EntreLeadership - #344: How to Steward Your Own Potential with Mark Miller

Episode Date: October 14, 2019

Instead of wasting your time hoping and waiting for your next big break, Mark Miller, vice president of high-performance leadership at Chick-fil-A, has a much better idea. He suggests focusing your efforts on the things you can actually control right now, like putting in extra time, energy or creativity when it’s not necessarily expected. Tune in to hear Mark explain why becoming a steward of your own potential is the best way to be to be ready if and when a new opportunity knocks.   entreleadership.com/podcast Mark Miller’s website Win the Heart by Mark Miller Free download: How to Create Core Values Review this episode for a chance to win a $25 Amazon gift card   Want expert help with your business question? Call 844-944-1070 and leave a message or send an email to [e-mail]. You could be featured on a future podcast episode! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey, I've got a stat that I want to share with you real quick, and you may want to be sitting down to hear this. A recent Harvard Business Review survey reveals that 58% of people, that's 58%, say that they trust strangers more than they trust their own boss. Folks, that is embarrassing. I mean, that stat, that is abysmal. That is a problem. And I think you and I both know that it is a problem that represents a leadership. crisis. From the Ramsey Network, this is the Entree Leadership Podcast, where we help business leaders grow themselves, their teams, and their profits. I'm your host, Alex Judd, and today's guest and the

organization that he represents are waging war on the harsh reality that is that statistic. You see, Mark Miller is in charge of leadership development at Chick-fil-A. And we all know Chick-Fillay. They are an organization that stands out because they have a brand of leadership that is both radical and uncommon. It's because it's a brand of leadership that at its core is rooted in service. And Mark will tell you in this interview that the difference maker, the answer, the reason why they are able to do that, is rooted in a belief. We actually believe that everything rises and falls in leadership. Many, many, many people will say that and our friend John Maxwell has popularized it. Most leaders say that. We actually believe it.

And so we try to live as if it were true. And we try to invest in our leaders. We try to invest in ourselves. We try to continue to grow. We think what's in the field is a reflection of leadership. And so it has been a priority for us forever. In fact, Truitt, Kathy, our founder, his original model, some would say simple. Others would say simply genius because he said, and this was 50 years ago or so, he

said, every organization needs two things to be successful. Tewitt was the master of boiling things down to the essence. And he would say they need capital and management. And he said, we'll provide the capital and we'll go find the management. He actually believed that, and he was right, obviously, the pool of men and women in the world who have the leadership is enormous. But if you burden them with the responsibility, oh, you also have to have a seven-figure net worth and want to be in the restaurant business, that pool gets very small. He said, so we'll put up

the money and we'll let those men and women provide the leadership. So that was his model from 1967. That's unreal. And with those two things, he built a business strategy. He built, well, and on a pretty good chicken sample. Which he invented himself in his original restaurant, which happened to open back in 1946. He was an overnight success. Open that restaurant in 46, invented the Chick-fil-A sandwich in the early 60s opened the first Chick-fil-A restaurant in 67. But even from the very beginning, he understood how important it was to put the right leader in that restaurant. And so we have been a leadership-centric organization, really from that day until the day. And one of the things I really admire about your story, but I think it's so fascinating about your perspective, too, is you've seen it

from early on or you've been there for a very long time. I think I read something that said, You were corporate employee number 16. Is that right? Correct. And I actually worked in the restaurant for a short season before that, but I was awful in the restaurant. I actually quit because my logic, this was the way my mind worked as a teenager. I think if I quit, that's better than being fired. So that's actually what happened. I quit. And I went to the home office and applied for a job working in the warehouse.

