December 2, 2025 • 19 mins
Zack sits down with Peter Gaudreau, CEO of Tacodeli, to talk about scaling a beloved founder-led brand while protecting what matters most. Peter shares how ingredient integrity, empowered managers, and thoughtful packaging make hospitality show up both on premise and off. A real service recovery story shows what guest care looks like in action and how feedback fuels better leadership.
Zack and Peter discuss:
- Balancing founder DNA with growth
- Why ingredient quality is a hospitality choice
- Designing catering and to go that presents well
- Training managers to own service recovery
- Using feedback to set weekly priorities
- Tenure, consistency, and trust
Thanks, Peter!
Links:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/peter-gaudreau-0b357521/
https://www.linkedin.com/company/tacodeli/
https://www.instagram.com/tacodeli/
https://www.tacodeli.com/
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_01 (00:00):
Welcome to another edition of Give and Ovation, the
Restaurant Guest ExperiencePodcast.
I'm your host, Zach Oates, andeach week I chat with industry
experts to uncover theirstrategies and tactics to help
you create a five-star guestexperience.
This podcast is powered byOvation, the feedback and
operations platform built formulti-unit restaurants.
Learn what's actually happeningin your restaurants and exactly
(00:23):
how to improve while drivingrevenue.
Learn more at ovationup.com.
And today we have JoffreyTeffetti with us.
He is the CEO of FrontlinePerformance Group.
He's been there for 14 years,working with some amazing
brands.
He is lucky to be based inFlorida, especially on this
chilly winter day in Utah.
(00:45):
But Joffrey, so excited to haveyou on the podcast.
Thanks for joining us.
Thank you, Zach.
I'm really excited about doingthis.
I appreciate it.
And one of the things I wasdrawn to when I was doing some
research on you was just one ofthe things that we always say
here on the podcast is that theguest experience cannot exceed
the employee experience.
And so for those who don't know,maybe you can share a little bit
(01:07):
about what does FrontlinePerformance Group do and how do
you help to create a bettercustomer experience?
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (01:15):
So Frontline Performance Group has been
around for we're in our 33rdyear, and we've always
exclusively supported frontlineteams in a variety of
industries, anything from cardealerships to theme parks, and
now hospitality.
Hospitality has become ourstrategic focus: hotels and
restaurants and bars.
And the way that we help createa great guest experience is that
(01:36):
we are in the business ofimproving and developing the
frontline.
So the frontline is the brand.
A lot of business owners orcorporate leaders forget that
your entire brand experience isyour frontline employees.
They can make or break anyexperience that a guest is going
to have.
So if you refine the frontline'sapproach, if you empower them,
(01:57):
if you build a really strongculture around them, it's going
to translate directly to yourguests.
Because the phrase you justused, our version is you can
expect your guests to be treatedexactly the way you treat those
you lead.
SPEAKER_01 (02:10):
Bam.
SPEAKER_00 (02:11):
Culture rolls downhill.
Right.
And so that's our entire ethoshow do we get the culture sound?
How do we get people trained upto be effective in their jobs?
And then everyone wins.
The frontline can make moremoney, the restaurant or hotel
can thrive, and the guest has abetter experience because the
human exchange is more nuanced.
SPEAKER_01 (02:29):
I think that is so powerful to think about because
you do all of this work.
I mean, everything that we do inhospitality is either to
increase profits or create abetter guest experience.
Everything.
And yet, when you look at thepower of your frontline workers,
we recently had a podcastepisode with the CEO of Taco
Deli where he was talking aboutsome of his employees have been
(02:52):
there for over 20 years, thesekitchen managers.
And so you want to talk aboutprofitability.
How quickly and efficiently andwithout mistakes, can someone
that's been there for 20 yearsdoing it, as opposed to someone
that's been there for 20 hours,right?
There's a profitability withyour people.
And not only that, everythingthat happens, the last line is
(03:14):
always the front line, which islike we often talk about the
last mile, but it's about thatlast foot.
When I hand it to you, how doyou feel?
When I put the food down, howdoes it feel?
When I'm expoing for a to-goorder, how accurate is it?
And it's all about thosefrontline people.
So what do you actually do tohelp frontline workers?
(03:34):
Like, and maybe we could kind ofparlay that into talking about
the guest experience, but how doyou think about the important
aspects of guest experience asit relates to frontline workers?
