Signs you have reached levels of your own incompetence

When I ran a Franchise restaurant not so long ago, it was painful to witness the levels of ignorance that held captive of the management team we had inherited from the Franchisor.  At first, it was very difficult to define or interpret the knowledge gap, because I myself was embarking on my own development track of becoming an experienced operator.  It was not long when I surpassed my own learning objectives when I uncovered the learning gaps in my management team.  I went through some parts of the grieving cycle: “denial”; “anger”; skipped “bargaining” and went straight to finally “acceptance.”  It was like watching a powerful icon fall from grace.  I had to promote one member to general restaurant duties and I had to demote and eventually dismiss a member who had been a 30-year veteran after some informal discussion on his own performance; followed by a grave alleged misconduct he committed.  Whilst he embodied a peaceful spirit in his execution of his duties; the poor middle-aged man had reached his own levels of incompetence which I reveal in my first upcoming book.

Since, then, I have identified some signs that may reveal that you or someone that you know may have reached their own levels of incompetence.  Feel free to add more to the list.  In no way is this list in any order of importance:

When you think longevity in a company translates to deep expertise

  

Did you know that you can be in a job long enough doing the same damn thing over and over, over a long period of time and because you are not honest and open to feedback about your job performance and how you can improve you will begin to think that you are the Don Jon of the gig.  Two things may happen (1) along comes a rookie and challenges your ‘formula’ out of pure curiosity and you instruct them to keep quiet and stay in their little corner – “watch n’ learn” they call it.  (2) you just become a monster menace in the office and bully your way through every meeting, negotiation to justify your long-standing service to the company.  In fact, you forget that being in the game is about “how relevant you are” it has nothing to do with how long you have been playing the SAME game.  I constantly have to reinvent myself despite what some people may call, “a colourful background.”  So, try not to take it personally, when you shower your decorative accolades to group of hungry learners and they say “so, what – what are we going to learn from you this moment.”  People need to feel that you have been of value to them on their journey of discovery-based learning.  Otherwise, you are not offering the world much by carrying your “heavy-weight” title around.

You think your view is always superior to that of others

A client once shared with a relative that they have never been around people smarter than her before.  This was after she spent a day with some of our very intellectual business colleagues and family members who are entrepreneurs and Chairman on several Boards.    

You are not open to your colleagues or your team’s ideas

I have been at both spectrums on this.  This one is a very delicate balance. Tread very carefully.

You lack emotional intelligence (EQ) and social intelligence (SQ)

This should be evident. No need to elaborate on this point. 

You really don’t know how much you actually don’t know

“It takes considerable knowledge just to realize the extent of your own ignorance.” – Thomas Sowell

One of my favourite Professors at university who taught me Contemporary Business in Finance, during my undergrad at Montclair State University, Joseph Dubanowitz once said in a recommendation letter he wrote to my future employers at the time: “Tambu, can at times be hard on herself…”  I am because I have always been in high performing teams.  The standard is always higher than the average.  Very competitive environment.  So, you develop a mental mechanism that even when you succeed at what your highest peak at that time is, you keep wanting to out-do yourself.  Therefore, I never revert to a state of “all-consuming, and all knowing” attitude.  It is very dangerous.  Eight years later, after I completed my Masters in Business Administration.  I was awed and still am, at how little I knew about markets, business, people and leadership.  I am in a constant state of knowledge-seeking.  Ignorance is not bliss.

“Care Killed the Cat"

In my 15 years of adulthood I have come across different types of psychology.  The worst to date was interacting with a narcissist with a heightened degree of masochism.  They used other people's weaknesses to control them.  My weak spot was seeing the beauty in their dishonesty.  Yes, beauty.  In the pursuit of identifying my weak spot, they had to play a game of self-disclosure.  They had to be vulnerable enough to reveal part of themselves, to unlock the barriers to entry.  To know how I think and possibly how I feel.  It is a dangerous game because they unwittingly became vulnerable to my childlike curiosity of their own world.  So, when the time came to control me and to put me in line they had to deny themselves the pleasure of letting our worlds unite.  They had to hurt themselves to hurt me.

The narcissist developed a soft spot, I too knew his weak spot.  The little dance of power play began.  But like in war, they are no winners or losers, just major casualties on both sides.  It is said by Ebenezer Cobham Brewer, that “a cat has nine lives, yet care would wear them all out.”  In essence.  Care kills the cat.  Few know, this is the actual original phrase of the adage: "Curiosity killed the cat."  Hence, it became clear that the deception of self-disclosure, they also came to care more than they wanted to admit.  So they self-sabotaged by severing any lines of exchange between us, to preserve themselves and the sanity they had struggled to attain prior to other  battles that they had exposed themselves to. 

