The Cutting Onions Podcast

Welcome to The Cutting Onions Podcast, Episode 82 which features Joseph Szala in a compelling conversation to talk about all things digital, loyalty, and how to create an amazing guest experience.

Joseph serves as Vice President of Digital Experience for Rapturous, a wing of 3 Owl. His hospitality-first approach and unyielding passion for creating remarkable digital restaurant experiences has positioned him as thought leader in the world of CX and UX as well as brand development and marketing.

He and the Rapturous team continue to craft superior digital restaurant experiences that realize measurable lifts in order averages, repeat traffic, loyalty, and revenue for an impressive suite of restaurant brands.

We know you are going to love this conversation! Enjoy.

Today we chat with Daniella Sardi from about AI Voice Technology. Daniella Sardi is the Head of Enterprise, Restaurants at SoundHound, specializing in strategic territory development and fostering collaborative teams.

She brings extensive experience as a successful sales leader across multiple verticals and has a track record of building winning cultures, which as you know is so important to us at The Cutting Onions Podcast.

Daniella also previously held key roles at Doma and TriNet, bringing a wealth of expertise to drive voice AI innovation in the restaurant industry.

There is so much to learn from this inspired conversation with Daniella, including the 5 questions you need to ask when evaluating a potential Voice AI partner.

In this week's episode we talk about the new California law, AB 1228 which raises the minimum wage to $20.00 as of April 1, 2024 at all fast food restaurants with 60 units or more in their portfolio.

We take a look at both sides of this issue and try and gauge the impact this new law will have on restaurant companies in California and talk about what this could mean for the industry overall if other states follow suit.

On this week's episode of The Cutting Onions Podcast and on the heels of the Restaurant Franchising Innovation Summit held in Kansas City by Fast Casual, we talk about Artificial Intelligence and Robotics.

We highlight some of what we learned this week about the future of AI and Robotics, and discuss what we already see in the restaurant experience with existing brands like McDonald’s and new brands that have just launched like Kernel.

This is a great lead-in to our conversation next week with Daniella Sardi, Head of Enterprise for SoundHound. SoundHound creates big-picture Voice AI solutions that drive growth for the restaurant industry.

Welcome to The Cutting Onions Podcast, Episode 78! In today's conversation Myles and Bobby talk about ramping up in the hospitality and retail business and all the things that need to be in place for that to happen successfully.

We also talk about team communication, scheduling, deployment, and how to take a fresh look at our businesses. We also dive into some leadership lessons from the late, great Andy Grove, former CEO of Intel.

We think you will enjoy this episode and would love to hear your feedback.

Enjoy!

On today's episode of The Cutting Onions Podcast, Myles and I continue the conversation we started last week around what it looks like to enter into a situation that is at best a struggle, and at worst broken, in the restaurant industry.

We get super granular in this episode building on the ideas we shared in Part One of this conversation in last week's episode. We talk about some important ideas including how important it is to bring your team alongside you as you begin rebuilding the shop, restaurant, district, or company.

We also talk about the key elements of effective leadership, including organization, follow-up, and clear communication. We suggest that effective leadership requires a combination of strategic thinking, strong communication skills, and a willingness to adapt and learn from experience.

We also discuss the importance of prioritizing people over financials when fixing a broken situation and setting expectations with bosses or ownership groups.

Key Questions we discuss:

* How can we celebrate wins and reinforce desired behaviors?

* What are the fears that people have when entering a challenging situation, and how can we help them overcome those fears?

* How can we document our experiences and share institutional knowledge for future leaders?

* How can we balance the need for speed with the need for organization and follow-up?

Welcome to The Cutting Onions Podcast, Episode 76! In this episode Myles and I start a conversation about what it looks like as a leader to enter into a situation where you might have a restaurant, district, market, area, region, or company that has significant challenges.

Where you do you start? What do you do? How do you do it? What does it look like to starting doing what needs to be done and protect the most important asset of your organization...your team. Your people.