SPEAKER_00 (03:44):
We spend our time in environments where revenue is in
play.
So we use revenue as thebenchmark for the performance of
our model.
So, how do we help?
Is we go in and we have asoftware platform and it
basically provides the entiretoolkit to optimize performance
at the frontline.
It handles recognition, ithandles goal setting, incentive
calculations, and training.
(04:06):
There's a lot of training inthere.
But essentially what we'retrying to do is we're trying to
get the frontline to engage theguest in a service-focused way
to drive more revenue bylistening to them, by responding
to the cues you're receiving,and by basically fulfilling your
promise.
So being attentive, being awareof what's going on, active
(04:27):
listening.
But we also teach them the rightway to promote things.
So you don't ask, do you wantthis or do you want that?
You recommend.
I'll give you a real example.
Let's say someone orders a steakand you want to sell them an
add-on to that steak.
You wouldn't say, Do you wantasparagus with that?
You'd say, you know, most peoplethat have this steak really
(04:47):
enjoy our asparagus.
That is a nuanced way ofpromoting it.
It's the same with the hotel.
If someone's checking in and youwant to offer them a room, you
don't just say, Do you want abigger room?
You say, because you'retraveling with your family and
you need a little more space, Ithink you would enjoy a suite.
It's a nuance, but it changesthe dynamic of being sold to to
being served.
(05:09):
And when you can actuallyaccomplish that, your revenue
goes up and your guestexperience goes up.
SPEAKER_01 (05:14):
Amen.
And I think that when you thinkabout what that looks like in
terms of the guest experience,and when you can say, hey, I
want to make sure that the guestis feeling something.
I love that it really thinkingabout it in terms of how do we
train, how do we improve theemployees?
And what are some tactics thatyou've seen that have actually
(05:36):
helped employees feel empoweredand feel like they matter?
SPEAKER_00 (05:40):
We promote what we call the Corey performance
equation, our founder, ZiadCorey, who was the visionary of
this.
And it's basically a frameworkfor leadership and culture.
There's three things that arenecessary to properly motivate
frontline people.
One is reward.
So they have to be gettingrewarded in some way,
incentives, tips in restaurants.
It could be incentive programrecognition.
(06:03):
So when people are doing whatyou want them to do, recognize
them publicly in front of theirpeers, and accountability.
So it's not all fluff.
You need a little carrot littlestick.
So accountability is are youfulfilling your part of the
mission as an employee?
Whatever the standards are thatwe set as a business.
SPEAKER_01 (06:21):
And when you put those three things together, by
the way, could we just pausewhatever the standards you set
as a business?
That is important because what Isee a lot of times is people
will come in, the standards arenot explicitly set.
And then it's like, hey, we wantyou to.
We just had someone who was headof brand at Papa John's, and we
were talking about how she'slike, we want them to be
(06:44):
friendly.
Well, what does friendly mean?
And like maybe I'm from NewYork.
Friendly means something verydifferent than if I'm from Utah.
SPEAKER_00 (06:53):
Yeah, if you're from Philly, it might mean insulting
your guest.
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah, yeah.
Right.
There we go.
Are you from North Jersey?
No.
Oh, okay.
But I know I know the area.
SPEAKER_01 (07:03):
Yeah, but that I mean, that's the thing, right?
You got to clearly set theexpectations of what you want
them to be doing.
But anyway, I sorry, I cut youoff there, but just like that's
so key to not forget that it isour job as leaders to set the
expectations so that we can holdthem accountable, so that they
(07:24):
know what it means to besuccessful, right?
SPEAKER_00 (07:26):
That's exactly right.
So the best way to set anexpectation in a service focus
where your product is service isto embody it.
That's the best way for a leaderto get a standard set, is to be
the standard.
And then you can say with astraight face, I expect you to
treat the guest the way I'mtreating you.
But yeah, defining it, having aframework, having a process that
(07:46):
you endorse as a business leaderthat you want people to follow,
all those things are importantso that you can hold people
accountable.
But it's also measurement.
So you can't hold someoneaccountable if you're not
measuring their performance.
So we, our platform is reallyall about how are people doing?
Are they responding positivelyto the training?
Do we see their metricsimproving?
(08:07):
And we're big believers inleaderboards.
So you put their names, don'thave to be on there.
