Leadership Book Club: Unreasonable Hospitality by Will Guidara, Part Two

In the second part of their deep dive into Will Guidara's Unreasonable Hospitality, Mike and Kristen explore the leadership lessons that transformed Eleven Madison Park into the world's best restaurant. From breaking traditional fine dining rules to creating moments of surprise and delight for guests, Guidara's approach proves that true hospitality extends beyond simply serving excellent food. His philosophy challenges leaders to build strong teams, empower staff through trust, and create authentic connections with those they serve. Whether you lead a team of two or two hundred, this episode reveals how small, thoughtful gestures—what Guidara calls "grace notes"—can turn ordinary service into extraordinary experiences that leave lasting impressions.

Highlights: 

• Breaking traditions: Prioritizing authentic guest connections over rigid fine dining rules
• Hiring for the "why": Finding people who genuinely care about hospitality over experience
• Team choreography: Using subtle hand signals for seamless service coordination
• The Miles Davis approach: Identifying 11 guiding principles after a critic's feedback
• The "important to me" card: Building partnership through respecting what matters deeply to others
• Empowering staff: Giving team members control of specialized programs before they're fully ready
• The Dreamweaver role: Creating a position dedicated to personalizing guest experiences
• Grace notes: Small gestures that create lasting impressions, like plating a NYC hot dog for tourists
• Balancing excellence and warmth: Finding harmony between perfect service and authenticity
• Scaling culture: Maintaining core values while growing and trusting others to lead

Links & Resources Mentioned:

• Unreasonable Hospitality by Will Guidara
• Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain
• Down and Out in Paris and London by George Orwell
• Extreme Ownership by Jocko Willink
• How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie

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Transcript

Kristen: Welcome to Love and Leadership, the podcast that helps you lead with both your head and your heart, plus a bit of humor. I'm Kristen Brun Sharkey, a leadership coach and facilitator.

Mike: And I'm Mike Sharkey, a senior living and hospitality executive. We're a couple of leadership nerds who also happen to be a couple.


Kristen: Join us each week as we share our unfiltered opinions, break down influential books, and interview inspiring guests.


Mike: Whether you're a seasoned executive or a rising star, we're here to help you level up your leadership game and amplify your impact.

Kristen: \ Hello and welcome back to Love and Leadership. I'm 

Mike: Hi, I am Mike.

Kristen: That was, 

Mike: I'm, running on no food and caffeine at this point in tribute to my life in the restaurant.

Kristen: It feels really appropriate. I mean, I, I've just eaten goldfish for dinner, so,

Mike: Apropos. Okay, so we're, we're back in episode two.I got edited.

Kristen: Well, yeah, we split these into two parts just for length, but, but yeah, so this was, is part two of our Leadership Book Club of Unreasonable Hospitality by Will Guidara

Mike: This episode is unreasonably long.

Kristen: Unreasonably Law. I mean,

it's our podcast,

Mike: Our podcast. aiming for

Kristen: Can skip the

Mike: I'm aiming for Jocko's three hours. I You shouldn't skip this episode.

Kristen: It's a great, but it's a great book. It's a great book and there are a lot of leadership 

Mike: So much leadership lessons in here. I don't know that I'm doing the best job of translating Will's leader, but if you read the book, he has so many like solid techniques and solid practices in there. He gets his team to perform very highly.

So yeah.

Kristen: So we left off, right before Chapter Eight, and at this point as a reminder, Will, has is now the GM at Eleven Madison Park and he's really in these chapters, he's getting into a lot of like the specific tactics and that he made that lead them to their multiple Michelin stars.

Mike: Wellthe Michelin stars are one thing. Okay. There are a lot of,

Kristen: yeah, there's a lot of steps in before

Mike: No. That's not what I mean. There's a lot of, I'm, let me explain what they because, so there's different accolades, accolade, accolades.

There's different accolades along the way that they're gonna achieve.

And of course, you know, Michelin is one standard of excellence. One star is an excellent restaurant. Two stars is a fantastic restaurant. Three stars is supposedly legendary, and there's claims of bias all these, okay? You don't get three Michelin stars without being one of the best restaurants in the world.

Eleven Madison Park was the best restaurant in the world. 

Kristen: Yeah. 

Mike: Yeah. So even among all of that, San Pellegrino and all food. And while all these, like at some point they started doing the world's 50 best restaurants. And unlike Michelin, they don't have the baggage, I will say of the history and the traditions of it.

And they were looking for, forward thinkers. I know, uh, Noma was on there, you know, chefs that are doing something so bold and new or just reinventing, dining and food. And so this story is the story of their progression to that.

And being a four star New York Times restaurant and winning three Michelin stars are, but signposts on the route, to that final win. It's not even in the same ballpark. 

Kristen: Yeah. 

Mike: And I think Noma never had three Michelin stars. You know, it was kind of a, a funny joke or something like, they just didn't like René Redzepi or something.

I don't know. Anyway, moving on. Okay. Chapter eight, Breaking Rules and Building a Team. 

In this, Will has the, an experience with a longer tenured service director who's in the firmly in the fine dining camp that wants to do things the traditional way and he calls Will out for touching a table while he's talking to a guest who is a very old, regular of his from Tabla.So he knew these people very well. And, the touching the table is a no-no in fine dining and the service director ad admonishes him, who is his boss, but doesn't care admonishes him anyway, that's fine. We don't put our hands on the table. He says. and Will, does respect him for this. It's probably awkward to yell at someone while that person is also your boss and Will asks, how come not trying to be a jerk, just trying to understand.

The service director can't answer why, and he just says, it's just always done that way. We just don't do that. So in this Will finds his four star weakness actually allows him to think critically about the only thing that mattered to him, which was the guest experience. The ultimate goal, just being, connecting with people.

If something isn't serving this, why keep it? So,

Kristen: Yeah, it's the classic, like the most dangerous words for organization or because we've always done

Mike: always done it this way, And Will, comes, Will, wants to be president of a Shake Shack, you know? He is not aspiring to,

Kristen: So Will likens this experience to athletic performance. You know, an athlete has done so many reps by the time they reach a high level, by the time they get through the competition, their body is working on muscle memory. While this is an advantage in many ways, it's also a disadvantage.If you can't answer the question,, why do we do it this way, with anything other than we've always done it like that.

Mike: The rule deserves another look. In this knowing less is often an opportunity to do more. I found that, I didn't know anything about senior living, but I came into it with a different perspective, a hotel perspective, a restaurant perspective. I don't have preconceived, I didn't grow up in the industry, you know, I didn't come from healthcare, which is a detriment in some ways, but lets me see things differently.

So he, doesn't care. He's like, if, if it enhances your connection with the guest, you can put your hands on the snowy white table cloth while you're talking to them, everything for him is about creating an authentic connection. That's the most important part. Over tradition. So challenges tradition for efficacy and authenticity.

His un unorthodoxy is, drives the traditionalist nuts. But he firmly believes that tradition should not interfere with hospitality. Nice moment where he reinvents the goodbye gift. The goodbye gifts in a lot of fancy restaurants are also very fancy. And it can be something like, I don't know, it could be like profiteroles, or macarons and you're stuffed to the gills. Like

Kristen: You've, you've had like four 

Mike: You've had four desserts and three cheese, like you don't want. So they do something totally off the wall. Daniel, whom makes like his own, I don't know, his whisk granola, for everybody.

