seat in the company.  It is also probably the most rewarding for growth.  But wanting to do the job may not mean being the best suited to the job.
5. That one must have self-awareness of what it best for the business, even if it is contrary to what I personally want, is fundamental to its long term success.  Having said that, when you align personal needs with business needs is when the business can really take off.

So key actions for 2014.
1. Stay involved in the business, even with this Deep Dive.  Watch and learn, and if required, do and learn.  I must have a better handle on how all the parts come together.
2. I must be ready to take up the position again.  What does being ready mean?  The ability to continue to deliver on the targets that have been made.
3. Learn learn learn.  Keep asking "why" until I get a satisfactory answer.  Be willing to come back to address the issue.  It is too easy for me to just nod and agree.  I need to do that less and assess the information as I go along.
4. Really hold people accountable for their jobs.  On the other hand, really understand the people to know why they do the things they do.
5. Shadow Jo for Suntec build as I have no experienced that side of the business.

Guilt

"You feel guilty when you’re doing something you like doing outside of the company.  Only through years of wrestling with this internal fight do you recognize how the word “balance” is an art that is just as important as any other skill set you could ever hope to have. "

- Paul DeJoe, http://www.knowledgeformen.com/what-it-feels-like-to-be-the-ceo-of-a-startup-over-100k-views/

I think anyone that owns their own company has this feeling, and it is reinforced externally as well.  Many people (including good friends) "what? you're not at the restaurant?" as if it is a sin to not watch it every day.  I feel guilty when I take time off, and the guilt is all self-induced.  

Perhaps this is all an ego thing. To be honest, I think that this restaurant can and will run without me.  Will it be the best restaurant that it can be?  Perhaps I am there to push the guys for that extra 5-10%.  As much as I would like to think that I make a big difference, I don't think I really do.  What I can do is to give the boost / structure / comfort / feedback in a "constant, gentle, pressure" kind of way to steer us in the right direction.  And in the long run, that extra 5-10% compounds each day.

But back to balance, my partner noted that I was more distant from the business the last few weeks. I do feel a tiredness, probably due to my own doubts as to where I wish to be.  Ironically, it might be a good way to get some balance in my life, to not be so 100% on the business.We all need to recharge once in a while.

Of course there is that fear that once the foot is off the pedal, it will all come crashing down.  But I doubt it.

Looking at it this way, I realise my personality is about finding things to fix up.  Correlating to that, the fact that something is fixed up means that I don't feel an internal need to keep making it better.  Like a true project manager, once the project is delivered, I move on.  Perhaps this is what I am feeling, a sense of "moving on".  But with the guilt of it being my own business, I need to make sure it gets better. Hence my tiredness!

On Giving

"So the question is: In your relationships, in your business, in your health, what are you giving too much of without getting something in return. This is not about selfishness but about being confident in your message, and ultimately about your survival, about your happiness."  -- James Altucher

It has been one year (1 year 2 months if you count KL training) since I have started this business.  There are definitely times when I wonder if what I give to this business is worth it.  Perhaps I am not good at seeing the forest from the trees, I am always just thinking about doing.  That is my character, to not be too future focussed, and also to not properly assess what I am "owed".

My partner and I had a conversation about our salary, to properly pay ourselves.  To be honest, I haven't really thought about it at all, I haven't thought "hey, I run a profitable $3m revenue business, I should be getting paid better".  Thank goodness someone is thinking it for me!  But then again, does it matter?

Even in this partnership, where I am reporting to my partner, am I giving too much without enough in return?  Are our contributions the same? Effort does not equal effectiveness.  What if it takes me 2 hours that he does in 30 min?  Should I still demand that he put in 2 hours effort?  No, I don't think that is the best way to be effective.

I think with all relationships, whether business, friends, one must have faith that the other person is trying their best to make the relationship be better.  Otherwise if you second guess all the time, you spend too much time questioning and not enough time building.  It may be better to have blind faith than to live in a world of worry and distrust.  Ignorance is bliss!

However, self awareness and acceptance is a better option.  Make the decision to accept the situation as it is and make the most of it.  If there comes a time when it is time to part, then part gracefully, knowing that you made the effort to make it work.

Leading

With any job, there is a balance of managing and leading.  One of the challenges (and joys for those who like it) is to consistently ask the question "is there a better way?" or even more challenging, "are we doing the right thing?"

For me this transition is still very difficult.  I find that each new opportunity or suggestion that gets raised, I think "will it work?", instead of "why not?".  And the less I am willing to test the status quo, the less that my people will want to bring up new opportunities to me.  I think this is a directly correlated to my working experience in IT and project management.  It's about hitting the goal that is designated, it is about managing what we have (this is especially so in a corporate IT environment).

I do enjoy the people interactions of being a leader, to shape a team.  Although that can be done as a manager.  The difference is in the "inspiring" part of the people interaction.  Talking to a friend who also was leading a business unit, he told me his stress of trying to meet sales targets, whilst enjoying the process of building a team. 

Would I still be willing to be a leader if it was under different circumstances?  If I didn't have this current reporting structure?  Would I be as driven to results as I currently am?  I think not.  Would that make the company not as "lean and mean"? I think also unlikely.  To be a leader, one must be willing to really be hungry for a goal, to shape everyone else to follow it.  The easiest thing to be hungry for is the money.  Since I don't have that type of hunger, I need to find something else.   A cause, possibly?

