Author: Denica Freitas

you’re not that good

You’re good but not that good. No matter how good you are, you are limited by the fact that you are one person. The way to multiply your impact is to lead, to duplicate yourself, to get the other pieces of the puzzle by building your team with people who are strong where you are not. Earlier in my life I would fall into the trap of thinking I had to do it all myself. Call it perfectionism, ego, pride…all just words that had the same outcome. I thought no one could do it as good as I could, and sometimes I was right. But this thought was the prison that was holding me back from growing. It held me back from growing my company, because there is only so much a one man show can accomplish. It held me back from growing as a person, because if you are not challenging your beliefs you are limiting yourself.

Side effects of thinking you have to do it all yourself can be overwhelm, overload, stress and breakdown if you don’t wake up and realize what you are doing to yourself. You can get pretty far on sheer force of will, but eventually that “force” will break you. The break can come in the form of being surly with people, getting physically ill, breaking out, gaining weight, angry outbursts, that nightly cocktail…Maybe you are not like me, where it was hard to ask for help. But if you are, there is hope. You can open your mind to the belief that you can do more by doing less. It’s true. I am proof. Once I really opened myself up to getting help, the stress lifted, the dream got bigger, the clouds shifted and there was the big bright sun.

“No one can whistle a symphony. It takes a whole orchestra to play it.” – H.E. Luccock

principles

What are principles? And how does one recover from violating them? I had someone tell me they would not go back to a business “As a matter of principle”. It was a line in the sand that they drew, and as long as everyone stayed just south of the line, they were cool. You could come right up to the line, even brush against it lightly, but cross it and you are toast. As I talked to this person, lets call her Beth, it became clear to me that she had very distinct rules about what was acceptable and what was not. Her threshold was large, she gave off the impression that she was very flexible and tolerant. Easy going, nice, a real sweet lady. But she had a line nonetheless, and when someone crossed it, it was the final straw. All of the mini sacrifices she had willingly made all of a sudden became the score she had been keeping.

Nothing I could say or do would turn her around, she had made her decision, “As a matter of principle”. If she didn’t stand firm as judge and jury of her own life, then what would come of the world? At least this is what she thought. I am going to propose that when you have a line, any line, you are putting up an invisible sign that is challenging someone to cross it. You are locking your gate, with an angry dog laying low in your front yard just waiting to pounce, and signs saying “stay out our else”. This works much of the time, since most people don’t want to get bit, but what about when someone doesn’t see the signs? Or they are so invisible and well hidden in your personality that not even those closest to you know you are keeping score? You have just set yourself up for conflict. Your line in the sand will attract the threat you seek.

Principles are rules. Rules are lines. Dissect your principles and see if they are opening you up or closing you off. Flexible or rigid. Open or closed. Fear or love.

“Know the rules well, so you can break them effectively.”
― Dalai Lama XIV

5 levels of leadership

My very first introduction into the concept of leadership came in the form of a video that one of my managers showed at a meeting he was leading several years back. I had never really thought about leadership in any way except as a vague idea of something that I was not. I didn’t know that managing people was different than leading them. Although it sounds silly now, I had a belief that if I put someone in place as a manager, the work was done. I thought that managers automatically were leaders and knew how to bring the best out in people. The video was John Maxwell, someone I had never heard of except maybe as some sort of religious leader. He started as a pastor, but has expanded his impact into the field of leadership in the business world.

He talked about 5 levels of leadership, and this was a catalyst for me to look at myself and the people that I had in management positions in my company. It was the beginning of the journey I am continuing daily, towards being the best version of myself that I can be.