And it's a very personal, humble touch. It's also something you're not gonna eat tonight. It's, you're gonna eat it tomorrow morning when you wake up and you're hungry. And this granola is gonna be that final moment of hospitality long after you've left. First of all, it's gonna be amazing granola.

And second of all, you're gonna remember the amazing experience you just had last night. And these guys are geniuses.So also in this, he challenges the orthodoxy of hiring. I love this. I do this myself. Hire the person, not the resume.This is start with why hire people that share your why.

Not necessarily have the right background or whatever. So he prioritizes genuine hospitality over fine dining experience and great service. Can look like something, stranger carrying a stroller up Grand Central's, number seven train escalator to the 4, 5, 6 platform, which if anyone remembers that escalator, it is the longest escalator on earth.

It's not, actually, I looked it up, but it's insanely long and you will see many times in the New York subway, random strangers helping a lady with their stroller and their baby up these crazy sta and that's hospitality. I look for that, not someone who's worked in all the right fine dining restaurantsanyway.

Hotel, front desk agent, personally escorting a guest. I remember, when I started in hotels, when I got promoted, the first time I was a front desk agent. And I didn't know anything. I'd transitioned from restaurants and I was just, I don't know. I was, had been a bellman for a minute and they put me on the front desk and, all our guests were European tourists.

They didn't know their way around America, not all New York. And some people had wanted directions and I took the time to walk out from the front desk, walk them out front of the hotel and start like, walking them halfway, a little down the street and pointing and giving them hand gestures to show them where the seven tra, I don't remember where it was, but,when I headed back, I saw the hotel owner, happened to be there and had been watching me do that, and I got promoted soon after that.

He and I could see it in his eyes. He was like, oh. This guy is going one extra, like who does, He says, oh, it's over there. No, I took them out and I'm like, you go left. You go right. Okay. Watch out for the Wendy. And that, that impressed him to the point where like, okay, this guy can be front desk supervisor. So I had a similar experience. I went to, you know, hospitality doesn't have this big grand gesture. I went to our company sales count conference in Orlando, and travel is stressful. I'm a, I'm an introvert. I'm a homebody. You take me outta my environment and it, it's eating away at my soul every moment.

And I finally got to the hotel, the, Hyatt Grand Cypress. Yeah. Shout you guys out. You did great. And I'm exhausted. I'm carrying my stuff. I don't know where to go. I'm also dealing with my own company. Oh, all these people. I have 45 bosses, and I'm trying to figure out what I'm doing. And as I'm standing there, the front desk agent left her pod and walked out to me to get me.

And she's like, I can help you over here. And brought me back to her little pod. And from that very small gesture, had a big impact. she wasn't on her phone waiting for somebody to bother her. She came and got me. And from that moment on, I had a great experience. And I was also willing to forgive many of the, problems that would've annoyed me otherwise, including, like, I had to walk three floors to use a microwave.

That would've been a very negative experience if they had not first framed the whole experience very hospitably. So,culture can be taught. Will starts to really hire for, the why I, the same thing. I just hired a very experienced hotel manager to be our lifestyle activities director.

He has some experience in volunteering, but he doesn't have direct experience. And everyone was like, I don't know about this, but he has years of experience as a director of rooms and operations manager front office. So he has leadership and he has service, he's killing it. And everybody's like, oh, he was a good choice.

And the residents chose him. We gave the final candidates the re to the residents to choose. But, he shares our why. So,Will starts to build trust in the teams. He's trying to teach them to, work seamlessly. He's got so many cool kung fu moves.He, they get to the point where, they're really pushing this authentic connection.

So they want waiters to stand there and engage the guests that want to have a conversation, right? As a waiter, you have to know like, does this guest want to talk to me and hang out with me? Or do they just want me to drop the dishes and piss off? And knowing the type, every person wants a different type of service.

And, but when you're giving that kind of service, when you're clearing the plates, you can be stuck talking to a table with dirty, sometimes very heavy plates in your hand for five minutes and it's really uncomfortable. And the guest might not super notice it. They're just chatty, chatty, chatty. But you notice it.

You're holding, a plate of spares or whatever and, not me, but. other people. And so they start to work so seamlessly together that a waiter that gets, put in that position will hold the dishes behind his back, not say anything. And within, 15 to 30 seconds, another team member will notice what's going on.

Swoop in, take the dishes, out of from behind his back and no one will ever know what happened. That's right hand, left hand, kung fu. There's a Chinese saying your right hand knows what your left hand is doing.

Kristen: Yeah. There's a lot of that stuff. Like I did not realize he, he talks about this a little bit later on, but just how often they use like very subtle hand signals.

Mike: Yeah, It's like Dune. They develop a sign, they use baseball player sign language. It's crazy. It's crazy to develop. So he's a problem solver. Eleven Madison Park is a gigantic room and just getting water to a newly sat table can take a long time. And there's a lot of traffic. They have to, there's so much foot traffic.

They have to establishone way streets. there's a whole flow of traffic around the room. But what they, instead of, so the waiter will go or whoever the will go over to take the water order. Do you want still sparkling bottled, we're gonna upsell you the bottled water and instead of walking 50 yards or whatever it is to the busboy to go get the water, the, he will very subtly make hand gestures, like they're in Dune and the bus or the food runner, I don't know who delivers, the water there, but will show up as if magic with their order. 

Kristen: Yep. 

Mike: Outstanding. Yeah. Outstanding.

it's choreographed dance

It's a dance. Yeah. I have personally been on teams that work together like this and it's an absolute pleasure.

It's a absolute pleasure and honor to be part of that type of team.That's where peer pressure and culture. You hold each other and yourselves to an incredibly higher standard than any external control system ever possibly could. That's the way it should be. The best way to reward A players is to surround them with more A players. Be unreasonable in how you build your team. 

Kristen: Yeah. And I like that he points out in this, that every hire sends a message. 

Mike: Every hire sends 

Kristen: Says morale is fickle, which it is. 

Mike: So a fickle, 

Kristen: Every individual that's brought onto a team can have an outsize impact on the team in either direction, positively or negatively. 

Mike: I like this. He says, build a cultural bonfire. Make it cool to care.

Mm-hmmThere is almost no more powerful incentive to give great hospitality than to receive it. Don't hide your passions. And he doesn't. And he's finally reached a place where he doesn't have to apologize for being obsessive and perfect perfectionist.

He loves his team in a way too, because they don't. said they don't super judge him for it. like the, I wanna understand too, like this ecosystem of high-end restaurants in New York, these waiters could make, I don't know, a quarter million dollars a year for real.

Kristen: But

Mike: But there's high standards, like when you sign on to work at Per Se, you sign a contract that says your hair will not change from when you got hired.

They will make you shave. You ha It is an intense job. They know the name of the cow that produced every one of the 14 cheeses, the different cow. They, you know, back to the busboy who wasn't a good busboy was a good expeditor. There was somebody who just couldn't learn the playbook.