This will be a two-part conversation, and we can't wait for you to hear this episode and we would love your feedback!

a seasoned and strategic human resources executive with 25 years of experience in leading HR teams and functions across diverse industries and sectors, including Fortune 500 companies. As a Chief Human Resources Officer, Michael oversees all aspects of human capital management, aligning HR policies and practices with the organization's vision, mission, and values.

His background includes roles as the leadership head leading HR functions for global organizations in the areas of Benefits, Compensation, Payroll, Talent Acquisition, Organizational Development, and Workforce Planning within both public and privately owned companies, including roles with Fortune 500 companies such as Carnival Corporation, Dollar Tree Stores, NY Life Insurance, Tommy Hilfiger, Polo Ralph Lauren and Focus Brands.

Michael is passionate about taking HR teams from operationally reactive to strategically proactive, by linking HR strategies to business strategy through the development of practical HR business plans that better leverage employees' talents and competencies.

Listen in behind the scenes to Myles Gift, Jay Timms, and me as we talk about our new project, a Mastermind Group that we are calling "Prior To Service: What Great Restaurateurs Understand About Leadership". This community is being built for three tiers of hospitality leadership, with the first focus being on the heart and soul of any restaurant...the General Manager. We wanted to give you a peak behind the curtain and hear the passion we have for creating this exciting new Mastermind Group, which we believe is the first of its kind. This group is being designed to help provide support, coaching and encouragement to the General Manager role. This group will provide a foundation of information and inspiration that attendees can tap into for a lifetime.

We are excited for you to hear all about what we are thinking about and can't wait to launch this group! Much more to come!

In this episode Myles has a great conversation with Pepper Lunch CEO Troy Hooper. Troy began his career in the Caribbean cutting his teeth in hotel restaurants and private clubs. A serial entrepreneur, Troy knows what it takes to succeed in business and has built his career on tried and true principles. He also offers some sage advice to anyone thinking about becoming an entrepreneur. Remember that it takes twice as long as you think it will to succeed, and it will take twice as much money. Both so very true.

Troy now leads Pepper Lunch as CEO. Pepper Lunch is a 30 year old casual dining Japanese hotplate oncept with over 500 locations in Japan, Asia, Australia, and now the United States. Just hearing Troy talk about the food made our mouths water!

Troy talked a lot about leadership and the importance of asking others to join your journey. There is no silver bullet to being successful as a leader. Just community and support.

Enjoy this chat with Troy Hooper! We look forward to continuing the conversation with him in future episodes!

In this episode we discuss how to enter an organization regardless of the level of leadership you are coming in at, and also some key principles from Great By Choice by Jim Collins, which we think is incredibly underrated. The two ideas we unpack today are the 20-mile march and firing bullets before you fire a cannonball. Enjoy this conversation around some timeless principles!

Known for her charisma, generosity of spirit, and infectious energy, Brooke Janousek is the kind of leader others feel inspired by. She brings this spirit to each and every client she works with through The Grow CMO, a fractional leadership solution for effective marketing growth that she founded in 2022 after two decades as an expert in the marketing industry. As a fractional CMO, Brooke partners with clients to execute strategies to increase revenue, profitability, and customer loyalty. In today’s world, Brooke makes her C-suite expertise accessible, affordable and most importantly, valuable by pulling from her experience with brands like Disney, Toro, GE, Sonic Drive-In Restaurants, and Liberty Tax. 

Brooke’s dynamic leadership style follows her outside of the office and into every realm of her life. A poised, engaging public speaker, Brooke feels most fulfilled when she is sharing her expertise with others and connecting with everyone’s energy. Her deep desire to support others is the bedrock of Brooke’s relationships as well. Whether she’s traveling, taking a CrossFit or yoga class, or simply taking her dog Kip for a walk, she cherishes the connections she makes along the way. A native of Omaha, Nebraska, Brooke is setting off on an adventure she’s aptly named “Brooke on the Grow,” chronicling her move out west and her year of intentionally living life joyfully. A self-proclaimed digital nomad, her hope is that her stories paired with those she meets along the way, encourage everyone to see their own good and ability to actualize their potential if they bet on themselves. 