Like in our system, that the theservers have their own app, but
they only see their name on theleaderboard, but they can see
where they rank.
So when you think you're doing agood job and you look at the
leaderboard and you're ninth outof 12 positions, it's
eye-opening.
And that's the accountabilitythat we go for, is just let them
(08:29):
know where they are.
You don't have to confront themwith it, but just let them know
where they are and then make thetraining and make the
recognition and make the rewardprograms available to drive
their performance up.
But yeah, it's to your point, ifyou don't know what you're
striving for, you're onquicksand, you don't know what
the goalposts are.
You gotta set some goalposts.
What is success?
SPEAKER_01 (08:48):
And are we providing them with the training and tools
to be successful?
And I think that's somethingwhere I'm thinking that like
this episode is reminding me oflike the cliff notes of the five
dysfunctions of a team, youknow, because it really is.
I mean, there's so much therethat that is so good and
accurate, but we get so caughtup sometimes in strategy or in
(09:12):
maybe our pet project of what wecare about the most that we
forget that really it's aboutmaking sure that our team is
empowered to be successful.
SPEAKER_00 (09:22):
Yeah, a common thought experiment would be if
you had a really beautifulaesthetic restaurant, the menu
was amazing, the chef was asuperstar, and your staff were
rude.
Would the food and aestheticprevail?
And conversely, if you have adive bar on the beach selling
fried food, but your staff isincredibly good, would that
(09:44):
overcome the aesthetic?
And I think everyone knows theintuitive answer.
The staff set the quality of theexperience.
It's not the environment.
I mean, those are all importantthings.
I understand you want to go fora concept, but if you don't have
the right culture at the frontline, you lose.
And most restaurants are pretty,they're okay.
I mean, you go in, people aren'trude, you know, they're not
(10:04):
yelling at you and stuff, butthey're just not as tuned in as
they could be.
For instance, we work with abunch of restaurants and we look
at the leaderboards on revenueper guest.
This is just as an example.
And in the same shift, the sameservers, there is often a 20 to
25% differential in revenue perguest between the top performers
(10:24):
and the bottom.
That means same guest, sameshift, you could make 20% more
revenue.
Why?
Because the people at the topare engaging the guests, they're
super friendly, they'relistening, they're seizing
opportunities to recommendenhancements, where others are
just taking the order.
And they're like, Oh, my, youknow, my name's job, I'm gonna
take care of today.
Would you like some bread?
(10:45):
That's what's happening.
The the top performers are like,let's get you started with a
round of drinks, let's get thisexperience underway.
I'll be right back.
They come back when they saythey're going to, they don't
leave for 20 minutes, so youcan't get your drink refilled.
It's like those kind of things.
So that's what we're focused onis the techniques that separate
top performance from average andimparting that into the servers
(11:07):
by giving it a what's in it forme, which is the accountability
reward and recognition.
Love that.
SPEAKER_01 (11:12):
And at the end of the day, people want to feel
seen and they want money, right?
And so if we could find a way togive them both, then amen.
Love that.
And one of the things that I'dlove to get your professional
opinion on this, one of thethings that we do at ovation is
we do something called give anovation, where it's not just the
(11:32):
podcast, but we also have aninternal give and ovation where
everyone at ovation gets whatthey call an ovation that they
get to give to somebody else.
So it's a monthly bonus thatthey have to give to someone
else.
And then at our all handsmeetings, they fill out a form
beforehand saying who they weregiving their ovation to because
they exhibited which of our fiveovation values and what happened
(11:53):
that made them earn that ovationof yours.
And then we read that in the allhands meeting.
And so that's just like a smallway that we can catch everyone.
Everyone's looking for otherways to say thank you and to
find people that are doing goodout there.
I guess what do you think aboutthat?
And what are some simple waysthat other that restaurants
might be able to help in therecognition standpoint?
SPEAKER_00 (12:15):
Yeah, so I think that's a phenomenal scenario.
We do something internally wecall cheers for peers.
Similar concept.
We do it every Friday, and it'sanyone in the company can give
cheers to anyone else in thecompany, and it's sent out to
the whole company.
So it's you do exactly whatyou're saying with innovation.
I love that you coined that.
I think that for the averagebusiness owner, I think it's
(12:36):
about having the kind ofenvironment where you solicit
from them positive feedback.
I'm thinking about my son, hewas on a football team, one of
the top teams in the country fora while.