And Truitt hired me. I tell people it was a combination of his lack of discern. in God's grace, he let me come to work for him in the warehouse and got to work in the mailroom as well because there were 16 people there. Wow. And that was 40 years ago, 41 years ago. So it's been a fantastic journey. The number of people that can say they've worked at the same place for 40 years today, it just doesn't exist very often. You're a small class. True. But I do admit that I've had trouble holding down a job over those 40 years. I mean, I have worked all across the business, started our corporate communications group, started our quality group. I think it was a little

bit of let the kid do it, let the kid do it. I'd do whatever they wanted me to do. Worked in restaurant operations, let our training group, started our leadership group, started an organizational effectiveness group. And so I've moved around quite a bit. Okay, so I want to get into some of that, but first I want to know, you've got this unique perspective of, you know what Chick-fil-A is now being the multi-billion dollar global icon that it is, but you also know what it was like. at 16 people. What was the secret sauce? What was in the water at 16 people that laid the foundation for it to be what it was today? Well, I think Truitt was gifted in many ways, but he was really good at picking people. Now, I may be an exception to that, but I'm saying

there are so many talented people that that is a tremendous foundation. Now, I wouldn't argue that people's enough. You've got to have systems, you've got to have processes, you've got to have a product worth selling, you've got to have culture. I know there's a lot. But I think so much of that is easier if you make good people decisions. And I think Truitt just had a divine ability to discern who might be best in which roles. It reminds me of something that Peter Drucker said years and years and years ago. It was in his last public speaking engagement. He was actually so old he was seated on a desk at the front of the room.

couldn't even really stand up. And somebody asked him the question. They said, what's the most important decision a leader makes? It's a really good question. And Drucker, I guess, is the world's leading authority, wanted to give a thoughtful answer. And it was as if no one had ever asked him. So he kind of sat there, like, for a long time. Some people thought he died because he actually, he bowed his head, closed his eyes.

It was kind of an awkward situation. A good friend of mine was in the room when this happened. So I said they were really worried about Drucker because it's like, did he die, pondering this heavy question? And he finally straightened up, and they said you could feel it in the room. It's like he's going to speak. And he said, who does what? Most important decision a leader makes, who does what? So I think our secret sauce has been that Truitt was really good at discerning that.

And he put people in place as the business grew who were really good at discerning who should do what. That's remarkable. And so for your story, and I know you speak. with humility, but he saw something in you as a, I mean, how old were you whenever he hired you at corporate? 18. He hired you as an 18 year old. And now you've been there for 40-something years and you lead leadership at the company.

So surely you didn't have the skill set that you have today whenever you were 18. What were the qualities that he saw in Mark at that time? I really, I really don't know. I would say that my first real encounter with the world as I know it today was about six months after I started working at the office. Dan Kathy, Truit's son, who Dan is now our chairman, he actually, I think, discerned a willingness to do hard work. I think about the athletes that may not have the best skill set, but they try to make up for it and hustle. You know, I was kind of that guy. I remember I was working in the warehouse, and this actually happened not many weeks after I started.

Dan came to me and asked me if I could help him with a special project. And I knew who he was, and I knew the answer was probably yes, but I had my job. And so I kind of flipped it to him, and I said, well, I think the operators, the men and women that run the restaurant, they need these parts that I'm supposed to be shipping out this afternoon. He said, you're right, you're right. That's your priority. He said, what are you doing after you finish that? I said, well, I'm going to school because I was going to school at night. And he said, what do you do after that?

And I said, well, nothing. He said, what time do you get out of class? I said, 10 o'clock. He said, meet me back here at 10.30. And I said, sure. And so I found myself coming back to work at night after going to class to help Dan with a special project and did that for weeks. And I think he said, okay, here's a guy that will do what it takes.

Here's a guy that'll give the extra effort. It wasn't because of my skills necessarily, but I said, I'm willing to help. I'm willing to serve. It feels like the right answer. And I'll find another time to study. And so it was about six months after I joined and had been doing that while working in the warehouse in the mailroom that he asked me to pull out of that and start what is today corporate communications. And I think I know the answer to this question before I ask it.

I assume it wasn't you saying, yeah, I'll do the extra work if you'll amp my pay a little bit. Yeah, that never. That never came up. We've got a lot of 20-somethings, lots of young people on here. I'm one of them that listen to this podcast, and we've been raised in a world that kind of teaches us to think work happens from eight to five. And you're telling us a story that is kind of at the centerpiece of your career that occurred way after 5 p.m.

