Winning With Wooden: Leadership Drives The Team

businessman restaurant leadership
  • AyrKing Mixstir
  • RAK Porcelain
  • T&S Brass Eversteel Pre-Rinse Units
  • DAVO Sales Tax
  • Inline Plastics Safe-T-Chef
  • RATIONAL USA
  • Imperial Dade
  • Atosa USA
  • Red Gold Sacramento
  • BelGioioso Burrata
  • Day & Nite
  • Texas Pete
  • Simplot Frozen Avocado
  • McKee Foodservice
Follow TFS on Google News


Article contributed by Mike Berman, COO, Day & Nite/All Service

Born 111 years ago this month, John Wooden remains timeless where the quote ‘If you don’t have time to do it right, when will you have time to do it over?’ is particularly relevant for today’s compromised operating conditions.

Qualified labor shortages coupled with product and materials scarcity indexed to inflation’s steady beat—with all indicators these and other complicating factors will only accelerate, get worse—require Wizard of Westwood leadership that produced 10 NCAA men’s basketball championships over a twelve year period. Keeping in mind that player turnover is built in to college basketball, all businesses must operate as efficiently as Coach Wooden’s UCLA Bruins did on the court but these stakes are much higher for hospitality in this era of high industrywide employee turnover indexed to foodservice’s premise of creating delightfully memorable customer experiences by serving others.

Recognizing the vital role it plays installing, maintaining and repairing hospitality’s critical Refrigeration – Cooking – HVAC – Indoor Environmental Quality – Plumbing equipment, the Day & Nite family of companies companywide Service-Delivery Chain Excellence initiative is both comforting and instructional for the industry it serves.  This week’s column summarizes an easily replicable guide of the highly engaged process designed to deliver unrivaled efficiencies translated as rewarding employee and customer experiences:

1. Define the Mission

Many refer to hospitality as organized chaos reflective of a service-delivery chain far more complex than the customer might realize; simplification is operational efficiency’s bedrock.  Project mission must be precise, specific and not conjunctive.  To be effective missions should exclude and or or.

2. Provide Compelling, Relevant Data

Just as the mission must be precise, tangible data establishes the size, scope, dimensions and urgency in ways all can relate to.  Rather than stating it in strictly business terms, you’ll get maximum employee engagement by basing the initiative around quality of work-life.

  • McKee Foodservice
  • Inline Plastics Safe-T-Chef
  • T&S Brass Eversteel Pre-Rinse Units
  • Simplot Frozen Avocado
  • Imperial Dade
  • BelGioioso Burrata
  • RATIONAL USA
  • Day & Nite
  • RAK Porcelain
  • AyrKing Mixstir
  • Red Gold Sacramento
  • DAVO Sales Tax
  • Atosa USA
  • Texas Pete

3. Establish a Core Mission Leadership Team

Appoint an executive sponsor but limit the executive’s role to the first 2 steps and program coordination, ongoing oversight.  Depending on the size of your organization, a core leadership team of 3-5 respected individuals coming from different roles/departments/functions serve as the visible hands-on managers responsible for resulting action.

4. Leadership Team Process Maps Your Service-Delivery Chain

Sparing no detail, step-by-step map out your entire service-delivery chain stretching all the way down to at least second tier suppliers right through the time your customer pays for service rendered.  The detailed process map must pay particular attention to interdepartmental handoffs.

5. Leadership Team Identifies and Confirms Service-Delivery Chain Contributions

Related only to how each department or function directly contributes to service-delivery execution, again in very specific terms, the core mission leadership team creates contribution statements for all roles.  Core leadership team then meets with each department to confirm or modify contributory statements as may be necessary.  This important step solidifies alignment.

6. Departments Classify Dependencies

Either coming in to them, or going out to the next function within the service-delivery chain, individual departments isolate all interdepartmental dependencies required to consistently execute.  This must be all-encompassing; no department can be neglected.  As one example, while procurement or finance may not immediately come to service-delivery execution mind, how capable will any company be if they have strained vendor relationships or are delinquent paying supplier bills?

7. Point-to-Point Problem Solving, Agile Communication

With the executive sponsor serving as a human wrecking ball to knock down any barriers that may exist or pop up, with the core leadership team hosting direct interdepartmental sessions driven by Key Performance Indicator and Key Performance Measure guidelines, incoming and outgoing dependencies are then addressed with explicit commitments from all.

8. Velocity and Momentum Imperative

One of Day & Nite/All Service/Popular Plumbing/Performance Air Mechanical’s core leadership members often reminds others let’s not boil the ocean, the perfect advice for getting this right. Emphasizing progressive steps, building a greater culture of continuous exploration and improvement will produce optimal results. Think of this like a sustained long drive in football resulting in a touchdown and not a singular spectacular play.

9. Daily Companywide Communication and Reporting

Mostly from the executive sponsor, but also appropriate from core mission leadership and participating managers each day should open and conclude with broadcast status reports, highlighting successes, stoking velocity and momentum fires

10. Established Sustainable Culture

Though this methodology includes classic project elements, make no mistake about it—it’s a defining mission built around purposeful collaboration determined to generate unrivaled operating efficiencies oriented to deliver consistently superb customer experiences through service-delivery excellence. Woven into an organization’s fabric the mission becomes the culture, the culture the brand.

If you’d like to learn more about how your business can prioritize the time to routinely do things right in pursuit of maximum efficiency and service-delivery excellence, to speak with one of Day & Nite/All Service/Popular Plumbing/Performance Air Mechanical core team leaders or participating managers email jbf@wearetheone.com.  The company’s commitment has always been to best support the foodservice industry and if the team can help you with more than expert installation, maintenance and repair for critical HVAC – Refrigeration – Cooking – Indoor Environmental Quality – Plumbing equipment, count on them!

  • Red Gold Sacramento
  • T&S Brass Eversteel Pre-Rinse Units
  • RAK Porcelain
  • Day & Nite
  • McKee Foodservice
  • Inline Plastics Safe-T-Chef
  • Imperial Dade
  • BelGioioso Burrata
  • DAVO Sales Tax
  • Simplot Frozen Avocado
  • AyrKing Mixstir
  • Atosa USA
  • RATIONAL USA
  • Texas Pete