And at the end of practice, theymake a starter stand up and pick
a non-starter and in front ofthe entire team recognize them
(12:57):
for something.
So that he's bringing the peoplewho aren't on the field into the
fold with the starters.
And it culturally, it's amassive when you're the kid,
when my kid was a freshman andone of the seniors called his
name, it's like you make suremonth.
A similar kind of thing couldhappen.
Your senior seasoned peoplecould pick your people that
haven't been there as long.
Like you were saying, with thevalue of a cook that's been
(13:18):
doing the line for 20 yearsversus a newbie, but have them
recognize each other is a hugelypowerful for culture building.
There's no question.
Love that.
SPEAKER_01 (13:28):
Amazing.
And I love this conversationbecause it really is all about
the people and just fantastic.
So if someone is, you obviouslyknow a lot of people around this
industry.
Who is someone that we should befollowing?
Who deserves an ovation?
SPEAKER_00 (13:42):
Well, I'll tell you, there's several people I work
with that I would love to answerthat question with, but I can't
because then I'm excludingeveryone else.
Uh, and I have to be verycareful.
But Will Gadera, your the bookyou have on the shelf behind
you, hugely influential to ourthinking about food and
beverage.
This is our newest industry.
We've been working at it forabout two years, but we work
with almost 3,000 hotels, butthe restaurants is fairly new
(14:04):
for us.
He has been a huge influence onunderstanding the psyche of a
restaurant tour and how you cango over the top to win guest
favor.
Now, not everyone can afford todo what 11 Madison does, but the
minor nuances that you canimpart onto your staff by
treating them in a nuanced way,you're basically teaching them
(14:24):
and every interaction they havewith you on how to treat the
guest.
And that will definitely driveforward.
And he's been hugely influentialto us.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (14:33):
There's a reason the book is right behind me.
He's one of my heroes.
He's been an incredible guy.
And they say, Don't meet yourheroes.
And I had him on the podcast,and I think that phrase is
accurate, not because I was atall disappointed, because he was
every ounce as amazing as Ithought he was, but because I
got so scared to meet himbecause I just was such a
fanboy.
(14:53):
So don't meet your heroesbecause you may look like an
idiot.
But anyway, but truly though,just what a great guy and
totally influential.
I have my two shoulder angelsare Will Gadera and just love.
And I figure that's what it'sall about.
Any last advice to someone whois thinking about how do I
improve the performance of myfrontline staff?
(15:13):
Anything that besides reachingout to you, which we're gonna
get to in just a second.
SPEAKER_00 (15:17):
Yeah, you just stole my punchline, I was gonna say,
other than hiring us.
Yeah, I mean, I've never ownedor run a restaurant, so there's
things about it I'm not gonnapresume to know.
But what I do know is frontlineteam culture and selling.
And I've said it a couple oftimes.
It's really like you have toimpart love and trust and
respect to your team.
You as a leader have to do thatfirst.
(15:39):
You can't expect them to give itto you first.
You've got to give it to themfirst.
And when you give them trust andlove and respect, they are going
to pass that right on to theguest.
If you're treating them like anauthoritarian and you're
micromanaging them and you'rebossing them around, you can
expect they're gonna be shortwith your guests, they're not
gonna have patience because theydon't feel like there's room for
(16:01):
them to take their time and doit right.
So they're gonna rush theguests.
It is how it is.
But a lot of times you getwrapped up, you lose sight of
the fact that that's what you'redoing.
So I would say, look in themirror, ask, am I treating my
guests, my employees the waythat I want them to treat the
guests?
And if the answer is no, justmake adjustments.
It's never too late to make theadjustments.
SPEAKER_01 (16:21):
Love that.
Awesome.
Well, Joffrey, for reminding usthat team is key and for being
the kindest Joffrey out of thetwo that I know of.
Today's ovation goes to you.
Thank you for joining us onGiven Ovation.
Thank you so much.
It was great to be here.
Thanks for joining us today.
If you like this episode, leaveus a review on Apple Podcasts or
(16:41):
your favorite place to listen.
We're all about feedback here.
Again, this episode wassponsored by Ovation, a two
question SMS based actionableguest feedback platform built
for multi unit restaurants.
If you'd like to learn how wecan help you measure and create
a better guest experience, visitus at ovationup.com.