On today's episode we have an incredible conversation with Corporate Communications Expert Chris Arnold. Chris help shape the stories and communications strategies that build, grow and protect beloved brands in a complex world. Over his career, Chris has led communications in-house for notable and high-profile consumer brands such as Chipotle Mexican Grill, one of the most outspoken and transformative restaurant companies in a generation, and REI Co-op, the nation's largest member-owned retail co-op.

As a trusted and unflappable counselor to senior leaders and a valued source to journalists, Chris helps companies successfully navigate everything from brand evolution to significant milestones and existential crises. During his time at notable public relations agencies and communications consulting firms, he advised clients across a variety of sectors. Currently, Chris heads communications at Darigold, an iconic Seattle-based cooperative of nearly 300 farmers who provide milk and other dairy products to customers in about 30 countries worldwide.

In this episode, Chris highlights important topics around corporate communications including the opportunities and challenges of social media for businesses, emphasizing proactive work, identifying allies, and being prepared for crises. We talk about the food safety crisis at Chipotle from several years ago and what the brand did to respond to the challenge of the 24-hour news cycle and how they weathered that storm.

We also discussed growth, people development, and overcoming challenges in a growing brand and how social media and the 24-hour news cycle has changed the game. One of the powerful insights Chris shared, which aligns with us so closely on The Cutting Onions Podcast, is this quote he heard and paraphrased about the power of story.

"Story is more important in human development than opposable thumbs. Opposable thumbs as people let us hang on. Story tells us what to hang on to."

Enjoy this amazing conversation with Chris Arnold and we would so appreciate it if you would share it with your network, along with your thoughts on the topics we talked about in this episode.

In this week's episode, Myles and I take a step back to process our amazing two-part conversation with Jay Timms. Jay shared some incredible information, concepts, and coaching with us over the last two episodes and it was so good that we felt like it deserved a full episode just unpacking the wisdom that Jay shared with us, and what resonated with us the most. We really enjoyed our time with Jay and look forward to reconnecting with him again on future episodes.

On today's episode we dive in for another conversation with Organizational Psychologist Jay Timms on The Cutting Onions Podcast. Last week we got to know Jay and talked about how important self-awareness is as a leader, picking a direction versus a destination, how we leave our fingerprints as leaders. In today's conversation, Myles and I talk with Jay about stepping stones and stumbling blocks, what failure actually is, the 4 important questions every leader needs to ask themselves, KBI's versus KPI's, and the 3 things you must do as a leader.

We are super excited to share this conversation and look forward to continuing to work with Jay in the future.

We know you will love this episode and encourage you to share it across your social media channels.

Welcome to The Cutting Onions Podcast. Today we feature Part 1 of our conversation with Organizational Psychologist, Employee Engagement Guru, and Hospitalitarian, Jay Timms. In this episode we talk about Jay's journey through university to hospitality to his dream of helping people become more self aware of who they really are and what they should be doing for their life's work.

Jay has developed and presented leadership training, consulted for, and been a keynote speaker to Fortune 500 companies including Microsoft, EA Games, and Chipotle Mexican Grill to name a few. Over the past 25 years, Jay has enhanced businesses, teams, and individual performance of leaders and employees in a vast array of industries by diagnosing, designing, and delivering a wide range of solutions and interventions: organizational design, change management, creative problem solving, training, process improvement, team building, and leadership development. He’s an expert in engaging learners at all levels including employees, leaders, boards, and team’s performance in consultation with business partners to match solutions to organizational needs. He is not a “coach”. He is not a “growth guide” or whatever buzzword is trendy at the time. It’s simple: Jay Timms is how you become a better leader.