What would you say to us about willingness to work, about hustle? Teach us on that a little bit. Well, I think everybody has to set their own boundaries and their own parameters. And I would not challenge anyone, but I think opportunity is often found in the second mile. If we're doing what's expected, that's what's expected. And I don't know that you separate or differentiate yourself by doing what's expected. And so whether that requires extra time, extra energy, extra creativity, but it probably requires something extra if you want to be viewed as,

extraordinary. And so I encourage people find a way to add value beyond what is expected, whatever that looks like. Whatever that looks like. Related to that and talking about kind of these early days, you said Truitt had this remarkable ability to seek qualities in people that he wanted on board. How would you describe a lot of the people that were early on? What qualities did they possess? I think they were men and women of integrity. Character was and is still the first thing that we look for in staff and operators. How do you discern character in an interview? Well, the human resources people have been coaching me for 40 years that the best predictor of future behavior is past behavior. And so they've trained us the best they can. Don't ask conceptual

hypothetical or theoretical questions. Ask people questions about tell me a time when. Have you ever experienced this or that? What did you do? And so I think learning about a person's past is the best indicator of what they may have in store for their future. Fascinating. So you said characters, obviously a huge piece. Any other qualities? Yeah, I mean, I think he looked for people with extreme competence. And if it weren't a particular skill set, a work ethic, and an ability desire to learn and grow, you mentioned a turning point in my career. I actually think the turning point probably came in that first year when Dan challenged me with an idea, and this is my paraphrase of several conversations, but he said your capacity to grow determines your

capacity to lead. And I went, oh, okay. And so I was telling this story just recently, and somebody said, yeah, well, that's probably always been easy for you. And I said, well, why would you say that? And they said, well, you're probably a learner, referencing the strength finder. Okay. You're probably a learner. I said, learner's not in my top 10. I'm not sure it's in my top 20. And they said, well, you act like a learner. And I said, well, thanks. Because that day I made a decision that I was going to learn to learn and that I was going to become a learner because if I understood Dan correctly, that's the way the world works, right? If your capacity to grow determines your capacity to lead, then I'm going to grow. And I'm going to make those choices.

And I'm still trying to make those choices today so that I can continue to increase my opportunities, my influence. And it's been a pretty good strategy. And I think I've seen others in our organization and even outside our organization that have followed a similar path. Now, a quick disclaimer, though, I was sharing this story with some young people just recently, and they said, okay, okay, let me be sure I've got it. So if I grow, I'm going to be given leadership opportunities. I said, that's not what I said. I said, we don't determine our opportunities. We can determine our readiness. Ooh, that's good. Because think about it. Pull it over into a sporting context. When the coach needs somebody off the bench, the coach is probably going to call someone. someone who is ready. Now, they may not be their starter. They may not be their star. They're pulling

them off the bench, but they've got to believe there is some level of readiness. You don't pull the people who you know aren't ready. So when an organization has an opportunity to seize or a problem to solve, most call them a leader. And so when they look your way, you better be leading. Are you ready? Are you ready? And if you're not ready, then they're going to pick somebody else. And if there's nobody ready, they're just going to give it to an existing leader, which is okay short term. But when you think at an organizational level, that's a way to burn out your leaders, right? You got to, sooner or later, you've got to build a bench or you're going to die, right? Gosh, that's so good. I love this because I think it speaks to every level of the org chart,

whether you're leading the business as a whole, whether you're a mid-level manager in the business or a VP, or you're an entry-level position, the idea that you better be ready when opportunity strikes. Here's what I want to know from you is I think everyone at some point in leading a business or in their career has found themselves in a spot where they can't yet see the opportunity. It's not yet visible to them, right? They don't yet know when it's being available because they can't control that, yet they still have to put in the work to be ready whenever it does arise. And that's hard to do whenever you can't see the opportunity.

in front of you. Maybe. Yes, it's hard if you're working because of the opportunity. Okay, so speak on this. So, but what if you're working because it's an opportunity for personal stewardship? What if you're working because it's the right thing to do, to steward what has been entrusted to you? Okay, so we don't always hear the word steward that much anymore. Explain to us what you mean by steward. Yeah, what I mean is that we don't. own anything. God owns it all. And I don't think that's just physical and tangible. I think that includes opportunities. That includes relationships. Certainly our time. I think we have an opportunity to steward at all. Our intellectual capacity, our potential. I want to steward my potential.

