Chicken Fingers

When I was 12, I was working for my parents at their restaurant.

I'd finish Greek school Saturday morning around 11:30 am and head over to their restaurant. I'd have a lunch (chicken fingers and fries - I LOVED chicken fingers) and share some time with my dad while he prepped the bar, lounge and patio with his team. I'd then go work in the kitchen, cutting vegetables, prepping stock, attending to inventory, and more. Eventually I'd work in the dish pit.?

The staff were of all ages, experienced professional chefs and cooks; and young artists and students with part-time gigs on the service side of things. The work was constant, the language was colourful, my parents would pop in and out of the business assessing and providing decisions to move things along. I both knew what was going to happen, and also had a sense that every Saturday could turn out differently.

It was exciting to work and I was happy to be part of something bigger than me.

From early on, my experience in work was focussed on working with groups committed to making customers happy. That's the cornerstone of all of my business to date. And the truth is that its both easy to do, and can also be very difficult to achieve consistently. My friends in high school and university were all hustlers, building their own businesses, working 3 or 4 jobs, and hustling towards their goals. To this day, my friends both young and old are all committed to building their companies with a commitment to excellence and putting smiles on their customers' faces. Surrounding myself with people who's values and goals happened organically and quickly. It wasn't difficult to pull people closer to my life who shared similar ideas and objectives.

As I moved out of service businesses and into product ventures in technology, I realized the importance of design, research, feedback loops between all stakeholders. That finding new customers to empower was much easier when you had a product that was dynamite. I realized that the values that made my friends in the early part of my life successful were to be found in my new colleagues and friends in technology ventures. Interestingly, we all had similar stories of having a family business, a school project, a sports team working towards something that required discipline, focus and a commitment to excellent that shaped us early on.

Oh, and we had all failed to build a good product early on in our attempts to work in technology and startups. And that was okay, because we didn't take it too badly and made a point to learn from our failure(s). And again, we all committed to bringing a larger cast of players to our efforts, drawing in more experienced professionals to join our teams, provide advice, and encourage us to keep going (gotta have coaches and fans!)

These days when I have a win, I still find a plate of chicken fingers.

Today I'm part of market leading technology accelerators, co-founder on new high growth tech companies building products and marketplaces, and stepping in to work with teams to optimize their business operations through working with leaders who are committed to success.

This story matters because it began with a great product - Chicken fingers! Imagine, working 12 hours a day, excited to take on all sorts of work, learning new things, interacting with people from all walks of life for processed breaded chicken?!?!

It was a great product that got me into business.

And here I am decades later working with ambitious, intelligent and coachable teams to build great products. In any case, the next time you think about your favourite lunch, remember, somebody or some team put work to design, prepare and deliver that to you.

Strive to be part of a team that builds great products.

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