269: Will Guidara’s Unreasonable Hospitality (Part One)

Will Guidara’s Unreasonable Hospitality: The Remarkable Power of Giving People More Than They Expect is the inspiration for this week’s letter.

Roger Martin, co-author of Playing to Win, one of the world’s best strategy books, describes it as, “One of the five best management books I have ever read. Plus, it is the most engaging and entertaining – by wide margin. This is, flat out, not a book to miss.”

Superficially, it’s the story of how Guidara, together with chef Daniel Humm, turned Eleven Madison Park from a pricey but otherwise unremarkable restaurant into the world’s best.

It’s actually about translating ambition into lived reality; about the hard, delicate work of creating culture and designing intentional systems to enable sustained excellence.

In the foreword, Simon Sinek writes, “Will recognized that if he wanted his frontline teams to obsess about how they made their customers feel, he had to obsess about how he made his employees feel.”   

[Please share today’s letter with your colleagues. Committing to creating hospitable businesses makes the world a better place. They can subscribe to this letter here.]
 
/strategy
You remember Frances Frei and Anne Morriss’ formulation:

Excellence = Design X Culture (read more here).

Today, we explore culture. Next week will be design.

Eleven Madison Park’s journey to Number One was fueled by Guidara’s determination that everyone, customers and employees, feel seen, cared for and connected with.

He observes that many companies have become so focused on product, or process, or finance, that they’ve forgotten the power of connection.

In contrast, “When you create a hospitality-first culture, everything about your business improves—whether that means finding and retaining great talent, turning customers into raving fans, or increasing your profitability.”

He argues, “In restaurants—and in all customer-service professions—the goal is to connect with people. Hospitality means breaking down barriers, not putting them up!”

It is a powerful lens with which to view your business. What barriers prevent real connection with employees and customers? What processes add unwanted friction? Are your customers a revenue line or guests?

Eleven Madison Park was part of Danny Meyer’s Union Square Hospitality Group (Meyer wrote the bestselling Setting the Table: The Transforming Power of Hospitality in Business).

Union Square’s first principle is: take care of one another.

Meyer understood the power of language in shaping culture. He coined several phrases around culture-defining principles. They became a shared shorthand.

Guidara’s favourite was “Make the charitable assumption,” — a reminder to assume the best of people, even when (or perhaps especially when) they weren’t behaving particularly well.

He explains how this translated into culture-reinforcing practice:
“Instead of immediately expressing disappointment with an employee who has shown up late and launching into a lecture on how they’ve let down the team, ask first, ‘You’re late; is everything okay?’”

I like “Constant, gentle pressure”, the idea that everyone should always be getting a little better all the time (but gently).  

(Read more on this theme in Culture That Works and Creating Culture). 

When Guidara shared his work anecdotes with industry friends, some sneered, “You work for a cult”.

He comments, “I have since come to realize that a ‘cult’ is what people who work for companies that haven’t invested enough in their cultures tend to call the companies that have.”

What stories are told in your business? Whatever they are, they’re shaping your culture.

When he started as Eleven Madison Park’s General Manager, there was an incumbent fine-dining team. They, naturally, viewed the way they’d always done things as the right way. Guidara wanted change.

But he was cautioned by a mentor, “Don’t cannonball. Ease into the pool… no matter how talented you are, or how much you have to add, give yourself time to understand the organization before you try to impact it.” 

Whilst he was committed to bringing people along, the old culture predominated, and new hires quickly left. He adjusted. He waited until he had three or four roles vacant and then filled them simultaneously, creating sufficient bulk to drive the momentum of change.

On occasion, he got it wrong.

He wanted the waiters to inspire diners and insisted they learn a standard script.

He eventually realised his mistake, “I’d made them performers, ruling out any possibility of a real, quality conversation between them and the guests… I had stripped the team of their authority to read the table and deliver an appropriate level of detail—to tailor the service experience to the guest. In my pursuit of a sense of place, I’d actually made the meal less hospitable.”

He ditched the script. In this instance, control destroyed connection.

Giving up control was more successful.

Staff volunteered to take charge of aspects of the restaurant. Once in charge, they were given the requisite authority to act. Eventually, every aspect of the business had an owner.

I love this example: “the guy who took over CGS (‘china, glass, and silver’) dedicated himself to reducing breakage. He discovered the racks in the dish room were half an inch too short, so the stems poked up above the top when the glasses went through the dishwasher. A couple of new glass racks later, and he’d eliminated loss by 30 percent. That’s serious money, and a major morale booster, as it also meant that we no longer ran out of water glasses in the middle of service.

Then he sent the handyman out for thick rubber matting, installed it on the stainless-steel table that held plates waiting to be washed, and bingo— no more chips on the raised rim at the bottom of our expensive, handmade ceramic chargers, either.”

Without ownership, it would have remained unsolved. 

It’s the experience of many businesses. We tolerate the friction. We deal with the consequences, but never resolve the underlying cause.

There is a simple solution.
Give someone the power and responsibility to fix it, and they’ll want to do it.
Ensure your culture is story-rich, they’ll know how to.
Magic guaranteed.

//self
Of course, creating culture like this, puts an obligation on you the leader. You have to be self-aware and able to self-correct.

On his script mistake, Guidara comments, “In truth, I’m not surprised I made this mistake—and I’m almost certain I’ll make it again in the future. My compulsive attention to detail is one of my superpowers; it’s how I take aim at perfection. But that tendency also means I’m always walking a tightrope between my desire to guarantee excellence by controlling everything and knowing I want to create an environment of empowerment and collaboration and trust among the people who work for me.”

Attention to detail is a superpower. How you use it is critical.

//soul
In shaping his leadership approach, Guidara’s insight was “Fads fade and cycle, but the human desire to be taken care of never goes away”.

He states, “I believe that whatever you do for a living, you can choose to be in the hospitality business.”

He challenges us – look for the human impact in our jobs.
Do you sell houses or give people homes? Do you open bank accounts or enable financial security?
 
Best wishes
 
Karl
PS: You can learn about my executive coaching practice [here] and find me on LinkedIn. If you’re interested in increasing your leadership team’s strategic, communication and reflective powers, I facilitate curated leadership journeys. The details are [here]. You can subscribe to this letter [here].