1-Positional leader- people follow because they have to (you’re the boss, so they have to follow)
2-Permission level – people follow you because they want to (you have begun to develop a relationship)
3-Production level – People follow you because of what you have done for the organization- you are growing things
4-People development level – you are turning producers into reproducers, loyalty kicks in here. You have mentored them and developed them, they follow you because of what you have done for them.
5-Personhood level – people follow you because of who you are, you are bigger than life- this will come if you are growing as a leader

“The individual leads in order that those who are led can develop their potential as human beings and thereby prosper.” —Socrates

culture trumps vision

I believe that the limit to the growth of any organization is limited by their ability to grow and develop leaders. When I first started coming to this understanding, it seemed a long way off. A long way off from actually having a leader who we had coached and helped grow into the position we needed. We had to learn through trial and error, then through deep introspection, what qualities to look for when we select who to mentor. It started with digging deep into my heart, looking for the answer to the question, “Why are we in business?”. I have explored the changing answer to that question many times, and it has evolved as I have grown and matured. What it drills down to at the most core level for us is that we are in business to add value, or in other terms, to spread love and to brighten people’s day.

I had this conversation with one of my leaders just yesterday. Her journey is mirroring my own. As a young leader, she is finding that her position is requiring much more than managing numbers and processes. It is pushing her to learn more about herself as well as the people she is leading. She has had to learn to communicate differently with each one, and is becoming aware of the need to connect first. My coaching was to remind her that we all have a basic human need to be appreciated, to be loved. We have a tendency to take life personally. If you neglect saying hello to someone on your team, many times it is likely they will think you are either mad at them or rude or don’t care. The simple act of walking through the building and saying hello, greeting each by name, touching a shoulder or shaking a hand, can make the difference between a tough day and a great one.

Culture is a living thing, it trumps vision by 10:1. A vision will only get you so far, a vision is what you preach, but culture is what you do. You can remind people of the vision by coaching, teaching, training, but ultimately people do what people see. So my mentoring with my leader, reminding her of our vision, is only a small dose of vitamins to remind her of the direction we are headed. The true path to health for the culture is to live what I see in my vision. To be there for them when they need me while still allowing them the space to grow into the greatness that I see in them. It has to start with the leader, it has to start with me.

“Coming together is a beginning; keeping together is progress; working together is success.”
– Henry Ford, Ford Motor Company

the cure

Some people cause happiness wherever they go. Some people cause happiness whenever they go. Oscar Wilde

Which one are you? Do you make it your intent to bring people up? Or are you tuned out inside your head, thinking the hundreds of thoughts that are looping around in your mind at any given moment?

And how the heck does one stay positive when faced with grouchiness and negativity and aggravation? What about when you are working with a deadline? or short on resources?

Our mind is a tool, and it’s main job for generations has been to ensure our survival by looking for all the threats. In this day we live in, and if we are lucky enough to be reading this online, we have resources and are not racing for survival. There are no saber tooth tigers ready to pounce, we have access to food and shelter, clean water and electricity. Yet our minds are slow to advance and still look for danger. The overwhelming fear that is all around us will invade the most loving space if it is allowed.

I have put myself on a news diet. Meaning I am done with it. I turn it off or tune it out or leave the room when it is on, and lucky for me my family is following. I am not saying to bury your head in the sand and chant “its all good its all good”, but rather to focus on the love and good things that are all around you.

One thing that is certain is that this current state of affairs in our country and our planet has brought to the forefront of our awareness the need to WAKE UP. To realize that you have the amazing ability to change your world. That the only way to counteract fear is with love, anger with gratitude, frustration with acceptance.

everyone is different

“He who thinketh he leadeth and have no one following him is only taking a walk”

I am back to the subject a leadership, it is a topic that is always on my mind, both as a business owner and as a parent. When I first became aware of this thing, “leadership”, I was not really clear on what it was, or how it was different than being an owner or a manager. I just knew that there were people in my life that were natural born leaders, and that I did not see myself as one. I may be behind the times, but it is a relatively new concept for me, this idea that you can create leaders. As I began delving into learning about this leadership thing, there was one simple definition that helped me see what it really means. Leadership is influence. If you have no influence over people, it is impossible to lead. If you don’t have the ability to touch lives, to create change, you are not a leader. Can a leader be destructive? Absolutely, as we have seen and continue to see in world we live in right now, with the tragedies and injustice we see happening on the world stage. So influence makes a leader, but to be a truly great leader there is more to it than that.

Integrity is the variable that determines the type of leader you are. Who you are is who you attract, and if you are working to create leaders as I am, it is important to be the model and live what you believe in.

