More on ‘Walking the Talk’

South Carolina governor Mark Sanford disappeared for almost a week, and when he was found, he was having an affair with a woman from Agentina. Yesterday, I spoke of the importance of being at your post when you’re the leader. After all the hard work you put in charting the course for the crew, you [...]

Leadership is Integrity

Leadership is defined many ways by many different people. John Maxwell, for example, in his book The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership, defines leadership as “influence.” That’s a good definition. People may not define leadership as “integrity,” but I think that we can all agree that a good leader needs to have it.
Pat Croce puts [...]

Are They Your Best Employees?

Recently, a collegue recounted an experience she had working at another store. She said that the crew ran the store, not the management. I asked her what the GM thought about that, and she told me that the GM let the workers do it, and wouldn’t hear anyone telling her that this is wrong.
The two [...]

Speed of Service 1: Be a Leader

It’s a question faced by every fast food manager at some point in his career: how do I decrease my speed of service? Let’s face it–there is a lot of pressure from above you to do so. Most of the time, the higher-ups will not accept the fact that customers do a lot of little [...]

P/PC Balance

In The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, Stephen Covey relates the importance of what he refers to as the P/PC Balance.  He uses the fable about the goose who lays the golden egg to illustrate his point.
For those of us that can’t remember that fable, the story goes that a farmer one day discovers [...]

Messed Up Orders: Two Views

Helium has two essays on messed up orders in fast food restaurants. One says that the employee and the customer are to blame. This one says that only the employees are to blame.
You’d expect that since I’m a fast food employee, that I would side with the first article.  Frankly, I think the [...]

Applying the Tricks of the One Minute Manager

Yesterday, I started to apply the tricks I learned in Dr. Blanchard’s book, The One Minute Manager.   I think that it was a little bit weird for my employees to be told exactly what I think of them and to always know their standing.  I know that this is something that isn’t seen too often [...]

Found at BK: A Card on Great Leaders

I found a card at Burger King on Saturday.  I have no idea where it came from, as I couldn’t find any related materials nearby.  It contained several good points about what a great leader is.  So I thought I’d share them.
Great leaders:

Surround themselves with the best people
Cast a positive shadow
They gain commitment, not compliance
Focus [...]

10 Steps to Empowerment 3: High Standards of Excellence

All too often fast food becomes an environment that tolerates mediocrity.  Most places I’ve worked at were filled with apathetic workers and managers that sat in the office all day and night.  Shortcuts were the norm.  The old-time employees knew the procedures, but no one actually followed them.  The new people never even learned procedures.
Does [...]

10 Steps to Empowerment 2: Delegating Authority

Many fast food managers hate to delegate authority. Fast food is typically an autocratic environment, with the manager barking orders and the employees droning about doing the manager’s bidding. It becomes tough when more than one manager is on duty, because then you have two people barking out orders to the same employee, [...]