Jay’s pioneering work in process improvement has led to shifts in policies and practice for government professionals. He has coached the development of hundreds of leaders at all levels throughout his career and laid the foundation for what CEO’s have described to investors as “aggressive and unprecedented expansion” in the organizations he has led and supported. His award-winning research on communication and relationships is complemented by his Master’s Degrees in Organizational Psychology and Counselling Psychology, and he is also certified in Neuro-Linguistic-Programming.

His latest book, “The Great Awakening: How Successful Leaders are Attracting, Engaging, and Developing Rockstar Teams”, is due to be published in September 2023.

We recently learned about The Great Game of Business and absolutely believe the principles it teaches, so we thought we would dive deeper into the content here and highly encourage our listeners to do the same. In The Great Game of Business the core principle is to engage your teams with transparency, share your critical metrics, help them keep score and know if they are winning or not, help them own their results, and provide them a stake in the outcome. This was a fun conversation and we would like to invite you along for the ride in learning more about this revolutionary approach to management and leadership.

In this episode we discuss some basic core principles around how we get ready for summer in the hospitality industry and how we engage our teams to own their results. We riff a bit on the amazing book Great Game of Business and we just scratch the surface of this book and the philosophy and we look forward to unpacking more of this content in the weeks to come on The Cutting Onions Podcast. Enjoy!

What does a great interview process look like? In this episode we share some personal stories about our interview experiences and contrast the two extremes...those organizations who handle the interview process beautifully and those that don't. We hope you enjoy this episode and we would love to hear your feedback!

Thanks for joining us today on The Cutting Onions Podcast! This is Episode 61 and today we dive into the topic of Supply Chain and the key points from the Q2 2022 Kinetic 12 Deck. This was a great conversation and it was helpful for us to tackle this topic and do a deep dive on it, and we hope it helps you just as much! Please feel free to weigh in with your thoughts as well. We would love to engage in a conversation with our listeners. We would also appreciate you sharing this episode on your networks and let's keep the conversation going. Enjoy!

In this episode, Bobby and Myles begin to unpack the excellent Emergence Kinetic 12 Q2 2022 Report that shares Emerging and Growth chain insights, operator connections and live regional roundtables on important subjects like Supply Chain, Technology, Automation, Inflation, Labor Retention and so much more. Bobby and Myles provide their insights and commentary on the data found in the report and over the next several weeks will tackle all of the data in the deck and continue the conversation, as well as invite special guests to the podcast to share their insights.

Our thanks to Tim Hand and Bruce Reinstein at Kinetic 12 for their excellent work in putting this deck together for the industry.

Enjoy this episode!

Welcome back to The Cutting Onions Podcast! Myles and I have been gone for a bit, getting the opportunity to put into practice so many of the core beliefs we both have around culture building, people development and operational excellence. We have been able to do all that through the process of opening new restaurants! That's right, NRO's are back folks!

It was great to connect with each other and share our learnings over the last few months around opening new stores and being on the front lines of the process and working shoulder to shoulder with our teams. We think you will really enjoy this conversation and we look forward to your feedback and comments!

Cheers!

Welcome to the Cutting Onions Podcast, Episode 58! On today’s episode we are super happy to feature our conversation with Frios Gourmet Pops president Patti Rother. It was so fun to chronicle Patti’s journey through the restaurant space from her time at two iconic brands, Panera and Noodles & Company, into Franchise Sales and Development, into her current role. But rooted in all of that is Patti’s desire to develop people and build high performing teams.

Frios Gourmet Pops, serving gourmet popsicles, started in a tiny garage years ago and the goal of the company is simple: to hustle happiness and leave people better than they found them. That is a pretty spectacular goal. And they do it out of tie dye food trucks which is pretty spectacular in and of itself.

We know you will enjoy this conversation with Patti as she tells her story and the journey she is on with Frios Gourmet Pops and what the future looks like for this exciting brand.

See you on the other side!