It was so complicated. It's, it is not. Hey, I'm just bringing you your hamburger. These are the highest level professionals, the expectations are very, very, very high. The standards are not the same. Now, you know, we went to a Michelin restaurant for my birthday a couple years ago, and the food was amazing and the service was not.

And after COVID I think there's just, people don't want to do these incredibly brutal jobs for not as much money anymore. You can make a quarter million dollars at Per Se, but you're not making that at, 

Kristen: Okay, moving on. Chapter Nine, Working with Purpose. On Purpose. Don't try to be all things to all people. They're very satisfied with that mission statement. Be the four star restaurant for the next generation.Yeah. Which is a great business thing, right? Like yeah. Don't try to be everything to everyone. 

Mike: So Will reads every un against many people's advice. He reads every review.

Kristen: Yeah. Which is interesting.

Mike: He's an obsessive 

Kristen: person,

I don't think I could do

Mike: that, but he learns from it and he turns that on its head. and at some point, I think the New York Times critic gives them a, like a cursory review or the, before the full review.

And they say, he says, this restaurant needs a lot more Miles Davis. And Will's like, what the fuck does that mean?

And, but they think about it. So he's crazy, right? So he goes online and he researches and he starts to look through every article and everything everyone ever said about Miles and starts to aggregate words and look for the most,spoken words.

And he finds, I think 10 or 11? No, 11. So what they find is,repeated words that many people use to speak about Miles, and they pick 11. Cool, endless reinvention, inspired, forward moving, fresh, collaborative, spontaneous, adventurous, light, vibrant and innovative. And they put these 11 words up everywhere and this becomes their roadmap.

Kristen: I love that. 

Mike: It's like Marcus Aurelius says, whatever stands in your way becomes the way.

Kristen: Yeah. And he also, like, it's important to note that this was a team exercise. 

Mike: Team exercise. 

Kristen: And he gets into this when he, like he says, like, strategy is for everyone. Like really encouraging you to involve your team in strategic planning.

So they're bought in to the goals, the roadmap, the vision without you just deciding on it and then trying to get buy-in from them. 

Mike: Yeah. He's obsessive, but he is not an autocrat, right?

I like this part. He talks about choose conflicting goals.Hospitality and excellence are in a way opposite.

Kristen: Hospitality is the warmth and kindness, which is like going to your mom's house and serving youvegan meatloaf, does not have the excellence that, Daniel Humm puts on a plate, right? So choosing conflicting goals actually forces you to adapt and grow. And he references Southwest Airlines.

Mike: It's set out to be the lowest cost airline and the number one in customer service and employee satisfaction. And they were up until last week. When they laid off like a thousand people at their corporate headquarters. And everybody says now it's not the same reality, but okay.

Multiple conflicting goals force you to innovate. He, his team at Eleven made up really two camps. Those that have been delivering warmer service and those that have been delivering classical technical service. And obviously they're gonna go for the warmer service and they're gonna revolutionize dining. He talks about the impact of service and the nobility in it. We have the ability to make the lives of the people we serve in a better, in a very profound way. 

Kristen: Yeah. And then that pulls back into, like, you and your team members must be able to name for yourself why your work matters. 

Mike: So, chapter 10, I love this chapter, Creating a Culture of Collaboration.

He says, choose worthy rivals. And he targets Per Se, so he goes to, Per Se, is Thomas Keller's restaurant in, Columbus Circle. Is it still called Columbus Circle? Probably not. Hope not. Anyway. 

But he has an amazing experience, but the coffee at the end is very ho-hum and it's not great.

And this resonates with him. And he's like, you know, and this is the norm in fine dining. the cocktails aren't good. The beer's not good. The coffee's not good. The wine's amazing, but nothing else is why, because you get the sommelier to also run the, he doesn't know, the sommelier doesn't know beer, he doesn't know cocktails, he doesn't know coffee.

So you know what Will figures out? Every 22-year-old that works for him knows great coffee. And he talks about, and I fucking love this, he goes to Ninth Street Espresso, which is where I fell in love with coffee.

Kristen: Oh, really?

They 

Mike: have the best coffee in the history. They not, they don't anymore. It's changed.

But when they started, there was one on Avenue C and there was one on, I think it was on Seventh Street, right by, in the East Village by where I worked. Best coffee ever. They made it a fucking science. A science of the temperature of the water, the exact measurement of the grounds, the gr every little thing was attended to.

And the best coffee I have ever had will always be Ninth Street Espresso. And this was also before all the soy milks that came out, these barista, so soy milks, so they could do their art, have oil in them, but the soy milk they were using back in the day didn't, and they were less worried about the art than they were about the quality.

So it never tasted as good once all these bougie barista milks came out. So he gives these programs to young people on his team. He finds a 22-year-old dude who loves beer and puts him in charge of Eleven Madison Parks, beer program. He's fine talent everywhere.

He makes it like

Kristen: And he makes it like a beer destination. 

Mike: He

makes it a beer destination. 'cause he's crazy in love with beer. And he, and these distributors are falling in love with this kid who's like now in charge of this famous restaurant's beer program. And he's seeking out like, I don't know anything about beer obscure pilsners and and giving, giving these kids the opportunity to, make a difference and be part of something more.

and

Kristen: And I think one of them, I forget which one ends up being the GM after 

Mike: him, right? I think it's the beer guy. I I think it's the beer guy. 

Kristen: Yeah. Which is really cool. 

awesome. Right? I'm sorry. The best way to learn is to teach right. Is to let, give somebody ownership and let 'em go for it, Yeah. 

Mike: I love it.

Kristen: For sure. I love 

Mike: It might not work is a terrible reason not to try.

Kristen: Yeah. He also says like often the perfect moment to give somebody more responsibility is actually 

Mike: they're ready. A hundred percent is before they're ready.

Kristen: It's so true.

Mike: He wasn't ready for Eleven Madison Park. Yep.

He was not ready for that. You know, it can't be too outside their wheelhouse. It can't be too far over their capacity, but, what do they say? Progress is made outside your comfort zone. I fucking hate that. I like my comfort zone. Okay.

Kristen: Yeah, I love this and I love the finding what people are passionate about and then fi having that lead into a leadership opportunity for them is so cool.

Mike: Yeah. Oh, you're passionate about that. Cool. You're in charge. Good luck. Let me know what you need. Yeah. I'm here for you. You'll blow people's minds when you do that. Like,they're not ready for that. 

Yeah. I also really like that he talks about, the pre meal meeting, so he runs it himself for, for the first year or whatever, but, then at some point once a week, they start having a line level team member lead it. 

Run the show. Yeah. 

Kristen: Which is great. I've used this tactic many times, and encourage people to do that. It's a great way to get people who may not be ready for promotion yet, but start getting them some responsibility,

Mike: Put 'em in the hot seat.

Kristen: Yeah. And he also talks about, this kinda goes back to listening, which I of course always love to talk about, but he really stresses like the first time somebody comes to you with an idea, you need to listen closely because how you handle it that first time is gonna dictate how they choose to contribute in the future. 

Mike: A hundred percent.

Kristen: I love 

Mike: So I love those.

I love it.

And we can find all those lessons in Extreme Ownership.

Oh, how US Navy seals, we know. Okay. It's true though. Like you'll see so many parallels between, sorry, we're in restaurants now. This guy is talking about the same thing as a battle hardened Navy Seal.