Welcome to another edition of Give and Ovation, the
Restaurant Guest ExperiencePodcast.
I'm your host, Zach Oates, andeach week I chat with industry
experts to uncover theirstrategies and tactics to help
you create a five-star guestexperience.
This podcast is powered byOvation, the feedback and
operations platform built formulti-unit restaurants.
Learn what's actually happeningin your restaurants and exactly
(00:23):
how to improve while drivingrevenue.
Learn more at ovationup.com.
And today we have JoffreyTeffetti with us.
He is the CEO of FrontlinePerformance Group.
He's been there for 14 years,working with some amazing
brands.
He is lucky to be based inFlorida, especially on this
chilly winter day in Utah.
(00:45):
But Joffrey, so excited to haveyou on the podcast.
Thanks for joining us.
Thank you, Zach.
I'm really excited about doingthis.
I appreciate it.
And one of the things I wasdrawn to when I was doing some
research on you was just one ofthe things that we always say
here on the podcast is that theguest experience cannot exceed
the employee experience.
And so for those who don't know,maybe you can share a little bit
(01:07):
about what does FrontlinePerformance Group do and how do
you help to create a bettercustomer experience?
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (01:15):
So Frontline Performance Group has been
around for we're in our 33rdyear, and we've always
exclusively supported frontlineteams in a variety of
industries, anything from cardealerships to theme parks, and
now hospitality.
Hospitality has become ourstrategic focus: hotels and
restaurants and bars.
And the way that we help createa great guest experience is that
(01:36):
we are in the business ofimproving and developing the
frontline.
So the frontline is the brand.
A lot of business owners orcorporate leaders forget that
your entire brand experience isyour frontline employees.
They can make or break anyexperience that a guest is going
to have.
So if you refine the frontline'sapproach, if you empower them,
(01:57):
if you build a really strongculture around them, it's going
to translate directly to yourguests.
Because the phrase you justused, our version is you can
expect your guests to be treatedexactly the way you treat those
you lead.
SPEAKER_01 (02:10):
Bam.
SPEAKER_00 (02:11):
Culture rolls downhill.
Right.
And so that's our entire ethoshow do we get the culture sound?
How do we get people trained upto be effective in their jobs?
And then everyone wins.
The frontline can make moremoney, the restaurant or hotel
can thrive, and the guest has abetter experience because the
human exchange is more nuanced.
SPEAKER_01 (02:29):
I think that is so powerful to think about because
you do all of this work.
I mean, everything that we do inhospitality is either to
increase profits or create abetter guest experience.
Everything.
And yet, when you look at thepower of your frontline workers,
we recently had a podcastepisode with the CEO of Taco
Deli where he was talking aboutsome of his employees have been
(02:52):
there for over 20 years, thesekitchen managers.
And so you want to talk aboutprofitability.
How quickly and efficiently andwithout mistakes, can someone
that's been there for 20 yearsdoing it, as opposed to someone
that's been there for 20 hours,right?
There's a profitability withyour people.
And not only that, everythingthat happens, the last line is
(03:14):
always the front line, which islike we often talk about the
last mile, but it's about thatlast foot.
When I hand it to you, how doyou feel?
When I put the food down, howdoes it feel?
When I'm expoing for a to-goorder, how accurate is it?
And it's all about thosefrontline people.
So what do you actually do tohelp frontline workers?
(03:34):
Like, and maybe we could kind ofparlay that into talking about
the guest experience, but how doyou think about the important
aspects of guest experience asit relates to frontline workers?
SPEAKER_00 (03:44):
We spend our time in environments where revenue is in
play.
So we use revenue as thebenchmark for the performance of
our model.
So, how do we help?
Is we go in and we have asoftware platform and it
basically provides the entiretoolkit to optimize performance
at the frontline.
It handles recognition, ithandles goal setting, incentive
calculations, and training.
(04:06):
There's a lot of training inthere.
But essentially what we'retrying to do is we're trying to
get the frontline to engage theguest in a service-focused way
to drive more revenue bylistening to them, by responding
to the cues you're receiving,and by basically fulfilling your
promise.
So being attentive, being awareof what's going on, active
(04:27):
listening.
But we also teach them the rightway to promote things.
So you don't ask, do you wantthis or do you want that?
You recommend.
I'll give you a real example.
Let's say someone orders a steakand you want to sell them an
add-on to that steak.
