I didn't write this one because Book One ran out of things
to say. I wrote it because knowing the frameworks was
never the hard part. Saying the right thing, in the actual
moment, with a rush backed up or a hard conversation
staring you down, that is where most leaders still get
stuck. I've been stuck there too. I've had the right idea and
the wrong words, more times than I can count, and
watched a good instinct land badly because I hadn't
figured out yet what to actually say.
This book is what I wish someone had handed me the day I
got promoted with no training and a title I hadn't earned
yet. Not another framework to memorize. The actual
words. The actual scripts. The actual thirty seconds before
you walk onto the floor.
The simplest thing done every day beats the brilliant
thing you did once. That is the whole book. If you read
nothing else, hold that one sentence, because most of
what is broken on your floor is not broken because you
lack a good idea. It is broken because the good idea is
too complicated to run on a Tuesday.
I have spent more than twenty years on floors, in dish pits,
behind counters, and in community kitchens in the Hudson
Valley. Restaurants, retail, catering, an incubator in
Kingston that trained people this industry usually throws
away. I have run the ugly shift and I have been the new kid
getting yelled at. I have been the guy doing the yelling,
before I learned there was another way. Everything in this
book, I did with real people before I ever wrote it down.
I am part leadership coach, part storyteller, part punk-rock
foodie. I believe work can mean more and be a lot more fun
when we lead through story instead of fear. I believe the
person everybody wrote off is almost always a strength
nobody bothered to deploy. And I believe most of what
breaks a restaurant, a store, a kitchen, or a shift can be
fixed by a leader who says one true thing, simply, and
repeats it until it sticks.
Book one of this series, The Coaching Playbook, made the
case that coaching beats commanding. It was the why.
This book is the what to say. Every chapter lives inside the
moments that actually decide whether a team rises or
SET THE TONE
quits: the pre-shift, the correction, the new hire, the
change in leadership, the person poisoning the room. You
will not have to hunt for the words. They are in here.
Most leadership books were written for the boardroom.
This one was written for 6pm on a Friday, when the fryer is
down, two people called out, and the new server is about
to cry in the walk-in. That floor is where I have spent my
life. If you lead from there, whether you were promoted
last week or you run a whole region, you are in the right
place.
Let's set the tone.
Your team isn't broken. Your system is.
Lead with Heart. Coach with Clarity.
