You can’t start being a loving mentor and inspiring leader until you have all your systems in place.
New ideas are marvelous, like a chocolate ice cream stuffed donut, but novel concepts and artistic wizardry can only flourish in an environment that is built on a solid foundation.
So whether you are putting together a new kitchen, adding a new dish to the menu or introducing a new program to your restaurant it is your job to build a system for it first.
A system that has been penetrated with so many bullet holes it looks like a mangled slice of swiss cheese.
Sit down with your sous chef or someone else in the restaurant that has an intelligent, objective perspective and think of every reason why your system could fail.
You are essentially designing your “what if plan.”
We want to start making our own bread.
Ok, so what if the baker calls out sick?
What if the oven goes down?
What if someone forgets to feed the starter?
What if the world is hit with a global pandemic and we can’t find flour anywhere?
What if, what if, what if.
When you’ve exhausted that exercise you’re ready to start experimenting with new bread recipes, blast the news out on instagram to all of your sourdough obsessed followers and buy your head baker the Tartine Bread book.
Hopes and dreams are beautiful, but they do not produce results without a bulletproof system complete with dozens of contingency plans.
Start with the bones and you’ll end up with a robust stock that you can use to slowly simmer a raw hunk of meat, until it transforms into a rich, succulent masterpiece full of the meatiest flavor you could ever coax from a low budget, humble cut.
Because nobody wants boiled meat and potatoes when you can have Beef Bourguignon.