You wouldn't say, Do you wantasparagus with that?
You'd say, you know, most peoplethat have this steak really
(04:47):
enjoy our asparagus.
That is a nuanced way ofpromoting it.
It's the same with the hotel.
If someone's checking in and youwant to offer them a room, you
don't just say, Do you want abigger room?
You say, because you'retraveling with your family and
you need a little more space, Ithink you would enjoy a suite.
It's a nuance, but it changesthe dynamic of being sold to to
being served.
(05:09):
And when you can actuallyaccomplish that, your revenue
goes up and your guestexperience goes up.
SPEAKER_01 (05:14):
Amen.
And I think that when you thinkabout what that looks like in
terms of the guest experience,and when you can say, hey, I
want to make sure that the guestis feeling something.
I love that it really thinkingabout it in terms of how do we
train, how do we improve theemployees?
And what are some tactics thatyou've seen that have actually
(05:36):
helped employees feel empoweredand feel like they matter?
SPEAKER_00 (05:40):
We promote what we call the Corey performance
equation, our founder, ZiadCorey, who was the visionary of
this.
And it's basically a frameworkfor leadership and culture.
There's three things that arenecessary to properly motivate
frontline people.
One is reward.
So they have to be gettingrewarded in some way,
incentives, tips in restaurants.
It could be incentive programrecognition.
(06:03):
So when people are doing whatyou want them to do, recognize
them publicly in front of theirpeers, and accountability.
So it's not all fluff.
You need a little carrot littlestick.
So accountability is are youfulfilling your part of the
mission as an employee?
Whatever the standards are thatwe set as a business.
SPEAKER_01 (06:21):
And when you put those three things together, by
the way, could we just pausewhatever the standards you set
as a business?
That is important because what Isee a lot of times is people
will come in, the standards arenot explicitly set.
And then it's like, hey, we wantyou to.
We just had someone who was headof brand at Papa John's, and we
were talking about how she'slike, we want them to be
(06:44):
friendly.
Well, what does friendly mean?
And like maybe I'm from NewYork.
Friendly means something verydifferent than if I'm from Utah.
SPEAKER_00 (06:53):
Yeah, if you're from Philly, it might mean insulting
your guest.
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah, yeah.
Right.
There we go.
Are you from North Jersey?
No.
Oh, okay.
But I know I know the area.
SPEAKER_01 (07:03):
Yeah, but that I mean, that's the thing, right?
You got to clearly set theexpectations of what you want
them to be doing.
But anyway, I sorry, I cut youoff there, but just like that's
so key to not forget that it isour job as leaders to set the
expectations so that we can holdthem accountable, so that they
(07:24):
know what it means to besuccessful, right?
SPEAKER_00 (07:26):
That's exactly right.
So the best way to set anexpectation in a service focus
where your product is service isto embody it.
That's the best way for a leaderto get a standard set, is to be
the standard.
And then you can say with astraight face, I expect you to
treat the guest the way I'mtreating you.
But yeah, defining it, having aframework, having a process that
(07:46):
you endorse as a business leaderthat you want people to follow,
all those things are importantso that you can hold people
accountable.
But it's also measurement.
So you can't hold someoneaccountable if you're not
measuring their performance.
So we, our platform is reallyall about how are people doing?
Are they responding positivelyto the training?
Do we see their metricsimproving?
(08:07):
And we're big believers inleaderboards.
So you put their names, don'thave to be on there.
Like in our system, that the theservers have their own app, but
they only see their name on theleaderboard, but they can see
where they rank.
So when you think you're doing agood job and you look at the
leaderboard and you're ninth outof 12 positions, it's
eye-opening.
And that's the accountabilitythat we go for, is just let them
(08:29):
know where they are.
You don't have to confront themwith it, but just let them know
where they are and then make thetraining and make the
recognition and make the rewardprograms available to drive
their performance up.
But yeah, it's to your point, ifyou don't know what you're
striving for, you're onquicksand, you don't know what
the goalposts are.
You gotta set some goalposts.
What is success?
SPEAKER_01 (08:48):
And are we providing them with the training and tools
to be successful?
And I think that's somethingwhere I'm thinking that like
this episode is reminding me oflike the cliff notes of the five
dysfunctions of a team, youknow, because it really is.