The biggest lesson I have learned as a parent is that everyone is different. You cannot treat everyone the same, because everyone is not the same, even with the same upbringing and the same gene pool. As a leader it’s like you have to be a practical psychologist. You have to learn to read between the lines and to become aware of what works with each person you are in contact with. Sometimes it means being very strict and matter of fact, other people require a softer touch. Ultimately it means connecting with people and paying attention to your intuition when listening to what they say, through their words, but more importantly, through their actions.

Most of our communication is non-verbal, and that is why “do as I say, not as I do” is so ineffective. People do what people see, your actions and your intentions speak louder than words.

“Above all else, good leaders are open. They go up, down, and around their organizations to reach people. They don’t stick to established channels. They’re informal. They’re straight with people. They make a religion out of being accessible.” —Jack Welch

leaders made here

The vast majority of organizations have a shortage of leaders. Not a shortage of managers, but a shortage of leaders. There is a prevailing thought pattern in many companies that managers are what is needed. We used to be one of those companies. We thought that a manager was the solution to all of our problems. Managers to tell everyone what to do, to measure their progress, to enforce the rules. The best of them help ensure that the workload is distributed fairly and that sales and expense targets are met, the worst of them…well, the worst of them we could talk volumes about. The ones who live in their own little world and don’t even manage let alone connect with their team. The ones who are inflexible with their rules and don’t allow creativity. The ones who think they deserve the respect because they have the title. The ones who have no idea how to motivate or inspire their people. The ones who end up costing you dollars and loss of talent through their incompetence.

Someone in the organization has to wake up. If it is the top dog, great, but it doesn’t have to be. For us it began with an amazing individual who came to work in our restaurants. He is one of the people that I can see was sent to me at exactly the right time, for us and also for him. He embodied the work ethic that James and I share, but beyond that, he has an energy and a yearning to do more for others and to help them along their journey as he had been helped. He saw the coming and going of many people in our organization who we had placed in positions of management that were unable to lead. He continued caring and building and connecting, in spite of the chaos around him. He brought a young man on board who started as a dishwasher, and in that most difficult position in our organization as far as straight physical labor and mental fortitude, proved himself to be a superstar. Within a year he had helped this young man grow into a kitchen manager. How did he do this? Not by teaching him the nuts and bolts of how to run a kitchen, although that of course plays an important part. Instead, he encouraged in him the most important part of being a leader. How to connect.

We all communicate, but CONNECTING is where the magic happens. It happens when you work side by side with someone, when you are there to support them WHEN THEY NEED IT, not when it is good for you. It is when you know that they have 2 kids, or that their wife suffers from depression, or that they are helping to support their parents and disabled brother in another country. When they trust you and you trust them, to be there for each other as human beings, not just in the workplace. Leadership is many things, most of all to continue growing and learning, but it all starts with connecting. This is what we are teaching at our restaurants, we are taking responsibility for the 80+ people that are working with us, giving them tools that they can carry with them on their journey, whether they stay with us or not. Not everyone is at the point in their lives where they are ready to step up and lead, but we love them all the same nonetheless. We have a commitment to share with them what we have learned, to lay the tools out for them to pick up and do with them what they will. This is the culture at Denica’s Real Food Kitchen. This is why I wake up early every day. This is why I am here.

“A Dream You Dream Alone Is Only A Dream. A Dream You Dream Together Is Reality.”
– John Lennon/Yoko Ono

living on purpose

Good intentions are a world away from living with intention.

Good intentions mean you hope things will work out well, you wish things would change, you desire it to be better. Good intentions will get you thinking about what you want to do, but it takes more than thinking to make things happen.

To change anything, to improve your life, to grow, you have to be on purpose. You have to take that leap from wanting to doing. From hoping to executing. From dreaming to living. It starts with the intention, the dream, but sitting at your desk thinking about it will never bring it to reality. You have to express it. By talking about it, by writing it down, by enlisting help, by looking for people that are doing it already successfully and modelling them.