I want to live as a faithful steward independent of the opportunities that come my way. did I do the best I could today with what God has interested to me today? Regardless of what's next. Regardless of what's next. Because, again, I don't control that, right? I don't control that. But I can work to be ready. I can work to grow.

I can work to fulfill a commitment to lifelong learning. Quick story about that. One of my friends and mentors was Dr. Howard Hendricks from Dallas Theological Seminary. He taught 60 years at the seminary. So it's kind of a get your head around that. And he told me about a turning point in his life when as a student at Dallas Seminary, he said he had breakfast duty in the cafeteria and he hated that, college student having to get up at 5 o'clock in the morning.

But he said as he was walking to his job, he noticed the light on in the window at the home of one of his professors. And he said he could see him in there and it looked like he was studying. And so the first day or two he noticed that. He thought, okay, well, I mean, I guess he's an early bird, right? But then he said he noticed a lot of nights he's going back the same route, 1030, 11, 1130, as a college student would, right? And the guy still sitting there looks like he's studying. So prof went to him and said, I got a question for you.

He said, I noticed, looks like early in the morning you're studying, looks like late at night you're studying. He said, how long you've been doing this? He said, well, I've been doing it for 20 years. years. And Hendricks said, don't you have it figured out by now? And he said, the professor said something that changed his life forever. He said, I made a decision years ago that I would rather have my students drink from a running stream than a stagnant pool. I want to be that running stream, right? I want to be that running stream so that I can better serve leaders within Chick-fil-A and around the world, independent of my next opportunity.

Irregardless, whether I never have another traditional opportunity or not, I have the opportunity to steward what God has given me. I feel like you have unique credibility to make that statement because you started off this conversation by saying you've gone from position to position to position. I mean, you have touched multiple areas within Chick-fil-A and are largely responsible in one of the highest impact areas in the entire organization. So you have focused on stewardship, but you have not lacked for opportunity. Well, I have had opportunity, but I don't pretend I've gotten it right.

I mean, there are a lot of days I feel like I don't get it right. But then thankfully, there are some days I can say I did good today. I learned today. I grew today. And that's one of the questions that I've tried to discipline myself to ask more and more often. What did I learn today? How did I steward today? And, again, we'll trust God for the outcome.

Love it. Going back to kind of the early days and probably a challenge that y'all still focus on today, I would assume. You mentioned that Truitt had this unique innate ability to see good in people and to call out the potential in people and get the right people on the bus. Eventually, Truitt can't always be in all the interview rooms and he can't hire every single person. So how did they scale that ability and how have y'all put systems and processes in place to protect the culture that he created? Well, I will tell you that he moved out of that role early. Really? So he was really good at it, but he delegated that early because he found some people who he felt like he could trust to make those decisions.

The way we've scaled, I don't know that I can speak to that specifically, but we continue to focus on the priority of people and the selection. We also, as we have done now for decades, we use a very sophisticated. The sophisticated process in selection is we talk to people, and we talk to them a lot, and we'll have multiple interviews and multiple perspectives and multiple conversations, and we really try to understand the character piece, the competence piece, and the chemistry piece. Character, confidence, chemistry. You know, if you have four, five, six, eight, ten, twelve people interview a candidate, and sometimes they'll interview them multiple times, you can reach a pretty good. good consensus, is this the right person for Chick-fil-A? And you're looking for those three things. And I would assume every person that's interviewing them is looking for those three things. Well, yes and no, the human resources professionals

