Common Business Sense

Just watched some old episodes of Gordon Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares. I love that show. I love entrepreneurship, I love restaurants, I love food, I love systems and processes that work, and I love seeing him take things that don't work and make them work.

What really strikes me about the program is that it always comes back to those fundamental basics: Is the food good and delivered on time? Is the menu and the decor inspiring and inviting? Is there leadership and re the systems working? Is the inventory in order?

Most of all, I love his brutal honesty. There's no time to beat around the bush. Let's at least see the situation as it really is. Only then can we choose to something about it.

It fascinates me how people can go around in complete denial about the state of affairs. An entire restaurant with 10 or 20 people who just show up every day and go to know, even though they must know somewhere that the product is complete shit. And yet they do nothing about it.  It boggles my mind, and it makes sense that when there's so much fog going on, you have to give a shock to the system so they'll open their eyes and see it.

I particularly love it when he goes out in the street and interviews regular people. What do you really think about this restaurant? Look at this menu, what do you think of it?

None of what he does is rocket science. It's all so obvious and basic. Don't have rotten food in the fridge. Don't make shitty food. Communicate clearly. Be a leader. Offer things people want.

I think it's the same with our businesses. It's not rocket science to figure this stuff out. You just have the ability to see things clearly.

Some people don't want to hear or see the truth. Why? The only reason I can see to not want to hear the truth is if you believe you can't change it. If you believe you're doing the best you possibly can, and someone tells you your product is shit, it's going to hurt. But if you know you can do better, and you want to, and you know that you'll be able to figure it out, even if you don't know how right now, then you'll want to hear the truth. It may still be painful and uncomfortable, but you'll want to know it.

Don't run around believing that business is hard or complicated or that there's a million things you don't know you don't know. Just take a look at it clearly with your own unbiased eyes, and think it through as a customer. Would you want to be a customer here? How would you feel when you first came into contact with your own business? Would you consume your own products?

Allow yourself to see the naked truth and then act accordingly.

Enjoy your day!

Love,
-Calvin