And this guy could not be more like,warm hearted. Will's not a tough guy. If you see him, he's, skinny and nerdy. Right.Jocko's a 225 pound war. They're talking about the same concepts. Yeah. Same techniques. And I'm sure Will, can command as much respect in a roomas Jocko. So chapter 11, Pushing Toward Excellence. Excellence is the culmination of thousands of details executed perfectly. We're not looking for perfection, we're looking for excellence. I think that's a genius way, to talk about it. I will say I'm a recovering perfectionist.

Confessions of a perfectionist. Will and I share something in common. We both remake the bed when our wives make it. Uhhuh, and Christina Tossi is an amazing chef, but her style is, I almost want to say irreverent. Like she stopped icing the sides of cakes because it was really annoying to her. And,

Kristen: Oh, that cre that created a whole,

it 

Mike: created a movement.

Kristen: yeah. The naked 

Mike: The Naked Cake. The Naked Cake. But at her, She, but she's a genius in She created like the cereal, milk cake. Everything she does, like hearkens back to your childhood, what's the tastiest thing you've ever had as a child? It's the milk that's left over after your Fruit Loops. Right? It that's remember how sweet and weird and good that flavor is, and it's like green and per, and she took that and turned that into a

Kristen: Yes, I do 

Mike: remember that. I, okay. but we, she,

Kristen: But she shares my bed making abilities. Apparently

Mike: it is not, you know,it is not, she values hospitality over a little bit over excellence, I would say.

But her stuff is amazing. It's just, it's

Kristen: And creativity 

Mike: It's so creative. It's so that cookie, oh, what is it like It is 14 years and that is still the best cookie I've ever had. 

Kristen: Uh, My goldfish dinner is getting more and more disappointing

Mike: It had cornflakes, it had everything. I really thought it had beef tallo and it, I was like, it should not.

And probably when they opened, it was only Christina and one other person. She probably made that cookie. She, they were both working like 18 hour days or something like that. Just the two or three of them to open Milk Bar. And, her story's the same. David Chang pushed her. You know, he saw her talent and pushed her to do that. Who she is. Okay. Um,

Well, I'm sorry. Fastidiousness can be a superpower. 

Kristen: Yeah.

I don't disagree with that. 

Mike: It's not possible to do everything perfectly, but it is possible to do many things perfectly.

Right. The aggregation of marginal gains. You chase excellence in every area. When you plate a dish, 96% of things are perfect. It's gonna be mind blowing. I love the development of sign language. We talked about that. They had to create like lanes in, the only one way traffic. They wanted ballet, not football.

And I love this. People can feel perfection. They don't necessarily see it.

Kristen: Yeah, that's true. It's back to hospitality is about the way you make people feel. that's true. 

Mike: So, Eleven Madison Park balanced this un almost unseen perfection with the warmth of hospitality as face front.Has a good thing being right is irrelevant.He sees a waiter correct a guest, the guest says, I ordered my steak. Medium rare. And the waiter goes, it is medium rare. And the waiter's right. But now you've made the guest feel dumb.

Kristen: Yeah. That is so true. It's like the letting, pushing ego 

Mike: push your ego, ego aside

Kristen: And 'cause that doesn't really matter.

It's like the guest experience matters. 

Mike: And, Danny, and I think a lot of people, and I agree, the guest is not always right. The guest is not right when they cross the line of disrespect, of, of aggression. there's a lot of people that are not right. But in things like, and this is we'll do, How to win friends And Influence People.

Kristen: And there's a similar passage in there. Like you, he corrects somebody and you just made him feel smaller, And, so you won your point. So what, that wasn't, you didn't win a friend.yeah.

Mike: Okay to, it's okay to put your ego aside. That's so hard.

hard. It's so hard.

It takes a certain level of like emotional maturity 

Yeah. So and definitely 

Kristen: struggle with it myself.

Mike: Yeah. it is, it's,

Kristen: But it's so true.

Mike: You wanna be right or do you wanna win?

Kristen: Yeah. And yeah. And the way he puts it is if you've corrected a guest because you don't want them to think you've made a mistake, you've made a much bigger 

Mike: bigger mistake.

You made a bigger mistake. That's genius. Yeah. Their perception is our reality. Take one more step.

That's what it is too. It's doing one more thingthan someone expects doing. Just something out of the ordinary. Something that's not required. Something that's special to you. It should be special to you too. Chapter 12 Relationships Are Simple, and Simple is Hard. Heck yeah, it is.

So as they're starting to ramp up their goal for stars and wins, Daniel kind of expects to win the James Beard Award. He does not. Instead of, you know, drowning his sorrows, they celebrate anyway, they gather in the restaurant and they support him. And I love this. He says, you should support your team even more when they don't win. And they honor Daniel and celebrate Daniel even more than they might have should he have won the Beard Award. And they become fame. EMP becomes famous for their parties. They're celebratory parties and I think it kind of starts here.What's the saying? Drink. Drink your best wine on your worst day. I think Daniel also comes over to this part, Daniel Boloud, not Daniel Humm Daniel Boloud comes to this party and cooks scrambled eggs for everybody. This dude is just like this crazy cool character and in and out of the story, like cooking and scrambled eggs. here's the world's probably most decorated chef cooking scrambled eggs at two in the morning for a bunch of drunk, you know, I don't know.

It's, I miss that life. It's a beautiful life. Okay,

Where do we go 

Kristen: The important, it's important to me card

Mike: It's important to me card, genius card. This book is about the exploration of a partnership between Daniel and Will. And they build, they have to build a lot of trust and one of the things, there, there have different passions.

They have different focus, but at one point, I can't remember which one started this, but I think Daniel wanted to do something, but it was a lot of extra work. And Will was like, ah, this is, and Daniel says to it's important to me. And Will's like, okay, we'll do it. Yeah. And this becomes the building of a partnership of connection and trust. So powerful.

Kristen: powerful.

It also, like, it only works if you don't abuse it. Right.

Mike: Right. You can't abuse it. But we should, we should do this in our marriage.

Kristen: I know. I was thinking, I was like, this is perfect 

Mike: it's perfect, for marriage,

Kristen: relationships. Not just working 

Mike: relationships, Yeah. this is important to me. Okay. You don't have to explain yourself. You don't have to convince me. I love you. We'll do it because it's important to 

Kristen: you.

Yeah. And I know if you're, I know if you're saying that, if you're pulling that card, then it's really meaningful to you and we'll do it. 


Mike: Thoughtful trust and feedback, right?

Thoughtful critique must be part of leadership. Tough love works, but sarcasm doesn't. We go back to our root of the word meaning too tear, flesh, sarcasian.

Kristen: Yeah. 

He also talks about also like the people you work with will never be your actual family. And we talked about that in an episode recently, where corporations are like, you're our family.

So they may not, they may not, they may not be your actual family, but that doesn't mean that you can't work harder to treat them like family. And this means things like, don't fire too fast. 

Mike: A hundred percent.

Kristen: Like, make sure you've really given somebody a chance to succeed make sure that they're in, that there's not like a better role for them before you fire them. 

Mike: Yeah.

I guess they start having Thanksgiving dinner together. 