That dream going round and round in your head, that vision of a world without violence, the dream of being an artist, the hope that you will find the perfect mate, the dream of owning your own business- they are all possible. They are possible because we are the authors of our stories. We don’t realize it until we see it, that we can start right now changing the direction of our path. We can choose to verbalize, to vocalize, to take that dream, that vision, that hope, and place it out here. Take it out of your head, put it into the world.

All of the stories you tell yourself about why it is impossible are B.S. The story that no one can make a living as an artist, that businesses fail, that you need to have a ‘real job’, that violence is too ingrained, that all the good ones are taken- all B.S. They are the stories of your life that were written by other people. Take hold of the pen, and begin writing your story ON PURPOSE. With intention. Out loud.

“Infuse your life with action. Don’t wait for it to happen. Make it happen. Make your own future. Make your own hope.” – Bradley Whitford

bigger on the inside

Is it true that more and more small businesses are disappearing? When I was growing up we had a local butcher shop, a fish market, a co-op grocery store, the “milk depot”. There were independent bookstores, clothing shops, hof braus, corner coffee shops. Places where you knew the owners, saw their kids working on the weekends…Now it seems that the brands that are growing and taking over the prime real estate are the ones that have the biggest budgets, the Costcos, the Dick’s, the Lazy Dogs, the Starbucks. And every marketing expert has been preaching the power of the story, so the big brands are working to tell us a story about why they are not giants that are gobbling up the little guys. But I wonder.

I love small business. I love to go to a place that is not quite “perfect”, where they may be slightly short staffed and going crazy, where the signs are hand made, where the people are genuine and don’t follow a script. I seek them out and support them and see in them the cure to mass corporate overload as they are living their American dream. I get asked often if I am going to take my restaurants big. I get all kinds of free advice and kudos and you shoulds. And maybe they are right, we have something good, so the automatic thought for many is to grow it, but why? For me, as the driver of the Denica’s brand, it is my fiduciary responsibility to my team, my family, my integrity, to ensure that our growth is organic. That means growing from the inside. For the reasons that are right for us. Not to make more money, not for ego, not for glory or fame. Instead a decision to grow our brand has to benefit more than just me, or my immediate circle. It has to provide a place for the people that are working with me to grow into positions of leadership, a place for them to make more money, a place for the people in the communities we serve to come and have a loving, friendly place to eat.

So are we growing? Yes we are growing. We are growing our people, watering and nurturing the seeds of greatness that exist in all of us. We are providing a place where they can begin to dream and to see that we can make this world a better place, one interaction at a time. The love in our organization is HUGE, though our company is small. We are bigger on the inside.

“The universe is big, its vast and complicated, and ridiculous. And sometimes, very rarely, impossible things just happen and we call them miracles. And that’s the theory. Nine hundred years, never seen one yet, but this would do me.”
― Steven Moffat

fear

Everybody feels it. It is the biggest thing, that holds us back from taking action. Fear of leaving something that is secure and stepping into the unknown. Fear of trying something new that we may not be good at. Fear of what people will say if we fall on our face. Fear of not having enough money. Fear of losing love people have for us. Fear of speaking up and asking for what you want. What is that feeling? Where does it come from?

I can pull it up in an instant just by thinking of some of the moments in my life where I felt it. The sick feeling in your gut, the heavy weight of some negative energy that just cloaks your body, the hyperawareness that suddenly occurs to every perceived threat to your current world. We have a global connected consciousness that has a deeply rutted path of fear, of scarcity, of separation. But we also have an even stronger space that is tremendously powerful, strong and able. Able to create a beautiful life in spite of or because of the challenges that we have faced along the path. I am not going to say it is easy to disconnect yourself from the stickiness of fear, it is freaking hard shit. It can take a cataclysmic event like losing someone or getting cancer that shoves you into another reality where you have to question who you are. It can take going bankrupt, losing your business, the end of your marriage, losing your home. But it can also happen another way – you can choose to let go without needing the hard lesson. You can begin to open your thoughts to the idea that fear is not acting in your favor. Begin to open your mind to the idea that fear is not a message to stop, but instead a message that you are headed in the right direction. Fear is telling you to step forward, step up, hold someones hand if you need it, but move.

“I am always doing that which I cannot do, in order that I may learn how to do it.” – Pablo Picasso