actually focus more on the character piece because that's a pretty slippery slope and there are things that you can legally ask and things that you legally shouldn't ask. They're professionals. They're trained at that. And so it's not that they disregard the other areas or that me as a hiring manager would not talk about character, but if you were going to say, where's the focus and the priority, the hiring manager is going to focus more on competence in chemistry. Yeah. So often, whenever you talk to someone about why they love Chick-Fleigh, a customer about why they love Chick-fil-A, they'll mention the culture, and whether they use the word culture or not, they'll say something in that regard. But we don't know the language that

you all use internally. We just see that something is going on right there, and I like the way I feel whenever I'm inside their store. What is the culture that y'all are trying to exemplify and create? Well, that's a fantastic question. It's a little bit tricky to answer, though, because there's not a Chick-fil-A. I mean, there is a Chick-fil-A brand, and we're very thankful for that and the strength of the brand. But each of our restaurants, we have about 2,500 restaurants today.

Each one is independently operated. Which is radically different than most restaurants in America today. It's correct. And so it's one brand with 2,500 different manifestations of that brand. And so we want to show honored, dignity, and respect to every guest. We want to create a great place to work. Corporately, we're trying to fulfill our corporate purpose, which is to glorify God by being a faithful steward of everything that's entrusted to us and to have a positive influence on everyone who comes in contact with Chick-fil-A. That's corporate. We don't empower. that on the restaurants. Each and every one of those restaurants, those leaders, is welcome to

create their own purpose. And some may have adopted our corporate purpose. Many have their own. They establish their own core values. They establish their own people practices, their own selection. What I mentioned a moment ago about talking to people with multiple interviews and so forth and so on, I was referring to corporate. The process is radically different in most restaurants and even different from restaurant to restaurant. That's at the discretion of that end of the. operator. Okay, and I know that was a strategic decision to give them that much freedom. What was the impetus? What was the motive behind that strategic position? I think it goes all the way back to the story I told earlier. Truitt believed that a local

entrepreneurial-minded leader was the best model, that we, corporately, at the support center, would exist to support them and help them be successful. It's funny, I was up at the Harvard Business School a few years ago and was in a course on. strategy. And I'll confess to you and the viewers, the professor that had just finished, I understood about 5% of it. I mean, it was the most, I'm not saying it was confusing to the world and it was really clear to him. I didn't have a clue. I was like, I have no idea what this guy said for like an hour. And it was a little frustrating to me. And then they asked me to come up and share Chick-fil-A's strategy. And I thought, this is not going to end well.

So I went up there and I drew a smiley face. And I said, this is the restaurant. operator. And I drew all these arrows support toward the operator. And I said, these are all the various functions that we provide corporately, everything from consulting and accounting and IT and real estate and me and you. And we're trying to help them be successful. Because True, it always said, if you help enough other people get what they want, you'll get what you want. And I said, and the operator makes a very handsome income, and we do okay corporately. And so I'm not sure how many people understood my presentation, hopefully more than understood the other guys. But that's been the model from the beginning. And you give them autonomy because you've got leaders. If you've got

leaders, you let them lead, right? I think a lot of leaders that I've encountered in my lifetime in all walks of life, many of those who are frustrated, it's because they're not being given the opportunity to lead. And so we're thinking, we've built a system to help leaders flourish. Like, let them lead. Challenging the lead, inspire them to lead, equip them to lead, right? Give them the tools and resources. Give them great locations. Give them great uniforms and great consulting and IT serving and give them all the stuff they need and let them lead. And it's been a pretty good formula. You're betting on people in that scenario. Absolutely. People, yes, but specifically that leader, because the leader hires and fires and selects the team around them. And people often talk about the

caliber of the people in our restaurants, and we're very thankful that that often is part of the conversation. And people will say, how do you do that? I said, well, we don't, but we did select the man or woman that is making those decisions. That's fascinating. My day job is I get to coach and work with business leaders and entrepreneurs. And I literally, right before I came in here with you, I was having a phone call with someone that has not been on a vacation in years. And it's because they don't feel okay letting go the organization to the quote-unquote leaders that they have in place. And so they can't ever leave. And they're trapped by the thing that they built.