Kristen: Yeah, they, so he, I remember this, he made a case to Danny Meyer whose 

Mike: open on 

Kristen: restaurants were all closed on Thanksgiving, but he made a case that it was not that great because most of the people who worked at the restaurant didn't, were not from New York, so they couldn't go home to be with their families anyway.

A hundred

Mike: hundred percent. We loved working Thanksgiving. First of all, it was the most money we ever made,

Kristen: I'm sure.

Mike: And we also got an amazing meal. And the restaurant was kind of our family. Exactly what you said. They the most New Yorkers like their family live somewhere else.

Yeah. And 

Kristen: And with the money they saved by being open on this very profitable day for restaurants to be open, they could close for like a few days in January.

Yeah. So they actually could go home to their

Mike: families. Yep.

Kristen: Yeah. 

Mike: Yeah. So don't follow traditions, ask questions. 

Kristen: Yep. 

Mike: Yeah. And the first Thanksgiving toast he gives wait, will says he's very grateful for a place where he doesn't have to hide his neuroses anymore.

Turns out fine dining was for him

Yeah. Fine dining is for him. Well, you know, I am sure he could run a burger joint and the nomads are much less formal,

Kristen: That they are.

Mike: Yeah. Yeah. But they're, the attention to detail is not less precise. So.

Kristen: Yeah. And this is where, so this big, huge family meal after the restaurant closed on Thanksgiving became a new tradition. And he talks about like new traditions work only if they're authentic.

So they have to fill a real purpose and satisfy a real need. And it really did create this dual purpose where it allowed them time to go home with their families later. And it also created like a family bonding experience for the staff as well. 

Mike: You know, people who are gifted at hospitality, oh my God, tend to 

Kristen: sensitive. 

Mike: They're empathetic and they care a lot. They notice everything and feel deeply. These tendencies can make people difficult to manage, but they're actually superpowers. Baby. I'm so sorry.

Kristen: I love you. It's okay. Me too. You, you put up with my neurodivergence.

Mike: I do I love your neurodivergence. Except for the cleaning part. Um, 

Kristen: yeah, yeah, 

Mike: it's fine. Your, your neurodivergence is an impressive superpower. And it makes you unique.Chapter 13, Leveraging Affirmation. So on this journey, they, I think they're at three New York stars at this point.

They're, they probably have two Michelin stars or one anyway, they're trying to rise in the ranks of the San Pellegrino 50 list. I think the first time they go, they're like 50, and then, I don't know, they, it takes a while, but in the interim, they apply for something called Relais and Chateaux, which I had no idea what this was, but it's,

Kristen: I've seen it in hotels. I didn't know what it

Mike: There, there was a restaurant near where we lived in San Francisco that I kept seeing it. Now, I see it more often,you'll notice it now. But anyway, it's this, I don't know, it's the secret society of restaurants and hotels. And you have to, the difference between this award and everything else is you have to apply for this.

Kristen: And, it's very unique among the awards. There's 580 properties slash restaurants worldwide, which is probably more than three Michelin star restaurants, but it's very unique. You know, all of Thomas Keller's restaurants are in Relais & Châteaux, you know? Of course. I would also like to just point out the confusion. I mean, this is, obviously, this is nonfiction, but there is a next section of our notes that reference both two Daniels and a Danny are all central characters in this. Sorry, it's a little confusing.

Mike: There's Daniel Boulud. There's Daniel Humm. There's Danny Meyer.

Oh my God. yeah. 

Kristen: Yeah, a little confusing. 

Mike: I want to find the restaurant right near where we lived. Gary Danko.

Kristen: Oh, Gary Danko.

Mike: Yeah. That they

Kristen: fantastic

Mike: Fantastic. Historically fantastic restaurant. Yeah. Uh, Saison right by the Hyatt that I worked at, is apparently in there too. It's very prestigious. Right. And they want to apply and Danny Meyer tells them no. He says, you're not ready. And probably not like that.

Take that out. Danny Meyer says, you're not ready. And so, you know, he thinks about it. He talks to, he talks to Daniel Humm, and he goes back to Danny and he says, he asks him again. I know you say we're not ready, but I don't think you know fully what we've been working on. And I think we're ready.

And Danny Meyer actually respects that Will challenges him and tells him to go ahead, but they missed the deadline. They've missed the deadline. And instead Daniel Boulud loves him so much that he says he can help, he offers to reach out. But there's a caveat, he has to come in for a meal.

So, uh, Daniel Boulud, Thomas Keller and Patrick O'Connell of the, in Daniel o' Patrick O'Connell is a very famous chef of a very small, restaurant slash hotel. The Inn a Little Washington. 

He has like water from like glaciers that haven't seen the light of day in, in a million years. And like there's part of the ta like you can order this as part of the tasting. 'cause he also, a lot of people are not drinking anymore. So like, you can do this weird water tasting, you know,so Pat, these are the three like titans of industry, it's the rock stars. Imagine like you're a rock band and Paul McCartney, Jimmy Page and like,I don't know who's that dude. The, Stones, who's in the stones? Mick Jagger. Mick Jagger. Like show up to your band to, you're playing at a club and like these three dudes walk in to listen to you play to see if they'll give you,and this really, it puts the spotlight on, on the team.

And, but, Will's so proud of the team and he really, it showcases, what they've worked on. Of course they love it and they recommend Eleven Madison Park and they make calls and they beat the, they don't care about the deadline and they're in Relais & Châteaux huge, feather in their cap.

so he says, as a leader, you should take credit for creating the situation that others can thrive in. That's what you get to take credit for.

Kristen: You don't get to take credit for other people's work. 

Mike: Nope. Yeah. some people tell him not to do this because team members that get a lot of public praise are gonna get poached from other restaurants.

He's like, yeah, that's true. Don't care. And he uses this to, and some people do, occasional person does, but you know what? They'll fill that with somebody else who wants to be part of the highest performing team on earth. Um, like 

Kristen: They're not operating out of fear.

Mike: They're not operating outta fear.

And I do that too. What's right is you gotta do what's right. Like I, if you have a career opportunity, I'm gonna support you. I'll miss you. It's gonna be hard to lose you. But And probably he kept more people than he would've otherwise by being such a, supportive leader. Yeah.

Kristen: Yeah. He also talks about receiving praise always feels good, but the dopamine hit from it only lasts so long. So being super intentional and using that praise to encourage, inspire, and uplift your team. And doing it the right times in the right way matters. 


Mike: Chapter 14, Restoring Balance. On ambition. It's an extraordinary thing that can drive you to great heights. Good advice for leaders. You need to keep an eye on the experience that the team is having. It's easy to drive for the goal, but hard it, but it can be hard to go slow.

I think this is where they realize they're probably pushing everyone a little too hard. They have a cook show up, disoriented at I don't know, 9:00 PM free, all freaked out because she thinks she's late for her 10:00 AM shift and instead of being an hour late, she's actually like 11 hours early because she's been working.

So, and, and oh God, I can, oh God, I can relate to this. Yeah. And you don't know what, and I don't understand. It was dark out. Like, what? But she's so, like, you can get in this weird zone of that and they're like, okay, maybe we need to, step a little back and Will realizes he's, I can only be inspirational and restorative if I buy back the time to restore myself.