This personal revelation is very critical in forming strategic partnerships or alliances with your suppliers; contractors; employees and business associates and business partners. This is because all these networks require a delicate balance of self-disclosure and professionalism that allows one to develop trust over a long-term period.  One can’t be in the business of doing business for any length of time without understanding the inherent psychology of managing these professional relationships.  Who you know always gets you the access to business and opportunities but it is what you know that will sustain you once you have acquired the opportunity.  They say, don’t mix business with pleasure.  But whoever came up with that saying never engaged in the process of business development and account management.  Pleasure with business, mix; it’s the apportioned ratio of how much pleasure should be necessary in ensuring the continuity of a business relationship.  Here are three ways to ensure that you don’t care too much to kill your business or yourself:

1.      Self-reflection and introspection

Thomas Sowell once said, “It takes considerable knowledge just to realize the extent of your own ignorance.”  Am sure you have been told by a friend or business colleague at some point in your life that you think too much.  Always, take time to reflect the context in which it was said.  If it was said, whilst you needed time to review over some legal contracts, a sale agreement, a purchase agreement or even implementing a project chances the person, who mostly likely would have been the recipient of your final decision didn’t want you to uncover certain things.  People who think they can out smart you or they are a few steps ahead of you always, particularly in business or were monetary risk is concerned don’t want you to have a time of introspection and self-reflection.  Anybody who says trust me before they have invested time in giving you your own time, should not be trusted. One needs time to masticate on the why’s, and when’s of the recipients of your business decision, are self-disclosing the way they are in the first place.  How will you proceed? Will you self-disclose in turn? Or will you take your time until you have ALL the information?  Or will you take the leap of faith?

2.      Know the end game

It’s common knowledge not to go into a meeting without an agenda and projected outcome of the meeting.  When I ran a franchise restaurant not so long ago, we used to be subjected to ambush meetings by the Franchisor.  It’s a type of psychology that has the propensity to always keep the attendees out of the loop and in turn makes decisions based on the information presented only in that meeting, risky business.  Luckily, my team and I always insisted on knowing before what the agenda of the meeting was and how much time should be allotted to this meeting.  You don’t ever want to be taken by surprise – based on the decisions you made not paying attention the detail including paying attention to the behaviours of your suppliers, contractors and business associates. 

3.      Keep an open mind

The world we live in, in 2015 requires us to have a very fluid approach to the decisions that we make in business.  When a business documents its strategy for the next 5 years it’s not an entirely prescriptive measure.  The business has been to be cognisant of all the different moving parts in the market and non-market economies that will affect is strategic objectives and tactical plans.  More than several decades ago companies like Anglo American plc, BHP Billiton's Ingwe Collieries, Sasol Mining, Glencore Xstrata, and Exxaro may have the mission statement of being the leading coal producers in the region; but the environment they lend themselves in, has shown that the strategy may have to refocus and look at being the leading energy companies in the region, in spite of accounting to 85% of all production.  Thus, even though you are being played by market forces keep an open mind on how to strategically navigate and adapt your strategy to remain relevant in the game. 

In the end, it’s a faith-game; but a faith-game you continuously bet on yourself and not the self-disclosure and perceived sincerity purported by your business players.  Whilst, my colleague in beginning of this article started to care, in a way that may have exposed his initial strategy to control me.  They failed to adapt their mindset.  In failing to do so, I also believe that they were unable to meet the new needs and demands of our association.  In addition, I later learned that they had obtained an incomplete profile of me and when they soon discovered who I was, they were unprepared and reacted in a way that revealed they had over exposed themselves and cared too much.  I was affected to the extent that I had exposed myself.  No winners, no losers; just casualties and a heightened awareness. 

Tambu Ndoro can be contacted on Email: tambu.ndoro@gmail.com

“Changes that are not connected to process, don’t last”

I officially started working and earning a salary at the age of 19 as an Executive PA at an Asset Management company that my mother was a partner of together with Vernon Mwamuka, Sue Vera, and South Africa partners Lowenthal and Venter.  Working for a living was not entirely a novelty, 3 years earlier a vocal group that I had started with my friends Kudzai Sevenzo, Sakhile Sifelani and Marjorie Ngwenya had not only led us to be the brain-childrens of African Voices of Africa choir at Chisipite Senior School aka AVA but we had accepted a well remunerated gig by singing  at a wedding taking place at the Chisipite Senior School Chapel.  We had been spotted at one of the most popular events during the school calendar “Miss Chisi” in 1995/6.  It wasn’t long when the group split up to focus on our A’Level studies and at the time taking such activities more seriously than they needed to would result in a lifelong of disappointment and failed ambitions.  The only person who was determined and courageous to take the singing activity more seriously then and still at it in 2015, is Zimbabwean singing sensation Kudzai Sevenzo.   I went on to study Accounts and then 7 years later an MBA and worked briefly in various roles; I heard that Sakhile was a lawyer and personal advisor to Morgan Tsvangirai prior to the 2013 elections and Marjorie is working and residing in the UK after graduating in Actuarial Science. 