I mean, there's so much therethat that is so good and
accurate, but we get so caughtup sometimes in strategy or in
(09:12):
maybe our pet project of what wecare about the most that we
forget that really it's aboutmaking sure that our team is
empowered to be successful.
SPEAKER_00 (09:22):
Yeah, a common thought experiment would be if
you had a really beautifulaesthetic restaurant, the menu
was amazing, the chef was asuperstar, and your staff were
rude.
Would the food and aestheticprevail?
And conversely, if you have adive bar on the beach selling
fried food, but your staff isincredibly good, would that
(09:44):
overcome the aesthetic?
And I think everyone knows theintuitive answer.
The staff set the quality of theexperience.
It's not the environment.
I mean, those are all importantthings.
I understand you want to go fora concept, but if you don't have
the right culture at the frontline, you lose.
And most restaurants are pretty,they're okay.
I mean, you go in, people aren'trude, you know, they're not
(10:04):
yelling at you and stuff, butthey're just not as tuned in as
they could be.
For instance, we work with abunch of restaurants and we look
at the leaderboards on revenueper guest.
This is just as an example.
And in the same shift, the sameservers, there is often a 20 to
25% differential in revenue perguest between the top performers
(10:24):
and the bottom.
That means same guest, sameshift, you could make 20% more
revenue.
Why?
Because the people at the topare engaging the guests, they're
super friendly, they'relistening, they're seizing
opportunities to recommendenhancements, where others are
just taking the order.
And they're like, Oh, my, youknow, my name's job, I'm gonna
take care of today.
Would you like some bread?
(10:45):
That's what's happening.
The the top performers are like,let's get you started with a
round of drinks, let's get thisexperience underway.
I'll be right back.
They come back when they saythey're going to, they don't
leave for 20 minutes, so youcan't get your drink refilled.
It's like those kind of things.
So that's what we're focused onis the techniques that separate
top performance from average andimparting that into the servers
(11:07):
by giving it a what's in it forme, which is the accountability
reward and recognition.
Love that.
SPEAKER_01 (11:12):
And at the end of the day, people want to feel
seen and they want money, right?
And so if we could find a way togive them both, then amen.
Love that.
And one of the things that I'dlove to get your professional
opinion on this, one of thethings that we do at ovation is
we do something called give anovation, where it's not just the
(11:32):
podcast, but we also have aninternal give and ovation where
everyone at ovation gets whatthey call an ovation that they
get to give to somebody else.
So it's a monthly bonus thatthey have to give to someone
else.
And then at our all handsmeetings, they fill out a form
beforehand saying who they weregiving their ovation to because
they exhibited which of our fiveovation values and what happened
(11:53):
that made them earn that ovationof yours.
And then we read that in the allhands meeting.
And so that's just like a smallway that we can catch everyone.
Everyone's looking for otherways to say thank you and to
find people that are doing goodout there.
I guess what do you think aboutthat?
And what are some simple waysthat other that restaurants
might be able to help in therecognition standpoint?
SPEAKER_00 (12:15):
Yeah, so I think that's a phenomenal scenario.
We do something internally wecall cheers for peers.
Similar concept.
We do it every Friday, and it'sanyone in the company can give
cheers to anyone else in thecompany, and it's sent out to
the whole company.
So it's you do exactly whatyou're saying with innovation.
I love that you coined that.
I think that for the averagebusiness owner, I think it's
(12:36):
about having the kind ofenvironment where you solicit
from them positive feedback.
I'm thinking about my son, hewas on a football team, one of
the top teams in the country fora while.
And at the end of practice, theymake a starter stand up and pick
a non-starter and in front ofthe entire team recognize them
(12:57):
for something.
So that he's bringing the peoplewho aren't on the field into the
fold with the starters.
And it culturally, it's amassive when you're the kid,
when my kid was a freshman andone of the seniors called his
name, it's like you make suremonth.
A similar kind of thing couldhappen.
Your senior seasoned peoplecould pick your people that
haven't been there as long.
Like you were saying, with thevalue of a cook that's been
(13:18):
doing the line for 20 yearsversus a newbie, but have them
recognize each other is a hugelypowerful for culture building.
There's no question.
Love that.
SPEAKER_01 (13:28):
Amazing.
And I love this conversationbecause it really is all about
the people and just fantastic.
So if someone is, you obviouslyknow a lot of people around this
industry.