Wellness is not a passive pursuit. He starts to talk about, wellness pursuits, diet, exercise, mindfulness. They create something that's fun called the Deep Breathing Club. I think it's cute. They make shirts that are, that have DBC on them. And, under pressure, a lot of these, jobs are very high pressure.

It is like a battle. In France, the kitchen, they're called the brigade and their discipline is almost like military discipline. In terms of the hierarchy and the strictnessBut so like they,they create a practice of like,do you notice yourself getting overwhelmed?

Okay, you're gonna go take, I don't know, five deep breaths or something like that. And the, his friend worked in a psychiatric hospital and this, they created the deep breathing club technique to calm people down. And sometimes it works. And teaching people to learn to ask for help. SoChapter 15, the Best Offense is Offense.

No shit. Go for it. 

EMP gets hit by the financial crisis of 2008.

They go through the same process, I did in hotels, a little later. They zeroed everything out and looked for savings everywhere they could find. Over time, I found, companies build up, I found this in my hotel, like we had three newspaper subscriptions for the same newspaper. But when times are good, you're not looking for a hundred dollars a month to cut, you know? But when things are tough,you do. And he says, enough raindrops create an ocean. that. Yeah.

I love this quote, adversity is a terrible thing to waste. They get creative on expense cutting and revenue generation.

Yeah. Like one of the innovations that, that on the revenue side they talk about is like their lunch service was just completely slashed. Right.

The businessman's expense account went away. Yeah. And fine dining is, that's a big revenue stream for all fine dining restaurants.

Kristen: I believe that. Yeah. So what they did is they created a $29 lunch menu, I think it was like a two course

Mike: Yeah. A little prix fixe

Kristen: And Yeah. And they were able to avoid laying off a single team member during that financial crisis. So that actually filled up their lunch.

And even though they were working on lower margins, it was enough, so. 


Mike: I love something else in here, earning informality. When I start with people, like I have my board of directors telling me to not call them "Mr." I haven't earned, you know, I will, I'll try. I'm like, I don't know if that's possible, sir, but we'll give it a shot.

You, have to earn informality. And you do that through respect and consistency. 

Kristen: Yeah. That's a very, chapter 16 is very short and that's the whole, The whole idea of it. Although, one thing that from the previous chapter I also really liked was the cool critic of the night program.

So this was, oh yeah. They were preparing for a their next New York Times review. And they had, usually there's like multiple appearances by the critic pretty close together, but I think for some reason they had like a year before the critic came again and it's like an excruciating wait

so

Mike: that's

Kristen: Frank Bruni. Frank Bruni, yeah. What they did is they would designate like at random a table every night as the critic's table.

Mike: Yeah.

Kristen: And they would treat those people like as if they were a critic. And it got them so prepared for having him come in that when he came in again and they were ready.

Mike: And to Will's point in here, you're not going to impress someone past the high levels that you're, you can only do your best for the, like, you can make sure the plate's just a little bit cleaner. You can make sure your best server is there. By knowing who the critic is, you're not gonna change that much, but you can just ensure there's a little bit more polish on what you're doing.

Um, andyou shouldn't be doing all that much different when the critic shows up. And I practice hotel. Like I don't make them scrub the floor with the toothbrush when the VP comes. But we do put his picture up,so just don't miss the chance, like it's a little, turn it up just a little bit.

Chapter 17, Learning to be Unreasonable. 

Kristen: One of the things he has early in this chapter that I don't find myself quoting Jay-Z very often, but he has the quote I,

Mike: Hard knock life, man,

Kristen: But I believe you can speak things into existence. That really fits in with this chapter.

Mike: I mean, Jay-Z did speak a lot. He spoke a billion dollars into existence. Yeah. Yeah. So

Kristen: And also married Beyonce. So what, what,what higher level of achievement is

Mike: I, I don't know. You know, like there's some. So he says, hospitality is a dialogue, not a monologue. Will goes a little crazy at some points.

They make up their own menus. Like the customer can basically dictate their own menu. He treats everyone like a VIP. One thing in restaurants is generally at the end of the night, you want to get people out of there, or even when the table's done, you wanna turn the table, but it's very rude to drop the check.

Dropping the check is like, get the fuck out, I need your table. So Will does something different. And instead brings a full bottle of expensive cognac and puts it down on the table and he's like,enjoy this, after dinner, aperitif, this is on the house. Take all the time you want. And they barely, of course by this point they're bloated and drunk and they barely drink anything, but they'll, they, that's final touch of hospitality.

And it doesn't cost that much. There's your 5% and there your 95 5, you can take out my vulgarity, but I'm from the kitchen, we're brutalist.

Kristen: I think it's fair to leave it in

Mike: It's fair to leave it in.

Kristen: It's reflective of the restaurant industry.

Mike: The of it. It's very reflective. we're probably more correct in terms of not being quite so honestly, like the girls, have you ever listened to this?

The pastry girls that I worked with at Pure Food and Wine are absolutely the dirtiest motherfuckers that I have ever. You guys made me blush. I worked with like 11 girls and it was me and 11 girls, and I loved working with them. They were so dirty. And like the things they would talk about, I still blushed you to the, I would be like, oh my God, what?

We watched Sex in the City. It's like 10 times. It's like Samantha, but 11 of them and, you know, uh, so that's amazing. It's amazing. And, um, I'll talk about it later. Anthony Bourdain loved to have like, badass women because women who could survive in that environment could generally put the toughest dude in his place. 

Kristen: Oh, I'm sure. 

Mike: I'm sure. uchi mata that motherfucker into the dish pit. Okay, so chapter 18, Improvisational Hospitality.

Kristen: I love this chapter.

Mike: Fucking awesome. Plating the hot dog. So Will, has a table of, visitors to New York. I know we're from Iowa, someplace that's not New York.

And they have an experience at Eleven Madison Park. They love it. They're gushing over it and they're like, we've had just the best New York experience. We're leaving early tomorrow. This was amazing. You know, the only thing we didn't do was try a real New York hot dog. So what as Will do, he goes out, gets a hot dog, gets a couple hot dogs from the cart down the corner, brings him back, brings him to Daniel Humm, and is like, can you plate this?

Daniel's like, what the fuck are talking about?

about And Will says it's important to me. So Daniel Humm cuts the hot dogs into like four pieces and I know he garnishes it and Will brings this out and of course, it blows their mind. 

Kristen: It costs them like 

Mike: Cost him nothing but the effort.

Yeah. I remember I did that. Something not like that. Will's the master of this, but I had a hotel guest who was lamenting, and actually they did this at Eleven Madison Park. I didn't talk about it. I had a hotel guest that was, she was like, oh, I can't, I, my car's parked down the streets in San Francisco.

My car's parked down the street. I know the meter's running out. I have to run upstairs. I took some change outta the register and went and paid her meter. She had a terrible experience. Otherwise she hated the hotel, she's the room is small.. The food is bad. But she still left us a good TripAdvisor review because we went out and paid her and it was not close.

I had, I couldn't find it. It took like, it's confusing down there and I couldn't find it. She gave us terrible directions, but we tried and that, that meant something to her. So plate, the hot dog. Plate the hot dog.And that's that personal, authentic, bespoke service. Yeah. I'm not just The Grace Notes.