Branding and Social Media

I remember reading an article about personal branding, and one of the key points of the article is to emphasise the importance of continuously creating content.

Talking with our marketing manager, she identified two points that I had not previously realised:
1. That food photos get a lot more activity than drink photos.
2. That given Facebook's prevalence in the online world (and our lack of a real website), all our online interaction comes through FB.  This implies that it becomes our "official" channel.

She is taking things slowly on that path, consistently creating content, but not really getting "out there".  I suggested to increase the number of "ambiance" photos of the outlet, even some of the humurous signs we have in our outlet.  She disagreed, and her point was that the brand that our restaurant represents is always about the food, the drinks, and to a certain extent the fact that people come to us to have a good time and to celebrate with their co-workers, friends and family.  Putting out humour may not be congruent to the image.  However, celebration images may be useful.

I also mentioned videos, which is definitely good to demonstrate cooking processes.  We may start shooting some amateur stuff, but the cost of a proper production is beyond our budgets at the moment.

What was also interesting was how she saw the use of Facebook vs Instagram.  She believes that Instragram can be used to capture more of the "unofficial" side of our restaurant, a lot more "day in the life" stuff, which sounds right.

Mental note to bring my fixed lens camera in to take some better shots of the staff!

Execution

Revisiting the execution principles, one thing I need to grasp is:
"yes, we are doing these things and we commit to these things, what things must we NOT do so that we can appropriately focus our energies?"

In projects that was about defining scope.  Similar in promotions, what is key is to define what has stopped and what has started in our promotions.

However, it does lead to a conflict.  From the Disney Institute talk the other day about using creativity and innovation to drive continuous improvement and productivity, one thing the speaker asked us as an exercise to do is to go to our staff and ask "what are you saying no to?".  The easier it is for front line staff to say yes, the easier it is for our front line staff to deliver excellent service.

So if I have to say "no" to an existing promotion, even though there are guests that really like the promotion, am I better off to allow that "yes" to occur?  The balance here is between executional / operational focus and guest flexibility.

I will do that exercise with my staff this week and see what I obstacles we put up for ourselves.

Understanding Promotions

What have I learned about promotions?

Promotions are categorised in two types:  one to increase the average check of people that are already in the restaurant, the other to bring people into the restaurant in the first place.

The best promotions are those that are able to do both, but in a lot of cases (e.g. discount promotions), one must sacrifice average check in order to bring people in.

The reason it is important to understand our own branding is because that is what people see in us and expect from us.  And hence we will have a better chance of bringing people into the restaurant without sacrificing a/c if we are giving value to our guests in ways that is not just about money.  One clear differentiator would be that people come back for variety.

That all promotions need to be aligned with the brand.

And the brand is focused on "Best Ribs in Town" and "We bring the Real Smiles".  I think from an guest's perspective, we offer something "vaguely American" which is well received.

We would like to add "Best Coolers in Town" as there is a lot of room for creativity here.

In order to be true to the brand, we must continue to play in the space of ribs.  This includes new flavours, new cuts of ribs. We can even extend to different ribs, not just pork ribs.  It also gives our kitchen a great opportunity to express their creativity.

Back to Learning

Wow, a whole year has passed since I wrote on this blog!  I am now the proud owner of a restaurant that serves roughly 8000 guests a month.  My marketing manager wrote a press release talking about our "100,000th" guest.  Amazing.

With all good stories, what lies below is all the stress, late nights, pressures that come with attempting to start a new business.  F&B is tough, but it is has a wonderful feedback mechanism, in that every day is a show, and every day you have to be ready.  The pressure to perform every day means that our staff get better quite fast.  However, to perform every day means that we are always scrambling and putting out fires.  This means that developing a proper structure is hard, because there is a lack of time to train the staff, unless you really dedicate the time and effort to it.  And hence without proper structure, the same frustrating mistakes get made over and over again.

A lot of the operating processes I thought we could use from the franchisor, but I think they were too weak and not specific enough for our outlet.  And, to be honest, we didn't value it enough, having caught the "if it's not invented here, we don't like it" disease.  It was good and bad.  Good in that I have a very good understanding of Front of House, bad in that we keep changing out SOPs, so we are not very good at enforcing them.  One thing I am focussing on now is the commitment to what we promise to ourselves.  One worrying issue is that I did not and still have not found a great passion for food in general.  Can I be the best leader when I am not passionate about our product?  I have no answer for that.

We continue to struggle with consistency, but I feel it gets better each day. Our team has stabilised across the last 6 months, and the best thing I can say about my team is that they all have heart.  I have neglected a lot of the people development component and will focus on that.  I was told of an analogy to people development, similar to watering a plant.  There is the daily misting of the leaves, and then there is the once a week watering of the roots.  Similarly, people need a balance of the light "hello, how are you" stuff as well as the heavy "here's your performance" contact in order to perform.

For the first time this week, I went on a educational course, specifically about how to grow as a leader. I realise I just need to look further into the future, to create a compelling vision that would make others want to follow.  This is my main struggle.  I have never been too future-focused, but I must be able to articulate a future, otherwise it is too easy to drift.  I don't quite know how to fix this, but I know I must do it.

I have changed over the course of the last year, as some of my friends can confirm.  A greater willingness to speak my thoughts, to disagree, to raise difficult questions.  Perhaps I am not as carefree as I used to be, I'm not sure.  I think it's a good development, perhaps it's a sign of maturity. At least I have more time to reflect, so it's back to learning every day!