I chose to study Accounts because I was good at it.  I had obtained an A for O’Levels without really even trying.  I remember, when I came out of the exams and we were discussing how the exams went and the level of difficulty of the exam.  Mercy, my friend and classmate and myself, were considered the top Accounting students.  We didn’t share the same outcome as the others.  Both our Trial Balances and Balances Sheets had balanced but with different amounts.  So we started engaged in our own academic discussion, dissecting each problem, well, how we remembered the questions in the Exam to convince each other that the methodology we had adopted in recognizing Bad debts and Provisions for Bad debts made the difference in what number was posted to the Ledger accounts.  Either way we couldn’t figure out how both our ledgers ended up balancing despite of differing carrying amounts.  As it turn outs, we both ended up with an A for O’Level and we were the only ones who obtained that grade in our class.  So, where am I going with this?  I have watched TedX Youtube of Robert Greene: “Key to Transforming Yourself” who shares with us that changes that are not connected to process, don’t last.  I have read a summary article of “The Role of Deliberate Practice in the Acquisition of Expert Performance” by Psychologists Dr. Anders Ericsson and read a book by Dr. Cal Newport called “So Good They Can’t Ignore You: Why Skills Trump Passion in the Quest for Work You Love,” a book that challenges the conventional wisdom that one must follow their passion in life if they want to be happy and successful.  Instead Dr. Newport states that “following your passion is bad advice” and one must be devoted to continuous learning but most importantly developing rare and valuable skills to acquire great jobs or to be successful.  He gives accounts of people he has interviewed overtime who followed their passion to acquire financial freedom versus those who had disciplined approached to becoming successful.  The common thread in Greene, Ericsson and Newport is Deliberate Practice also known as the 10,000 hour rule:

"Being successful isn’t just about 10,000 hours of doing the activity; it’s 10,000 hours of what Ericsson calls “deliberate practice.” According to the paper, “deliberate practice is a highly structured activity, the explicit goal of which is to improve performance. Work is where we exercise the skills we already have. Deliberate practice is not work and it's not play. At work, it is assumed that you’re bringing your best possible performance to satisfy the needs of a client or the organization...work involves using skills and talents you’ve already developed; the performance improvement from time spent at work is minimal compared to time spent in deliberate practice. That fact that you’ve managed a team for 10 years doesn’t automatically make you a world-class manager. Work isn’t deliberate practice.

…The goal of deliberate practice is improvement…When we’re in deliberate practice, activities that require total focus and are designed to stretch, we’re rarely enjoying ourselves. If you’re engaged in the activity for the fun of it, you’re probably not getting much better...If you are not engaged in deliberate practice then you are most definitely wasting your 10,000 hours.

It suddenly occurred to me the reason I had obtained an A for O’Level with quite little effort then was because I had been engaged in such an activity.  My decision to study Accounts was because I understood it not because I was passionate about it.  The real challenge came when I took Audit and Taxation Classes for undergrad.  Not only did I get lost in the legal terms but also in the process of when, why and how of Taxation under the GAAP system.  I never went on to do the CPA nor the CA.  The Audit and Tax element of the Accounting discipline throttled my interest.  But let's not also underestimate the impact of working full-time for bread and butter and to pay tuition fees plays in dividing my time to be able to focus on the discipline deeper. Thus, if I had been engaged in deliberate practice I would most probably acquired the professional qualification(s).    Instead, I changed my entire focus to understanding the Strategic Management discipline in my late 20s as a result of working in my mother’s consulting business since 2008.  However, my non-linear journey to acquiring career capital has exposed me to various skills and exposure to types of mindset.  I will reiterate only three key strategies Greene identifies:

1. Adopt an internally driven mindset - stop fixating on what people are saying or doing.  Focus on yourself internally.  Become stronger yourself.
2. Return to your primal inclinations – spark a childlike intense curiosity in your work.
3. Transform yourself through your work – enter a journey of deliberate practice. ‘Changes that are not connected to process; don’t last’ says Greene.  Job hopping is a result of doing following your passions instead of working right to acquire skills that are rare and valuable says Newport.

