Ashish Tulsian:

Hi, welcome to Restrocast. Today my guest is John Haggai. He’s the CEO of Burtons Grill.

John’s journey is one, you know, of a busboy to a CEO in the restaurant space. A journey of over 30 years, and starting from a busboy at Outback Steakhouse to finding and building his own chain of restaurants to becoming the CEO of a fast-growing concept today. I found John to be, you know, extremely self-aware, this continuous hunger for learning, being great with people, caring for people.

And last but not the least, his entire career is built on the values that drive customer delight. I love this conversation. I’m sure you will.

Welcome to Restrocast. John, welcome to Restrocast.

John Haggai:

Thank you. Good to be here. 

Ashish Tulsian:

I was, I can see the journey that you have had is, while it’s really long, and and but still has only three pieces. You know, Three large pieces. Before we dive into your first stint, which was two decades worth, or no, it was one decade? We’ve got  that.

John Haggai:

Sure, three decades. 

Ashish Tulsian:

Well, Outback Steakhouse was 20. 

John Haggai:

20, yeah, two decades, correct.

Ashish Tulsian:

Two decades, OK. So while the first one was two decades old, I want to know, how did you get into this? Because I believe that most of the people don’t plan their life to come into the restaurants. I want to know, what were your early years, and how did restaurants happen?

John Haggai:

Early years, well, thanks for the question. Early years, for me, I’m Lebanese. So culturally, we grew up around the kitchen table, going to church, cooking bread for the church. My grandmother baked and sold bread and was very communal around the house. So from an early onset, I was kind of surrounded by food. 

Ashish Tulsian:

Was it in the States?

John Haggai:

It was in the States, yeah. So my great grandmother was an immigrant. My grandmother was from here, so extended families from Michigan. So these were the early years we would travel to her home. And she taught me how to bake and cook. And I was her little sidekick. And I just, for some reason, I was attracted to it on many, many levels. So that was early. And that kind of set the tone for my inspiration and love and affinity for food, and not just food, like hospitality and serving others and taking care of others and cooking and serving. So that was the early onset as my youth. But you’re right, people don’t, most people don’t plan on spending 30 years working the way of a restaurant organization. It just doesn’t really fit that way.

Ashish Tulsian:

And the way, like the kind of craziness this is, one should not plan it that way.

John Haggai:

Yeah, exactly. So it really started by accident, too, because I had this love and this passion for food. But it was when I was in high school, and I just wanted a job, wanted to make extra money. Restaurant work is really flexible. I was an athlete. I played football. I was in high school. And I got a job as a busboy at a local restaurant. And that’s how it started. And it was really part time to make money, meet some friends, meet some girls, just be the normal high school kid. And that turned into a 20-year career, that decision.

Ashish Tulsian:

Wow, I mean but a lot of kids start in restaurants like that, right? So it’s a pocket money gig, right? But then how did that turn into a career?

John Haggai:

I think for a couple reasons. I think, number one, you start to learn something. I’m a.. When I dive into something, I want to learn everything about it, and not just how to do it, but why, and what’s behind that, and what are the processes around that. So when you started working in this job, it was fun. It was engaging. It was extra money. But then I was like, hey, look at those guys down there cooking the food, or doing something down the cook’s line. That looks interesting. I think I can do that. I want to do that, and I want to learn that. So I was always intrigued by what was happening in the restaurants. And quite honestly, I kept tapping people on the shoulder, saying, hey, can I do that? Or can you show me? And I started working my way down the line. And it was never, hey, I want to have a career in the restaurant business. That’s not what it was. It was just more about, it was intriguing. It was fun. It was interesting. You know? 

Ashish Tulsian:

You mean you got it in the kitchen?

John Haggai:

Yeah, right away. I started with bussing tables, and then quickly got in the back of the house, washing dishes. Back then, it was like dishwasher, busboy. So I kind of did both. But pretty quickly, I started working on the cook’s line. But that was a long process. In a traditional kitchen, there’s several positions, beginner positions in prep, and salads, and fry, and things like that. But it was also, I think part of it truly was because the company that I worked for was just starting. It was called Outback Steakhouse. And this was their number three location. Now it’s a $2 billion company, or however big it is now. 