The Grace Notes, man. I'm not, yeah.

Kristen: Yeah. I mean, I love what he goes through in this chapter. He talks about like they created a role that called the Dreamweaver role. And then I think they eventually had more than one of them, but they took somebody who I think had been on the reservations desk and was not very well utilized

Mike: Yeah. 

Kristen: Basically made her entire job to come up with these like creative ways to go above and beyond for guests and just completely wow them.

And it's so cool.

Mike: No Noma had a job like that when you made a reservation at Noma. They had a full-time person that just Googled you and tried to find out everything they possibly could about you. There's a story about Anthony Bourdain and it, there's a video of it on YouTube somewhere. Anthony Bourdain going to the French Laundry for the first time. He blows. And Thomas Keller, Anthony Bourdain's, a very famous smoker, Thomas Keller, bakes him a fucking flan with tobacco in it.

At some point, because, not to be kitschy, but because he knew by two hours into the meal that Anthony Bourdain was going to be so desperately jonesing for some nicotine, that he put it in some flan to give to him.

Kristen: Oh my God.

Mike: I, I've watched chefs like that. They're just, it's like they're writing poetry with ingredients. It's just there's, they're not constrained by normality or they're just, it's cool. Okay.

Kristen: When he talks about, like these grace notes or allow everybody to explore their creativity, where it's like, traditionally it's the chefs who are the ones who get to be creative, right?

But it allows the front of the house to be just as creative.So it's really motivating for the team as well as mind blowing to the guests. And he recommends that identifying moments that recur in your business and then building a toolkit that your team can deploy without too much effort. Because he talks about, it's not like they weren't repeating things.

There were definitely things that they would do. Like they, had a strategy every time a guest was going straight to the airport. So they, they would have for situations, different tools, but by you can kind of operationalize that to some extent and starting with identifying like, what are the recurring moments in your business. Which is awesome.

Mike: It's beautiful, right? And he talks about hospitality exists in every business. Not just restaurants. Not just hotels. Luxury. Luxury means just giving more. Hospitality means being more thoughtful. 

Kristen: Mm-hmm. Yeah. I think that distinction is important. 

Mike: Luxury is more than you need.

Hospitality is kindness from your heart. You know it, I'm a good, why am I a good gift giver. 

Kristen: Yeah. You're intimidatingly good gift giver. 

Mike: Yeah. My, I, it's so, it's 

Kristen: Really puts the pressure on.

Mike: No, you're amazing. It's intoxicating to give a gift that is so personal and thoughtful that it's like, you know me so well. It's not about how much, sometimes it's nice to support, but it's about, The meaningfulness of it. Yeah.Chapter 19, Scaling Culture. They open the Nomad. They buy EMP from Danny Meyer. And he experiences a whole new level of, no one knows what they're doing until they do it.

And, it's a whole new, he learns a lot more about investment banking than he expected. I heard that. I feel that. And you just start to figure it out. The back to language creates culture, make it nice. That's their business. Language creates culture. Yeah. And, And to what you were saying, like, creativity is a practice.

It's not a gift limited to geniuses. It is a practice. And even, you talk about writers sometimes they, they have a very disciplined practice. They wake up at five and they make themselves sit there for two hours and write, even if they write nothing on the page. 

Kristen: Yeah.

I definitely wanna do an episode soon on like, how do you nurture creativity within your culture. 

Mike: So as they open the Nomad, Will fails to trust someone to be the GM of Eleven Madison Park. He's trying to do it all and he's failing. And he, has to eventually call everybody together and admit his mistake. And he criticizes himself publicly, much like Jocko and Extreme Ownership in the opening chapter.

And he promotes, I think, the beer guy to be the GM who's not ready. But he gets it together and does very good. Chapter 20, Back to Basics. the

Kristen: This is the final

Mike: Final chapter. And I think probably by now they have three Michelin stars and they achieve their four star New York Yeah.

Thing. And they, it's, they're winning, And they're winning because of the processes and passion that they've, and they, it's taken a decade to do this. Like it's not an overnight process. They embrace their, New York City roots. They start serving, I don't know, the black and white cookie, which I, we know from our episode on giving feedback,

Kristen: Yes.

Mike: They really go to the, it's too much for me. And they go to the mattresses on this. They're doing magic tricks at the table. And Will's just, he, for me, it's over the top, but, and it is for Pete Wells too. Who gives them the most, the New York Times critic gives them the most scathing review ever and says it's the most confusing meal he's ever had.

And then they slide backward on the San Pellegrino list, and they realize they've overblown the fine dining tasting menu. Life has become, it's too much.And they restate their mission, to be the most delicious and gracious restaurant in the world. They tone it down, they get their focus back.

And I think in 2017 they finally win number one restaurant in the world. I've watched their acceptance and it's also the first time that award was given that it wasn't just received by the chef that Will that the general manager also went up tor receive it. The true partnership.

A balance of yin and yang, The kitchen is fire. The dining room is water. But you need both.But then they break up.. They break 

Kristen: up. they 

Mike: up. Yep. They do break up. He doesn't talk about it a ton. And they say they're still friends and probably they are.

I don't know. It's a very intense relationship and they probably at some point just stopped seeing eye to eye. But, they, go different ways. They're both having very successful careers. 

Kristen: Yeah. More 

Mike: In their respective ways. So that's it. Unreasonable Hospitality.Very beautiful story. Yeah. Thanks for sticking with us.

Read the book. Yeah, I give it into my team to read. My board of directors is interested in reading it. It, it should be very inspiring to anyone I. Whether or not you work in restaurants or hotels. 

Kristen: Yeah. Especially if you serve people in any way. And guess what, if you're a leader, you serve your people.

So it definitely, there's a lot of gems in here, but I think what makes it really enjoyable to read is just the, narrative is just very well-written. 



Kristen: You really, you find yourself rooting for them.

Mike: Yeah. You're absolutely rooting for them. They're, you know, and okay, so Kristen, what doesn't resonate?

Kristen: So this is hard. This is, 'cause like I said, it, the narrative stuff is hit or miss mystery normally, but I really, this read like a novel to me with a bunch of tips packed into it. I found it really interesting also, I, one thing I often do with books we read is that I go to Amazon reviews and I look at what the low, like one or two star reviews are just to see like what is the criticism?

I often don't agree with them, but, it's just interesting information for me to have. And there are 4,300 reviews on Amazon and there's like not a single one or two star review for this book,

Mike: which is also That's scary that you do that. 

Kristen: Why is that scary? 

Mike: I don't know. That's very like, you're like, I'm gonna find out.

Kristen: Well, I mean, I think it's, for one thing, I like to understand if there's something that is, that I did not catch, that is something that is controversial or

Mike: You read the, did you read the reviews after you read the book?

Kristen: After I read the book,

yeah. Yeah, I don't read it before. I try. I give it like my take on it first, and then that's something I'll do when I'm like doing the summary stuff sometimes. Yeah. But, but I found that crazy that there's not like a single one or two star review of it. So I

Mike: How can you, it's hard to hate Will Guidara. He's very sincere and charming and sweet. 