Welcome to the Cutting Onions Podcast, Episode 56! Today we are featuring our conversation with Chef Essi Tadrus. Essi got his start in restaurants at the age of 14 years old and became an entrepreneur very, very fast. After working in kitchens in his teens and developing his craft, he took the plunge and bought a cell phone/pager shop and it was a huge success!

Realizing his love for restaurants, Essi got back in the game and started developing his own concepts to rave reviews of everyone who dined in his restaurants. These restaurants include Rib Shack and Fly Chix. After selling Rib Shack in 2018 and still feeling the love for barbecue, he began to think of the way he used to describe the food he was making in the kitchen as being made with southern love, and that is how Southern Luv BBQ was born!

But it all started with Essi created his BBQ sauce and sold it out of the trunk of his car to area restaurants and then figured out how to get distribution. And the rest was history, but the story is just beginning!

This is a super inspiring conversation that existing entrepreneurs or anyone thinking about being an entrepreneur should hear. Everything Essi has created has been through a lot of blood, sweat and tears, which is what it takes to be a serial entrepreneur, and that is what Essi is. He talks about those early days through today and how it still takes intestinal fortitude, a street-fighting mentality, and hustle to pull it all together, but at the root of it all is the culture he has created between vendors, suppliers, and the guest.

We hope you enjoy this episode with Chef Essi Tadrus as much as we did! Check it out wherever you consume your podcast content! #chef #essitadrus #southernluv #bbq #barbecue #fastcasual #finecasual #restaurants #restaurant #bbqrestaurant #cooking #southerncooking #lowandslow #cuttingonions #mylesgift #bobbyshaw

We are thrilled to present this conversation with Stephanie Stuckey, CEO of Stuckey's (during National Pecan Month) and it really was a masterclass on what it means to be an entrepreneur, the lessons she has learned along the way, how she ended up as CEO of Stuckey's, and the advice she would give any would be entrepreneur! We also had a great time chatting about the Great American Road trip, which Stephanie is super passionate about!

We talked about the challenges of buying the family business, raising capital, and charting the future of the 85 year old brand, while protecting its legacy. Stephanie spoke with all the passion, commitment, excitement, and enthusiasm that you would expect from her if you follow her posts on LinkedIn. We cannot wait for you to hear this amazing conversation. Enjoy! #stephaniestuckey #ceo #stuckeys #pecan #nationalpecanday #nationalpecanmonth #georgia #pecanlogroll #greatamericanroadtrip #roadtrip #travel #podcast #cuttingonions #cuttingonionspodcast #mylesgift #bobbyshaw

We are so excited to present our conversation with Duck Donuts CEO Betsy Hamm this week on The Cutting Onions Podcast!!! Betsy has such an inspiring leadership journey, including her time at Hershey Entertainment & Resorts and then joining Duck Donuts as Marketing Director, becoming COO, and then being named CEO at Duck Donuts right before COVID changed the world. She talked about how she navigated and led through the last couple of years and built relationships that thrived during a very difficult season, which helped the entire Duck Donuts team and franchise community adjust to all the challenges that COVID presented.

Myles and I also talked to Betsy about how those efforts have helped her build and protect the 109 unit franchise international brand, even through COVID, while growing it through grassroots marketing efforts and driving revenue. Leading by example and working alongside her team, Betsy is providing the tools and resources necessary to assure the franchise community of Duck Donuts is successful.

We also talked about what the future looks like for Duck Donuts, and the exciting growth plan for the brand that is on the horizon! Betsy also shared her thoughts about the industry and what she is curious about as we exit COVID and look to the future, and how Duck Donuts is prepared to respond to the ever changing landscape of our industry.

You don't want to miss this exciting and fun episode with Betsy. We hope you are as inspired as we are!

Welcome to a milestone on The Cutting Onions Podcast! This is Episode 50 and we could not be happier to still be hanging around trying to create meaningful content and engage in conversations that help us all get better, together. Today's conversation is centered around Danny Klein's excellent article "Why The Pandemic Only Made Fast Casual Stronger" where he touches on some incredibly important learnings from the pandemic including Drive-Thru's, Culinary, Labor, Technology, and Restaurant Design. About 2/3 way through the conversation Myles and I started thinking about the technology aspect and wondered out loud if the industry is doing enough to connect with staff inside the restaurants...the ones who are making it all happen.