Compare that to what y'all have done, where you are putting the brand that y'all have invested years and billions of dollars to build. And you're putting it in the hands of an independent operator. What would you tell that person about trust and autonomy? Well, let's back up. I would rephrase what you said. Like, those operators. have built the brand. They built it.

We've supported them in building the brand. And their teams have built the brand. Okay, so even that, though, like you corrected me, it's a paradigm shift. Yeah. And it seems like what you're talking about is servant leadership at its core, which I feel like is a buzzword that's used a lot and not always fully understood. I agree completely. But we just think that if you help the leader win, everybody wins. And so that's been our approach.

That's been our strategy for. decades, even before we ever use the term servant leadership, we think that's the path, the preferred path of the future. Tactically, just on an interpersonal context, for the people that report to you or for the people that you're leading to lead other people, what does servant leadership? How does that affect the day to day? Well, I think if it's real, it affects every day. We did some work about 20 years ago trying to figure out how we could accelerate leadership development. We needed more leaders, and we needed more leaders faster.

Now, this was corporate, but we could also see on the horizon this was going to be true in the restaurants. And I was asked to try and figure this out. And so I did what you might do in a similar situation. I put together a team of really smart people. And I said, we get to figure out how to accelerate leadership development because we sell chicken. Like, we didn't know how to accelerate it.

That's why we had a problem, right? We were leadership intensive because of Truitt's original model. of selecting restaurant operators who could lead. But corporately, we had been very, I don't want to say haphazard. I would say our leadership development strategy corporately had been immersion and osmosis. Basically, you hope emerging leaders are going to pay attention and you would spot them. And that's kind of what we did. So this team went to work and we said, okay, we discovered very, very quickly.

The first problem we had was we didn't even. agree on what leadership was. And so you think about how do you accelerate leadership development if you don't know what it is? Because what would happen, and I think this happens in a lot of organizations, when you say the word leadership, everyone nods. And if you handed out three by five cards and said, write down your definition of leadership, two things would happen.

Everyone could write down their definition. And unless you've done the work to forge a consensus, all the answers would be different. Well, if all the answers are different, how in the world do you accelerate leadership development? And so we did the work to figure out what was our point of view on leadership. And we actually decided that servant leadership, our own unique perspective on that, servant leadership would be our brand of leadership. We say it's the highest form. You know, you can fly around in a crop duster if you want to.

We want a fighter jet. And we think servant leadership is the fighter jet. It is the way to maximize everything within an organization. People, profits, opportunity, the future, leverage the past, honor people. We think servant leadership is the answer. Now, I'm going to come back to your question, though. I never answered it. The guy or gal who can't release their people, most leaders, I think, get trapped.

There's a natural development cycle for leaders. Most leaders, just the way the world works start out as doers. And sometimes that's as an entrepreneur, but sometimes you're within a system and you are recognized as a doer. And maybe you do it well, or in my case, I did it longer and harder and stayed late at night. And so doers can be put in leadership positions. But you quickly understand that's a dead end street. And you discover delegation. And it's like, oh, my gosh, the heavens have opened up.

People will actually do stuff that I asked them to do. And a lot of leaders get stuck there. fundamental problem with delegation as a way of life is it doesn't work unless you're there to delegate. You're getting more done, but you're still trapped within the system. So that next step is when you become a developer. Now, you may from time to time need to delegate, and from time to time you may need to do stuff. But as a way of life, as a worldview, we encourage leaders, servant leaders, to be developers of other servant leaders, and then you can actually be freed up to have more influence, to have more scope, more reach, more impact, but not if you're a prisoner of the business.