Who is someone that we should befollowing?
Who deserves an ovation?
SPEAKER_00 (13:42):
Well, I'll tell you, there's several people I work
with that I would love to answerthat question with, but I can't
because then I'm excludingeveryone else.
Uh, and I have to be verycareful.
But Will Gadera, your the bookyou have on the shelf behind
you, hugely influential to ourthinking about food and
beverage.
This is our newest industry.
We've been working at it forabout two years, but we work
with almost 3,000 hotels, butthe restaurants is fairly new
(14:04):
for us.
He has been a huge influence onunderstanding the psyche of a
restaurant tour and how you cango over the top to win guest
favor.
Now, not everyone can afford todo what 11 Madison does, but the
minor nuances that you canimpart onto your staff by
treating them in a nuanced way,you're basically teaching them
(14:24):
and every interaction they havewith you on how to treat the
guest.
And that will definitely driveforward.
And he's been hugely influentialto us.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (14:33):
There's a reason the book is right behind me.
He's one of my heroes.
He's been an incredible guy.
And they say, Don't meet yourheroes.
And I had him on the podcast,and I think that phrase is
accurate, not because I was atall disappointed, because he was
every ounce as amazing as Ithought he was, but because I
got so scared to meet himbecause I just was such a
fanboy.
(14:53):
So don't meet your heroesbecause you may look like an
idiot.
But anyway, but truly though,just what a great guy and
totally influential.
I have my two shoulder angelsare Will Gadera and just love.
And I figure that's what it'sall about.
Any last advice to someone whois thinking about how do I
improve the performance of myfrontline staff?
(15:13):
Anything that besides reachingout to you, which we're gonna
get to in just a second.
SPEAKER_00 (15:17):
Yeah, you just stole my punchline, I was gonna say,
other than hiring us.
Yeah, I mean, I've never ownedor run a restaurant, so there's
things about it I'm not gonnapresume to know.
But what I do know is frontlineteam culture and selling.
And I've said it a couple oftimes.
It's really like you have toimpart love and trust and
respect to your team.
You as a leader have to do thatfirst.
(15:39):
You can't expect them to give itto you first.
You've got to give it to themfirst.
And when you give them trust andlove and respect, they are going
to pass that right on to theguest.
If you're treating them like anauthoritarian and you're
micromanaging them and you'rebossing them around, you can
expect they're gonna be shortwith your guests, they're not
gonna have patience because theydon't feel like there's room for
(16:01):
them to take their time and doit right.
So they're gonna rush theguests.
It is how it is.
But a lot of times you getwrapped up, you lose sight of
the fact that that's what you'redoing.
So I would say, look in themirror, ask, am I treating my
guests, my employees the waythat I want them to treat the
guests?
And if the answer is no, justmake adjustments.
It's never too late to make theadjustments.
SPEAKER_01 (16:21):
Love that.
Awesome.
Well, Joffrey, for reminding usthat team is key and for being
the kindest Joffrey out of thetwo that I know of.
Today's ovation goes to you.
Thank you for joining us onGiven Ovation.
Thank you so much.
It was great to be here.
Thanks for joining us today.
If you like this episode, leaveus a review on Apple Podcasts or
(16:41):
your favorite place to listen.
We're all about feedback here.
Again, this episode wassponsored by Ovation, a two
question SMS based actionableguest feedback platform built
for multi unit restaurants.
If you'd like to learn how wecan help you measure and create
a better guest experience, visitus at ovationup.com.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark
My Favorite Murder is a true crime comedy podcast hosted by Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark. Each week, Karen and Georgia share compelling true crimes and hometown stories from friends and listeners. Since MFM launched in January of 2016, Karen and Georgia have shared their lifelong interest in true crime and have covered stories of infamous serial killers like the Night Stalker, mysterious cold cases, captivating cults, incredible survivor stories and important events from history like the Tulsa race massacre of 1921. My Favorite Murder is part of the Exactly Right podcast network that provides a platform for bold, creative voices to bring to life provocative, entertaining and relatable stories for audiences everywhere. The Exactly Right roster of podcasts covers a variety of topics including historic true crime, comedic interviews and news, science, pop culture and more. Podcasts on the network include Buried Bones with Kate Winkler Dawson and Paul Holes, That's Messed Up: An SVU Podcast, This Podcast Will Kill You, Bananas and more.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com