Kristen: Yeah. I think what would be a cool, I mean this is really a second book, but getting into more of an in-depth handbook of how to apply this stuff to other industries with examples

Interesting. Yeah. I don't, I mean this book isn't that old. 

Mike: Nope, this is his only, the

Kristen: only 

Mike: is his only book.

Kristen: But that could be a planned, I'm sure he has,

Mike: I don't know,

Kristen: Maybe there's other stuff planned around

Mike: It's, he's living a real busy life. They've, he and Christina have a kid. Her life is probably insanely busy. Like they

Kristen: Consults on The Bear,

Mike: consult. Yeah. I think on, I know if he was the whole show or one episode, 

Kristen: But yeah, but that was really my onlyonly criticism. It's not even really 

Mike: No. 

Kristen: but

Mike: Okay for me, what doesn't resonate? The One Minute Manager.

Kristen: Yeah,

Mike: I, there are some useful concepts in that book, but I feel it's pretty reductive and I don't love the sandwich feedback model.

That's not my cookie of choice. Also, I will say this book drags a little bit in the end. I'm s you know, it. It's a very good narrative. But could it have been two chapters shorter? 

Kristen: For sure. 

Mike: And for me, I'm still figuring out my workflow, but listening to books is taking forever. Oh my God.

He definitely, he also definitely takes the grace note hospitality touches ad absurdum. he, You know,the magic trick is too much. Fine, but I don't know. And he knows he's, that's why Pete Wells is like, this is the most confusing meal I've ever had.So fine. Anyway, he Will also paints a very rosy picture of restaurant work. I guarantee. I guarantee you, even with all this push toward excellence, there's burnout, alcoholism, and other hindered mental health issues that he doesn't address. And at some point he and Daniel have a real falling out. So I will encourage anyone that wants to know more about the darker side of restaurants sometimes fun.

there are two things I recommend to any new cook. It is Anthony Bourdain's book Kitchen Confidential for sure. Find out about Adam, no last name, and you will understand the life of the restaurant. And also,I also recommend George Orwell's book Down and Out in Paris and London. And it's George Orwell's autobiography. And if you haven't read it, you should, because Orwell was penniless and homeless in London and Paris and working for, pennies a day and eating at homeless shelters, tea and two slices of toast a day to stay alive and working in these brutal Parisian, hotel restaurant kitchens.

And he even though he is very upfront about the brutality of the life, it's, the picture he paints is still incredibly So those are two really good books to, to get a little bit more of a realistic picture. Kristen, what's your most life changing moment here?

Kristen: Yeah, I mean, I think there are a lot of awesome things in here.

For me personally, I think the Grace note service stuff really inspired me to think more about like how I serve my clients and how can I bring in more of those moments. It's, it's not gonna be to the level of Eleven Madison Park, but what are those like touches that I can add in?

And I think even if you don't have a customer facing business, I think a lot of it can be applied in creating experiences for your employees as well. 

Mike: Sure.

I love that.For me, I will say, this book really resonated with my life obviously. I have very deep and passionate feelings about food and restaurants.

But I really love,his saying, service is a guilty pleasure. It's very true. Bringing happiness to others magnifies, my joy. It makes me very present and fulfills purpose. I'll always make you a cappuccino. I think I put it in our wedding vows that I would always make you noodles whenever you wanted.

Yeah. I just, I think you have to be mindful of the why you're doing it. Is it for them or is it for you? And as people who serve others. Why are you doing it? Is it because I wanna take care of someone and it's what they need?

Or am I doing it for some selfish reason, aggrandizement, ego, something. Am I going overboard for my own? And that's what I feel Will does at some point with the, he takes it so far, it must be vanity and he admits that. So. 

Everything in this book is applicable to whatever business you're in.

Ultimately, we're all really serving someone. You can choose to go the route of UPS and have the most atrocious website in customer service ever. And it's truly awful. And they really don't care. And they don't care because like 99% of packages get delivered and they're just not investing in that part of their business.

Or you can go the route of Amazon. So whatever you think of them, when you need to chat with someone, 'cause your package wasn't delivered, you can chat with someone and probably get a refund and something reissued within five minutes. Whatever other opinions we may have of Amazon.

You know, they're, one of their things they say is to be the most customer centric business ever. And they kind of are, you know, how many you can, we can all roll our eyes, but how many times have you ordered from Amazon this week? There's a reason for that. So,serve your people. Serve others, care for others, you're really not taking the Amazon.

Kristen: I mean, there's some 

Mike: There's so many problems. I'm not

Kristen: a lot of problems. There's

Mike: there's a lot of

Kristen: But I do agree that they do very well with the customer service and the like, just defaulting to giving you refunds instead of making you go through hell that, yeah many other retailers will do.

Mike: They're probably not serving their vendor. You know, they're the people that's like independent businesses that sell for them. They're not treating them well. Yeah. And they're maybe not treating all their employees well.

Kristen: Yeah. There's a lot of,and you know, just Jeff Bezos in general, but there's a lot of problems.

Hundred percent. But I think in terms of that example, it definitely applies.

Mike: Confucius said wherever see three people walking together, one of them is my teacher. We can learn from. Even evil people don't do, but we can learn something from almost everyone. So do I, am I following that business model?

Kristen: No, of course. But But there, yeah, there is definitely something to be learned. 

Mike: Something to be learned from almost everyone. So,

um, Kristen, anything else you want to add?

Kristen: No,I think our two parters are our two

Mike: Do you wanna do third part? Let's do part three. Come on, let's do, let's go another one.

Kristen: Um, I would love to eat a real meal, so I think we're gonna wrap here.

Mike: Do you wanna rap? Do you remember the rap of

Kristen: Oh, no, no, no. W-W-R-A-P. 

Mike: WRAP. 

Kristen: Yeah. Like wrapping up.

Mike: That's also how you spell wrap for a burrito wrap.

Kristen: Oh. I thought you were talking about like rapping, like RAP

Mike: when why would I be?

Kristen: I don't know. You're punchy. You've had a lot of caffeine and not a lot of food.

Mike: I be, I think I can probably beatbox how, hold on. Google how 

Kristen: Okay. We're, we're not gonna subject our listeners to this.

I'm 

Mike: Probably pretty good at it. how I won't

Well, thank you guys for listening. I've

Kristen: no one's listening.

Nobody's listening anymore. But maybe you're

Mike: It's such a good book. It's a great story. I love the Daniel Boulud thread. It's like this weird dude who just shows up and cooks eggs for people, 

Kristen: And, I think this, yeah, this is a little bit of a different book and a little bit of a different like LBC episode and we went really deep into it with a lot of stories it's very personal to Mike.

So I hope you guys enjoyed it.But we will go ahead and end there. Thank you guys so much for listening. And we will see you guys again next week. 

Mike: 

Kristen: The Love and Leadership Podcast is produced and co-hosted by me, Kristen Brun Sharkey and co-hosted by Mike Sharkey. Please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever else you get your podcasts. We can't stress enough just how much these reviews help. You can follow us on LinkedIn under Kristen Brun Sharkey and Michael Sharkey, and on Instagram as loveleaderpod.

You can also find more information on our website, loveandleadershippod.com. Thank you so much for listening, and we'll see you again next week.