It seems like so many people get caught up at delegation and never graduate to developing. Right. I don't think you have to decide. Okay. I don't think you'll drift to becoming a developer of people. I think it's a strategic decision. And when you decide, what is step one? Well, I might even go to just before step one. Okay.

You're only going to change for one of three reasons. Okay. Pain, vision, or fear of future consequences. So you've got to decide I need to do something differently. And that's where it has to come from. That's where you start. Now, the first step in being a developer, I think you've got to identify who are you going

to develop. You're probably not going to develop everyone if you have any size organization. Now, you want everybody to be learning and growing, but where are you going to invest your time, your energy, who specifically are you developing? And then I would ask a leader to consider, and what are you developing them for or to be, or what are you trying to help them develop around? Because some people may be really good in one arena and not in another. So it's not just, you don't paint with a paint roller, you paint with a, with a detail brush. Yeah.

And so who am I going to develop and on which areas? Towards which vision. Towards what? The reasons to change that you gave, I think about the scenario we were talking about earlier. Pain, I haven't been on a vacation for three years. Vision. I have this vision of being on vacation on the beach where my business is around itself. And fear of future consequences burnout is real.

Right. You can see all that and you can say all that. They have to internalize at least one of those. I'm not saying you have to have all three. Yeah. Any one of those in sufficient measure can be enough to move someone to change. And sometimes it is a combination. Yeah.

Sometimes it is a combination. So I'd be interested to know for Chick-fil-A, I would assume at the corporate headquarters, you'll hire in from the outside. It's not just internal leadership development, although I would assume I prefer that, but you hire from the outside. And we've spent a lot of time discussing the idea that Chick-fil-A is not normal. Like, y'all's leadership paradigm is kind of counter. intuitive to a lot of the way the world operates. So how do you take someone that is maybe used to

a more top-down, authoritative leadership-type style, and then immerse them in this culture and get them to pick up this new paradigm of servant leadership? Well, I think you've got to be very careful on who you bring in and their style and their approach. Again, I'm not saying we would never bring anyone in who was a command and control leader, but they will struggle in our culture. And so I think we have to use good judgment. It takes a lot of discernment on who you're going to bring into the organization. And then if you think the person is adaptable and they can learn and they can grow and their heart is right, then I think you begin the orientation and indoctrination. But the other thing I think you've got to keep in mind is for us, servantly,

leadership is not a strategy as much as it is who we want to be as human beings. And I've seen some success in changing people. We'd rather not have to change people. It's hard to change people. This is who we are. You can join or not. Well, and we may invite some who we believe will fit and not invite others who we don't think we'll fit. I mean, on something as fundamental as their leadership style, we do have a leadership

style as a culture. Again, I'm not saying we wouldn't. I'm not saying we haven't brought in men and women with a different leadership philosophy, but we believe servant leadership is the highest form. So if we choose to bring in that leader, we know we're bringing in a leader that can't play at the level of all the other leaders. Yeah. So you got to decide, are they going to step up? Are we going to expect less of them? It's a tricky conversation. What does, leadership development look like in the organization? Do you all have specific meetings or trainings or what does the schedule look like? Well, leadership development again, when you think about that topic broadly at Chick-fil-A, it is very, very different corporately than it is for the

restaurants. For the restaurants, we do some initial training with the operators when they're first selected. This is primarily about how to run a restaurant because many of them don't have any restaurant experience. We've got coaches and teachers and principals and bankers and lawyers. We've got a doctor or two that want to become Chick-fil-A operators. And so part of that initial training is how do you run a restaurant? How do you make the food? How do you actually operate the equipment? And we do an orientation on our leadership point of view and some other things. But again, we're expecting them to bring leadership. So it's not training. If we haven't selected men and women who can lead, then we've got a problem back upstream somewhere.

And then we have a group of consultants that serve those operators, specialty consultants with different facets of the business. So if an operator is having issues with finances, they can contact a financial consultant or others who serve them. And then we will from time to time have optional workshops that they can participate in. And then we do one annual event. We bring all the operators, all their spouses, all the corporate staff and all their spouses together for four days, been doing that now for

49 years. Wow. There were 21 folks at the first one. We had over 6,000 in February together. Wow. And it's a combination of pep rally and motivational family reunion, business meeting, revival, all of us, you know, worship. It's all recognition, rewards, celebrate.