Ashish Tulsian:

That was number?

John Haggai:

That was number three 

Ashish Tulsian:

Wow.

John Haggai:

 It was the third one. So it was still a local restaurant. But it was really special. I could tell it was special. Everything was made from scratch. They were intense about quality. They were passionate about food. And we were really, really busy, really busy. This was in Sarasota, Florida. And it was a lot of fun. So this was also high school, so just working and enjoying it. But it was so much fun. And then you kind of always fall back and say, hang on a second. Why not do this? Why not see how far this takes us? My career as a college football player was really short. Umm And so that didn’t really work out. But every time I moved somewhere, which was interesting, then I moved to Gainesville, Florida, went to college there, I would transfer to an Outback Steakhouse. There would be an Outback in the city. So I kind of worked around and started establishing myself at these restaurants as I was still going to school. So I was a part-time college student. I was a full-time cook and server and all those positions in the restaurant. And then now it’s two, three years down the line, four years down the line. Didn’t have my degree yet. And then I started getting asked to participate in new restaurant openings with Outback. This is when they were in their super growth phase. 

Ashish Tulsian:

That’s amazing.

John Haggai:

And so I got asked to be a trainer.

Ashish Tulsian:

So you and Outback were growing together. Yeah.

John Haggai:

Yeah. So I started to open new restaurants for them. This is still on 19, 20 years old. And opened restaurants in the Virginia Beach area. This is in the early 90s, 93, 94. And got to meet a lot of people. And it continued to be exciting and inspiring for me. Now all of a sudden, it’s only three years in, but I’m the expert because I’m opening new restaurants with these new franchisees and new people that are joining the company. And I knew more than they did. So they kind of needed me at that point. So I was a valuable asset to their growth. And I got started with a group out of Virginia Beach. That was a franchise group for Outback Steakhouse and connected with a gentleman who’s still a real dear friend of mine today. And I got into management at that point. So I was 21 years old, kitchen manager at Outback Steakhouse. Didn’t really know anything about running a business or anything like that, but I was really passionate about it. I packed all my stuff in my car and drove to Virginia Beach from Gainesville, Florida to become a manager. Didn’t know anybody.

Ashish Tulsian:

So by 21, you were already how old in Outback Steakhouse?

John Haggai:

Four years almost, yeah.

Ashish Tulsian:

Wow.

John Haggai:

 So by then, I knew the business really well and got into management at Virginia Beach. And that’s when it kind of just kept going and kept rolling.

Ashish Tulsian:

Was it a point where you actually felt that, OK, next foreseeable future is going to be this, our next few decades?

John Haggai:

Yeah, that was…  you kind of wanted to run a restaurant, be a managing, they called them a managing partners with Outback. So it was the leadership position. It was, back then, still a lot of money. You could make a lot of money. It was a dinner-only concept. So it was very intriguing. So everyone really wanted that role and that job. So I still had a ways to go. But I was also, on the corporate side, enjoying my travel, enjoying opening restaurants. So as I was kind of honing in my skills to become a restaurant leader, I was also contributing in other ways with the company. So, But yeah, I think at that point, it was like, I want to do it. I want to be a leader. I want to be a manager. I want to see how far this takes me. Why not? You know,  My football career is over. I’m not going to be in the Secret Service. I’m not going to be a firefighter. All those things, as a kid, you wanted to do. And I love people. And we love to serve people. And it’s just a tremendous, tremendous industry. And I already had the DNA to do it. And I was already acquiring the skills. So now I had the vehicle to kind of see how far it could take me.

Ashish Tulsian:

Outback is a great institution. And it’s amazing that you’re growing up with them. In 20 years at Outback Steakhouse, like what were the positions that you took? How did the career progress?

John Haggai:

I think it was every position. It was several years as an hourly employee. And then it was four or five years as a manager. And this was like, Outback back then, they’re growing so rapidly. There was.. I became what was called a food technician. So I would travel and open new restaurants. I would travel all over the United States. I would go to California. I would go to Michigan. I would go to New York, Philadelphia, