Leadership. Invest in Yourself.

I was not in the industry I wanted to work. I did not have the job I wanted.

However, I was there. It was a sizable number of hours of my day and my week and I didn't want to waste my time there.

So, when I went in every day, I dedicated myself to learning, and to getting better at serving food, then drinks. As my responsibilities increased so did my opportunities. Eventually I would open new restaurants as a corporate trainer and then was asked to be a manager and then I opened new restaurants as a manager. So much of this was about my process in figuring out how to talk to people. Talking to guests, and then to the people in the kitchen that needed to prepare what I was serving to my guests.

And while I was trained mostly in the "front of the house", I learned the kitchen and began to excel in leading there, as well. This was partly because I learned Spanish when I was growing up, and most of our "back of the house" employees also spoke Spanish. I liked to practice Spanish by speaking to them in their native language. It helped me and they appreciated it even if they laughed at me from time to time. Huevos isn't just eggs, you know.

In order to get the things I was learning to gel, or come together, in some comprehensible way, I read a book that was suggested by the General Manager of one of the restaurants where I was an Assistant Manager. The book is titled "First Break All The Rules".

This was my first investment in myself, that I had no idea I was making. I thought I was just reading a book, but it helped me help others, and myself at the same time. I won't dive into the details, but it squarely puts your employees first, and relies on the concept of them taking that happiness out to the guests/customers. It also teaches a bunch of other wonderful and logical concepts.

Now that I had all these tools; experience, trajectory, relatable skills and some information that maybe others didn't have, I had a bedrock in order to start building a structure that maybe didn't look like everyone else's.

The restaurant where I was working was in in the suburbs of DC. At the time we had a bunch of guys that worked in the kitchen from El Salvador and Guatemala. These two nations were about to square off in a Futbol (soccer) match in DC, and one of the managers had a great idea, and brought up getting tickets to the game for some of the guys.

Then the idea grew...

...what if we buy them ALL tickets?

We collaborated and made a decision. We would buy all of our back of the house employees tickets to the game. We also got them transportation back and forth, and then we filled the van with a few cases of Corona so they could have a few beers at the game.

Who would work in the back of the house part of the restaurant? We would. The managers would.

It was typically our slowest day, and we had a few servers who were also shift managers to cover the "front of the house" while the four managers worked the kitchen from open to close. For two of us, it was one of our days off.

The guys showed up at the restaurant to meet the van getting them to the game and we sent them off. They returned later, a bit tipsy and so thankful.

They talked about it for weeks. So did we. Of course we both did. Everybody won. Humanity won first. The rest was residual.

I love this story. The whole process makes me so proud. The sentiment. My co-workers' shared enthusiasm for the goal. The way it made us feel. The way we hoped it would make them feel. The looks we all gave each other in the following weeks of a shared respect for the other person.

And this investment; in a concept, in an idea, came from a great place. And, while intent does not need to be a driver to do something extraordinary, it can lead to unexpected positive results.

We noticed in the weeks after, that some of the guys in the back would do a little extra, or show up a little earlier, or extend themselves in ways towards each other that we didn't really notice in the past. We acknowledged that.

I tell this story from time to time, but probably not often enough, and that's because I have dozens of them. That makes me even prouder.

This story, however, was the first. The first time I experienced the feeling of what it meant to lead, and please notice...that I didn't do it alone. I had multiple other helpers in the process, from the shift managers, to the other managers, and everyone else who worked extra hard that day to make this gesture possible.

Leadership is everywhere, and it doesn't always look the same... and it's rarely done alone.