We think there is a hole here that needs to be addressed. How can we connect with our staff to increase retention and build loyalty that goes both ways? How can we help our teams feel like they are a part of something worth staying around for? These are important questions that as an industry we need to answer, and technology could play a big part of the solution.

Today we are thrilled to have Meat & Bread Owner/Operator Ernie Villarreal on the Cutting Onions Podcast! We had a fantastic conversation talking about Ernie's incredible restaurant journey over the years. From his start as an Assistant Manager at Chipotle, to GM, to Restaurateur and wrapping up a successful 12-year career there, to his time as a Managing Partner with Raising Cane's to a stint at Velvet Taco where he honed his culinary skills, and now onto his journey as an Owner/Operator with Meat & Bread where he is about to open his first restaurant in Austin, TX where he has master franchise rights.

Ernie doesn't shy away from the tough stuff in this conversation and you will hear him talk about the struggles of opening a restaurant in the age of COVID, how he has battled through and the lessons he learned in the early days of Chipotle and at Raising Canes that continue to be the bedrock foundation for what he does and how he continues to create a strong culture that has always been a hallmark of Ernie's restaurants.

We could have talked to Ernie all day, and as you can hear from the podcast, this was a very fun conversation! So much fun that we are making a trip to see Ernie in Austin in the near future, and may just have a bonus episode heading your way.

Enjoy this amazing conversation and please share it on your social channels. If you were as inspired as we were and want to reach out to Ernie you can find him on Instagram at @meatandbreadatx or drop him an email at EVmeatandbread@gmail.com.

In this episode Myles and Bobby tackle the question of incorporating a touchless experience in restaurants that virtually eliminates all human interaction and the effects that might have on a restaurants ability to build true loyalty. The reason for moving in this direction is all in the name of streamlining operations, but are there better ways to do that without eliminating the human equation and making it just a transaction?

We would love for you to weigh in with your thoughts. Enjoy the episode!

We hope you enjoy this conversation with LEAP Hospitality founder Pat Phelan as much as we did. Pat did an amazing job talking about how to build culture, create relationships, and work through adversity. Pat shares the story of how he founded LEAP in 2006 and then immediately battled through the recession, and then how he made the pivot from providing furniture, fixtures, and equipment to recruiting services and how that pivot helped catapult LEAP into the industry leader it is today. 

Thanks for joining us for this fun conversation where Myles and Bobby talk about what they learned in 2021 and what some of the Tech Trends are in 2022 that we can all leverage to help us serve our guests and our teams in the restaurant and hospitality industries. Happy New Year!

Today on The Cutting Onions Podcast we are so excited to feature our conversation with Brian Jackson, founder of Mighty Missouri Coffee Company in Bismarck, North Dakota! Brian is an entrepreneur through and through and in this conversation we cover his journey from a marketing executive to starting to Mighty Missouri Coffee, roasting coffee, opening his own storefront coffee shop, and creating Barista Party which provides everything coffee shops need to succeed in their business and in their communities.

Brian shares the valuable lessons he learned along his 10-year entrepreneurial journey and some behind the scenes history of how the brand took off, even after being told no to carrying his coffee by a major grocer in North Dakota, thanks to a little assist from Grammy-award winning artist Matthew West!

This was a fun conversation and we cannot wait for you to hear it! Enjoy!

Today's topic on The Cutting Onions Podcast is Conscious Competence, which is all about being aware of the things that have made us successful so that we are able to teach the next generation how to achieve great results. We loved this conversation because so many times in the restaurant industry learning happens by osmosis and we are not as intentional as we should be when we are developing our teams.