My journey to success has been a non-linear one.  After 3 months of series of interviews with a Swedish consulting PLC; I am down to my final interview with the Managing Director.  The Consulting role exhibits an accumulation of the skills that I have acquired in my various roles are unique and in alignment to this company’s strategy.  One of the Senior Directors said after my 45minute case presentation interview with a panel of 8 team members that included the MD: “we have been in the banking industry for a time and to see a presentation like this demonstrates that not only do you understand the key components but depth of analysis shows how curious you are.” I only had two/three questions from the panel and the MD was quite impressed with the presentation.

 

I have been engaged in a process of learning and continuous improvement for some time now and will continue to adopt an internally driven mindset.  Greene says “you will draw opportunities to you because people will sense how prepared you are.”  

Here’s to the organic process of self-improvement, no matter how laborious.

A Memoir of a Restauranteur Rookie

My interest for food did not begin from the sexy culinary shows we now see on DSTV’s food and lifestyle channel.  Neither did it begin with my brother’s gradual interest in studying from the vineyards of Western Cape to the small quaint village towns in South of France.  Rather it began in my grandmother’s kitchen, meekly nestled in an urban home located in Hatfield, Harare.  The journey was subtle.  It started with the regular ritual of baking that my grandmother partook in weekly.  She would prepare the family favourite, banana loaf bread and small banana cookies.  She also enjoyed baking her favourite fruit cake and, then as kids we did not enjoy the idea of dried fruit in a cake until our palates matured and began to savour the fullness of the fruit cake. 

I don’t recall how it happened but I found myself at 15, taking Cookery class for O’ Levels at Chisipite Senior School.   My Cookery teacher at the time was Mrs. Soltau. I remembered how she taught us how to prepare béchamel sauce.  She was relentless in making sure we were meticulous in how we prepared it.  This is because the white sauce is significant and versatile in many dishes in the kitchen around the world.  We also learnt how to make short crust pastry and flaky pastry from scratch.  In fact, choosing to do cookery class back then was not even a novelty.  All I know is that I chose it as an O’Level subject from a limited choice of Art and Fashion & Fabrics classes. 

20 years later, I found myself, running a franchise restaurant, a family business, in the northern suburb of Johannesburg.  As I stood in the middle of the restaurant, there were pockets of patrons in the store.   No promising signs yet, of a full lunch-hour in the horizon. The restaurant had old tall wooden sliding doors, some of which were about to come off their hinges; some of which you could tell had been repaired just enough to survive till the next “repair” job which was anywhere between a week to a month from now.   The space where the patrons dined humbly was dark and a feeling of desolation filled the room.   Part of the reason was the lighting in the store was dim and antiquated; the other, was the sharp contrast, past the boundaries of our restaurant, were bright well-lit surroundings; and the sound of vibrant and chatty customers in the adjacent restaurants quietly revealed the warmth and welcoming environment that our new restaurant reluctantly lacked.  The store was located inside a mall, so no natural light ever saw the curves and edges of the restaurant.  Only the white cold ceramic tiled floor of the mall provided some semblance of light into the reception area of the restaurant; beyond that, a black and white checked floor greeted the foot of the entrance of the door and a sea of wooden dark chairs covered in a red substandard faux leather fabric littered the dining area.  The walls were white and awaited a recoating.  Half way down the wall a black and white tiny ceramic mosaic tiled border emerged, to contrast the accent longitudinal wall of wood from the border to the floor.  The wall represented the history and the age of the store whilst a few of the framed pictures on the wall did not share the same liberty.  It is why a few months later when the Franchisor wanted us to spend money in the 1^st year of operating the store on redecorating the wall; my mother kept the original design of the wall without the large human portrait wall papers accompanied by a few of the framed pictures.

A lot of work needed to be done to restore the franchise restaurant to its supposed former glory but we also had to be realistic. We had just bought the store and adding refurbishments to the first financial year of the business was quite ambitious.

During the first three months of running the restaurant we decided that we needed to understand a lot more about the functions of each and every staff member and what they did on a daily basis.  Where the management’s job started and ended?  What kind of service the waitrons were providing to the patrons and whether they were incentivized to offer good customer service?  What would motivate the kitchen staff in the kitchen and why they liked talking so much in the kitchen as if they are vendors at a market place? We started piloting our way through the kitchen.  We embarked on a journey of discovery that would reveal that we bought an old restaurant with legacy issues such as immature operational systems, low staff morale, no pride for the brand, and poor working culture.  The changes and improvements we tried to foster in the coming months to turnaround the restaurant were met with distrust and hostility.

