Setting the Table The Transforming Power of Hospitality in Business by Danny Meyer

Author:Danny Meyer [Meyer, Danny]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

FEAR VERSUS TRU S T

Fear: them against us

Trust: us as a team, together and united

tyranny collaboration

ruling empowering

fl eeting

enduring

selfi sh

giving

scarcity abundance

closed expressive

telling listening

knowing learning

cynical hopeful

gatekeeper agent

In the divisive fear-based system, employees miss out on the true joys of sustained satisfaction, the satisfaction that comes from achieving for the sake of the pleasure that achievement itself affords. They also miss out on the pleasure of being part of a unified ensemble that achieves great things together. Fear-based management fosters a cor-rosive, dim-witted business culture where huge amounts of energy are squandered by bosses who fear employees, and by employees who fear bosses. There’s a steep price to pay for an organization when a staff member feels confused or intimidated. Prospective leaders often

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opt to leave before they can become great managers; and good employees quit because they know they can never thrive in such a negative climate. That leaves the kind of employees whose emotional needs are met by autocratic, non-empowering bosses. And those are not always the world’s brightest, happiest, or healthiest employees.

And so goes the business.

The good news, for us, is that there are enough bosses out there who rule by fear that they actually make hiring well-trained, motivated managers much easier. It often happens that bosses who rule through fear are actually very good at teaching skills.You never need to wonder what’s expected of you when you work for an ironfi sted boss.When they drive people with excellent skills out the door, some of those talented people find a haven working for a company that welcomes them and encourages them to contribute and thrive. Happily, they often come to us.

7 .Approving Patience and Tough Love

Tough love is another term for frank,“I’m on your side” honesty.

It’s saying,“I care enough about you to tell you the truth, even if the truth is tough to hear.” Patience with tough love sends a clear message to your staff that you’re on their side.We also put a premium on outward and unequivocal messages of approval. It is absolutely incumbent on managers to praise employees for good work. As I once read in Kenneth Blanchard’s One Minute Manager, it’s the managers’

job to “catch people in the act of doing things right.” I subscribe to that and take it one step further.When managers catch somebody on their staff doing something right in a consistent or remarkable way, I encourage those managers to let me know about it fi rst so that I can learn, and also so that I can connect with employees and tell them that their boss told me what a great job they’ve been doing, with specifics.This allows the employees to feel seen and appreciated by both their boss and me. It feels especially good and is a powerful motivator when your boss’s boss catches you doing something right.

Constant, Gentle Pressure 215

Our former chef at Eleven Madison Park, Kerry Heffernan, once told me that since a dishwasher named Juan had

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