Myles and I had a great time discussing how we can be more conscious as we teach, the four levels of teaching, and the art of asking questions to help people find the answers they are looking for. Thanks for joining us today and we hope you enjoy this conversation.

Join us next week for a great conversation with Brian Jackson, founder of Mighty Missouri Coffee Company in Bismarck, North Dakota.

Cheers!

This was my first episode with my new co-host Myles Gift and it was an amazing conversation. We discussed the labor issues we are all experiencing in the restaurant and hospitality industry, how the customer is not always right, and how to better support our teams by checking in on them with intentionality and truly making sure they are doing as well as they can. We discussed the excellent August 2021 report from Blackbox Intelligence titled "The Post Pandemic Employee: Who Wants to Work and Why" and dug deep into some of their data and research. It was very good and we highly suggest it as recommended reading for all restaurant and hospitality professionals.

I am so excited to have Matt Plapp, CEO of America's Best Restaurants, on The Cutting Onions Podcast today! Matt and I had a great conversation about his new book "Restaurant Marketing That Works: Back to the Basics" which talks about restaurant marketing before, during, and after the pandemic.

Matt's book is excellent and is jam packed with real-life examples of tactical strategy that Matt has deployed with his clients. He shares some great success stories of clients who not only sustained their sales through the pandemic, but actually grew their sales! He shares the lessons from that experience and they mean just as much now as they did in the beginning of the pandemic. We talked about Marketing Basics, Consultative Selling, Awareness Marketing, Meaningful Engagement, and so much more!

Matt is the real deal and it was a pleasure to speak with him! I know you will all enjoy this interview as much as I did!

On today's episode I share the audio from my first webinar where I discussed 5 Ways To Attract And Retain Top Talent. This is a message we need more than ever as restaurants, hotels, and many other service companies are reopening dining rooms and facilities as we emerge from the global pandemic. The 5 things I talk about in this podcast will help you take an honest look at where your organization is and what you can do to create or recreate the culture you want to have that supports your mission, and bring your team along with you. If you would like a copy of the video portion of the webinar, please send me an email at bobby@bobbyshawconsulting.com.

Welcome back to The Cutting Onions Podcast! As promised here is a second volume of solid gold wisdom that has been shared on my podcast during these last couple of years. As I was getting this episode ready and listening back, I am just incredibly grateful that these amazing leaders shared some of their valuable time to have a conversation with me about culture and leadership. 

Here are the incredible leaders you will hear from on this episode:

• Former McDonald's franchisee Art Phillips
• HR Manager Chris Cargill
• Crack'd Owner/Operator Danny Azzarello
• Restaurateur, Hotelier, and Non-Profit Founder Steve Mangano
• Raising Cane's GM Jacob Shaw
• Zalat Pizza COO Jason Brooks
• Chef, Restaurateur and Author Jeremy Barlow from Nashville TN
• Consultant, Coach and Food Safety Expert Luay Rahil
• Chief Storyteller for Dodo Brands, Max Kotin
• Culver's Franchisee Matt Mitchell
• Consultant and Halal Guys Franchisee Paul Tran
• Chick-Fil-A Franchisee Priscilla Mendoza

Enjoy this episode!

Today I am circling back to a conversation I had with Matt Plapp, CEO of America's Best Restaurants, on his podcast a few weeks ago. Matt was gracious and had me on to talk about a few key concepts of my book "Cutting Onions: Leadership Lessons Learned From the Restaurant Industry". One of those ideas was the concept of Generational Differences and we had a great conversation about that and I wanted to unpack it a bit more on this short podcast. I hope you enjoy it.

Welcome to the Cutting Onions Podcast! In this episode I go into the archives from the past 34 episodes and pulled some amazing wisdom that some of the various guests I have had on the show over the last 18 months. It was fun to go back and listen to these incredible leaders. They inspired me all over again, and I think they will inspire you too! If you hear something that grabs you, make sure to go back and listen to the full episodes wherever you consume your podcast content. I will be doing another Best Of compilation soon so be sure to subscribe!