I don’t remember how it quite happened but eventually I had grasped the basic Pilot System quite well prior to taking the intermediate and advanced course at the Pilot HQ in Woodmead, Sandton.  I had been taught by a manager at the store and Franchisor Operations manager on how to capture invoices on the system, how to count stock items, and how to print the income statement to ascertain our food cost weekly.  We were advised by the Franchisor that food cost had to be around 37% at least monthly; but unfortunately, during the first three months our food cost reported 40% and above.  Many questions came to mind.

How can our food cost be so high?

What are the factors that could cause high food cost?

What is the importance of the variance report because the current management did not see the use of the daily and weekly reports?  

They would print it and file it but there were no tactical plans around it on how to improve or check the abnormalities on the sheet.  The whole entire process was overwhelming, but I was determined to demystify the process of running the kitchen.  If anything I picked at business school is that human beings complicated issues.  The drawbacks are the gaps identified between how the processes should be running, compared to how it’s currently running.  If the gaps are too wide, it’s a legacy issue and to fix it at store level one would have to address it with the Franchisor.

My MBA came in handy in identifying, analyzing and making recommendations to my parents in steering this store out of the woods.  I had not been part of the original negotiations when my parents decided to buy the store so I was pretty much unaware of the operating expenses of the store.  The first three months my mother would handle the expenses of the store whilst I handled operational issues including human resources issues and payroll.  I learnt later that absolving myself from operational expenses of the store left me exposed to the real cancer of the business, RENTAL EXPENSE.  Despite our best efforts of being good restauranteurs, we had to be better. That means understanding what we should have understood before signing the dotted lines.

Franchise Disclosure Agreement

The Franchise disclosure agreement, also referred to as an FDA in franchising is a very pertinent document that discloses to the prospective buyer/franchisee the costs of owning and running a franchise restaurant; cash flow projections/potential returns and main overhead expenses.    The costs can include the following:

·        Franchisee Initial License fee

o   Training Manuals

o   Operations Manuals

o   Training of staff (some Franchisors don’t usually charge for training staff for Franchisees)

·        Outlet Development costs, includes but not limited to the following:

o   Assistance with lease negotiations with the prospective landlord

o   Assistance with application for financing (some Franchisors may not assist with this aspect)

o   Planning, layout and interior design

o   Site supervision

o   Site development

o   Store evaluations, equipment and fitting

·        Other costs – the cost of improvements to an existing building would depend on the amount of remodeling needed to change the interior to meet Franchisor’s specifications

·        Stock Deposit

·        Royalty Fees

·        Advertising and Marketing Fees

·        Insurances Costs

·        Liquor License

·        Trade License

·        Rent Guarantee/Deposit plus Gross Rental for 1^st month – dependent on the landlord

Main Overhead expenses – will impact directly on Net Profit of the business are:

·        Food Costs

·        Labour Charges

·        Worker costs

o   Uniforms

o   Staff food

o   Contribution to any regulatory authority

·        RENT – NB: MAXIMUM SHOULD BE 10% - 12% of TURNOVER

·        Electricity

·        Gas

·        Other Expenses

o   Bank Charges

o   Interest

o   Insurance

o   Accounting fees and Administration

o   Telephone, fax and postage

o   Stationery, etc

In essence, the FDA should essentially help you make up your mind.  However, it’s important not to rely on this document alone to make your decision.  Do your own due diligence, even if it means speaking with the existing Franchisees directly of the brand you would like to invest in before securing the right of first refusal to an area.   Nonetheless, the documents my parents received at the time weren’t as explicit in outlining the list of costs and expenses listed above.  That list formulated above is an excerpt of the FDA I prepared for the Franchisor at the time on a volunteer basis.  Running this particular franchise restaurant was a very expensive lesson to learn but not as expensive as the business school education in Denmark!

I still love the restaurant sector.  It’s a calling for me not a career not a job.  A restaurant is not just about providing glamorously plated food to customers at a premium.  It’s a lifestyle.  If we fail to deliver the tastefulness and beauty of culinary cuisine on a plate; we rob our customers of an experience that transcends the mediocrity of everyday life. 

Extract from the upcoming book Franchising Bull$h*!: Lessons learned in running a Franchise Restaurant.  Copyright @ May 13, 2015.  This article was first published online on BlogSpot by Tambu Ndoro, Enterprise Development Consultant, Author and Blogger.