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Articles

Developing "The Playbook" for your team

Chef Seth VanderLaan
Vollrath Guest - Chef Seth VanderLaan -

Much of my life and career has revolved around sports. Yet it only somewhat recently occurred to me that, on some level, coaching and being a chef were one and the same.

It was shortly after opening day in my second season as the executive chef at Miller Park when it clicked. I had to break the news to my sous chef team that I was going to blow up their world for the next homestand and move their lead cooks around.

Honestly, we had a lot of early struggles -- and I was not comfortable going into the next homestand with the status quo. I started my weekly chef meeting off the same way I always do: going over important upcoming events and reviewing positives from the week prior. Then I broke the news that I was moving the premium club lead cook to concessions, the suites lead cook over to the premium club, and the suites kitchen was just going to have to make do with what they had until we hired a quality replacement. I was essentially taking everyone’s number two and moving them into a new role as I saw fit.

I expected a complete revolt, and I was ready to stand my ground and explain why I thought this was best for the team. Instead, I saw a bunch of blank faces -- until my senior sous chef chimed in, saying, “Well… it’s the same playbook in every kitchen, so they should be fine with the moves.”

It occurred to me then that either opening day and the massive amount of hours they’d worked made them all so numb that I could say anything and they would agree, or they had completely bought-in to the system I had been pushing since the beginning -- where no one chef’s needs stood above the progress of the entire group.

Wherever I  landed, I had a history of building a team that was not only talented but also loyal and a cohesive fit. I always looked at the potential and personality of a candidate over qualifications on paper, and I'd take a chance on someone if they showed that blind trust and dedication.

But just because I have a tendency to make good hires (okay, I had a few that didn’t pan out) does not automatically foster a cohesive working environment. There is a system and groundwork that needs to be laid out to build this kind of trust. It boils down to getting your team to buy-in to 3 steps:

 

1. Establish a hierarchy where everyone is professionally respected and personally protected, no matter their title.

When I first arrived at Miller Park, the chefs had titles embroidered on their jackets that designated which kitchens they were responsible for. There was a “Suites Sous Chef” or a “Concessions Sous Chef” and so on.

The first thing I did was title everyone “Sous Chef”. No one was in any more of a prestigious role than the others, and no one was above being relocated if it made the team better. In fact, later on, the most tenured sous chef requested a lateral move to concessions -- because he knew it was in his best interest professionally to gain a better understanding of volume and production. Seeing our sous chef leaders make moves like this reinforced to the lead cooks, cooks, and dishwashers that their roles were of equal importance in every kitchen.

I also expected that every leader personally protected their team. I wanted to see them making a case for higher performance incentives, or going to bat for a team member if they felt someone was unjustly disciplined. My team knew I was doing the same for them; I've put my own job and reputation on the line to fight for someone in every role. From sous chef to dishwasher, if you were doing your part, I had your back.

 

2. Manage the hive collectively – but the person individually.

Just because everyone at the same paygrade now had the same title did not mean their competencies and goals were aligned. It’s important to understand each leader’s strengths, weaknesses, and career ambitions and use them to complement each other for collective success. In my experience, the only way to do this was through practicing communication with your team members in both group settings and one-on-one.

  • Holding weekly chef meetings was the best way to get strategic bullet points of information across to a group. Those meetings started with a structured agenda, transitioned into an open forum, and finally culminated in a casual “sous chef only” cigarette break to digest the information.
  • Setting email etiquette standards and expectations for timely email responses instilled communication accountability.
  • Daily kitchen walk-throughs and one-on-one sit-downs with the sous chefs and lead cooks allowed me to coach them based on their individual skill set and emotional quotient, not only preparing them for daily service, but also helping them grow professionally.

 

3. Let good leaders lead. Get out of the way.

A common problem with having strong middle management leaders is that weaker senior leaders tend to handcuff them.

I have yet to encounter a situation where senior leadership was better off micromanaging the day-to-day while at the same time trying to look ahead with business development. This always leads to confusing communication because teams can no longer discern between future business ideas vs. current operational needs. This approach is grounds for sinking work morale.

Some of my greatest personal and team accomplishments happened after I reduced my time spent on day-to-day decision making. For one thing, having a fully-functioning team allowed me to focus on long-term growth projects.

Once I stepped back and examined the operation as a whole while all the gears were turning, I could focus on tightening the process. I inspected how my equipment performed in the highest pressure situations and looked at the efficiencies (and lack thereof) of all the equipment in each kitchen. I would then build improvement plans and allocate capital for the larger expenses into the next fiscal year budget.

Countless times I observed a service and afterwards advised the sous chef or lead cook to move certain equipment around, purchase some new smallwares, or adjust certain menu items to allow for prep efficiencies. It’s much easier to spot these opportunities when you’re not engulfed in the same day-to-day execution as they are.

Improving operational inefficiencies allowed the chefs to focus solely on production. The chef team was running sprints every day, and I was just out front ahead of them removing the hurdles.

The collective understanding that no one on the team will let anyone else fail and that the above steps will be followed is in essence “The Playbook”. Because what is a playbook in football besides a diagram of assignments everyone needs to personally follow for the collective good?  And the team that does it best -- will have the most success!

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