So it's kind of a cultural cornerstone. So many of the operators would say that's a big part of their development because we share vision for the future. And we try to share very practical tips and tools and resources and strategies that they can get through an expo type space or through labs, breakouts where they can go and learn. So for many of our operators, that breathes a lot of life into them on an annual basis. We've just now added something starting this year called regional planning meetings. I say we've added it back in the day. We did spring and fall meetings with the operators.

As we've grown, we've moved away from that. Now we're adding back the fall workshop, which will be a time to give them what they need to plan for their upcoming year. So it's kind of a moving target. You know, what are the needs of the business at any given time? Quickly, I'll say on the staff side, it's all of the things you would expect. And it's seminars and workshops and required things and optional things and training and orientation and departmental stuff and corporate stuff and an annual staff summit where we bring all the staff together. And we're always changing that, looking for the right formula, the right combination. Yeah.

We're just trying to keep learning. We're trying to keep growing. It is remarkable and inspiring to see y'all sell chicken and everything you just talked about. It had nothing to do with chicken and everything to do with chicken. and everything to do with chicken and have everything to do about people. For the small business owner or highly driven growth-oriented leader that's listening this right now, what encouragement should they take from Chick-fil-A's story and from where Chick-fil-A is today?

I wouldn't worry about being small. I'd worry about trying to do things right. And that may be a blinding flash of the obvious, but we were really small when Truitt said, let's bring everybody together and see if we can learn from each other and with each other. other. There were 21 people in the room. That included the staff and the restaurant operators. So that wasn't a big organization. Yeah. 21 people. So I wouldn't get hung up on being small. I'd say, what are the right things to do that'll build a foundation that will enable us to be successful for years, decades, and even generations? Pursue those things, independent of your

size. Mark, that's so good. Thank you so much for being with us today. I know I'm better for it and I know our listeners are as well. Glad to be with you. Did you notice how there's kind of a theme that's woven through that entire conversation and in every single one of Mark's answers? The takeaway that I had was the idea of the power of presence. So often we start looking at the next opportunity, the next rung on the ladder, but Mark's leadership and life are a testament to the fact that there is power in maximizing

the moment that you are in. And I'll tell you, anytime I have a conversation with someone from me, chick-fil-A, I swear, it just makes the chicken taste just a little bit better. If you do want to get Mark's newest book, when the heart, the link to that book is in the show notes. Hey, I want you to know about a resource that our team created for you. One of the things that we believe around here is that a company needs to define what it stands for.

And that starts with a leader making the decision that they are going to define their core values. These values will identify and communicate what you stand for as an organization. So our team is providing you with a free resource. It's how to create core values. And it's a process that will walk you through figuring out your values. So if you want to get this resource, you can text EL values, no spaces, to 33444. Again, that's EL values, all one word, no spaces to 33444.

Or you can just click the link that's in the show notes. I hope you enjoyed this episode of the Entree Leadership podcast. If you did, please give us a five-star review and tell your friends to subscribe. For a chance to win a $25 Amazon gift card, you can review this episode by clicking the length that's in the show notes. And be sure to follow us on social media at Entree Leadership. This episode was produced by Tim Hull, and it was edited and mixed by Will Rutter. I'm Alex Judd, and on behalf of the entire Entree Leadership team, thanks for listening. We'll talk with you again very soon.

Hey, if you enjoy this podcast, you should check out other great podcasts from the Ramsey Network, like the Dave Ramsey Show. If you're looking for boring financial talk, you're in the wrong place. This is not your mother's 401k meeting. This is life on the radio. And it's just downright entertaining. Thanks for hanging out with us, America. We're glad you're there. To hear full episodes, just search Dave Ramsey wherever you listen to podcasts or go to Dave Ramsey.