Tag Archives: Strategic management

November 6, 2015 · 11:09 am

Being There

Our Foodie Friday Fun this week revolves around a question that keeps getting asked in foodie circles: do you care if the chef is in the kitchen? Many of the top chefs in the country have multiple restaurants, and obviously they can’t be in each kitchen every night. Does it make a difference and, moreover, does it say anything to us about how we run our businesses?

Augustin Théodule Ribot: The cook and the cat

 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In my mind, it’s immaterial. The chef is responsible for the overall menu and for developing the recipes. Once that’s done, the chef needs to hire and train an Executive Chef or Chef de Cuisine, or Sous Chef to execute those recipes to the chef’s standards each and every time. From there, maintaining the standards (and changing the menu once in a while) is the main thing that should be required.

I think people get more upset when they know the namesake isn’t there in the restaurant business than in others. Surely they don’t think that the fashion designer is walking the factory floor as clothes are made. In music, have you ever heard a really good cover band? For example – The Dark Star Orchestra plays set lists from Grateful Dead shows and on many nights they play them better than The Dead did originally. They are executing the recipes to perfection, much as a well-trained brigade does.

What does this have to do with your business? Let’s use an example I hear a lot in consulting. A big time firm comes in to pitch a potential client with a top-tier crew of executives. Generally, there is no chance those people will be working on your business. They key question, then, is what sort of training and tenure do the people who will be handling your business have? Many Sous or Executive Chefs have been with the “name” chef for years. Many of these consultants are fresh out of school.

You see the same thing with ad agencies and in other sectors. My feeling doesn’t change from the kitchen – the “name” being there isn’t critical if, and only if, the staff has been properly trained and is constantly checked on maintaining standards. You’re not going to eat the chef; you’re going to eat his or her food. Your clients, partners, and customers are expecting your business’ “food” to taste the same no matter who prepares it.

Leave a comment

Filed under Consulting, food

Tagged as , , , , ,

November 2, 2015 · 12:15 pm

Preservationists

I live in a town with a lot of old houses. By the town’s definition, that’s 50 years or more, although there are a lot of homes that are well over 100 years old. I should know: I live in one. Oh sure, a lot has been changed, both in my house and in many others, but the original structure and feeling of the building has been preserved. It’s part of what I liked about this town until recently. While there is plenty of new construction, much of the work was about adding on and/or renovating.  

I used the past tense because the trend over the last few years has been to knock down the older homes and build overly large new homes – they’re known as McMansions here. In fact, a local website features a Teardown Of The Day photo of some old home that is destined to be destroyed. Fortunately, we also have a Historic District Commission, and plans to rip down any home that’s over 50 years old are reviewed to be sure that no historic buildings or ones with historical value to the town are destroyed.

What does this have to do with business? I was reminded by it when I came across a quote from the critic Ada Louise Huxtable. She noted almost 50 years ago, “What preservation is really all about, is the retention and active relationship of buildings of the past to the community’s functioning present.” The same is true of sound business principles, which all too often are discarded like an old house as new technologies change the nature of the businesses.

Some of what I do with clients when I begin working with them is to clarify the “old” business thinking that needs to be preserved as we add on the new stuff. It’s akin to upgrading the electrical system and insulation which leaving the sound structure intact.  Sure, some of the old stuff needs to be tossed – you aren’t dependent on others for content distribution, for example, or your marketing can’t be a bullhorn, constantly blasting “buy me” messages.  Still, the underlying principles behind distribution and marketing haven’t changed since I’ve been in business (and I’m very much one of those historic houses at this point).  Confusing tools with the business just does not work.

I guess that makes me a preservationist.  I believe in retaining the sound old stuff and placing it into a present context.  What about you?

Leave a comment

Filed under Consulting

Tagged as , , ,

October 30, 2015 · 8:55 am

Recipes

This Foodie Friday, I’d like to talk about recipes.  Every family has them, as does every great chef.  Obviously, the difference between the results those two types of cooks deliver is large, even if the recipes they use aren’t really all that different.  What’s the difference, then?  The answer is a good business point.  

Let’s think about music for a second.  The musicians are combining their ingredients – the various sounds their instruments can make – based on a recipe given to them by the composer – the sheet music.  Just because you have the sheet music doesn’t mean you can play the tune.   Listen to even an accomplished high school orchestra and compare the results of their playing a symphony to the New York Philharmonic or any other world-class orchestra playing the same piece.  They’re quite different.  Successfully completing the recipe – making beautiful music – takes practice and technique.

It’s the same with food.  You might wonder why many great chefs share their secret recipes so freely.  It’s because they can give you the recipe, but that doesn’t mean you can cook the meal. You make lack their skill, you may lack the quality ingredients they use, you may be missing the tools they have (try comparing a steak done in a home broiler which might be 500 degrees to a steak house steak done at 1000 degrees).  I can almost guarantee you that what you produce and what they produce, even following the same recipe, will be very different.

That’s the business point too.  Just because you think you understand a successful business doesn’t mean you can replicate it.  I can explain my business in great depth, but that doesn’t mean you can start one up to compete with me.  The key for any of us in business is to develop the things that are difficult to steal.  Your team, your culture, and your relationship with your customers and partners are good places to start.  Amazon didn’t have the first online store, but the product they produced from the same recipe as others was just better.  The iPod wasn’t the first MP3 player, and there were many issued after it, but none with the same success even though the recipe was basically the same.  There are many other examples.

Great recipes are a basic requirement for success in the kitchen and in business, but don’t make yourself crazy protecting them.  Focus on what makes you really better.  Agreed?

 

Leave a comment

Filed under food, Thinking Aloud

Tagged as , , , ,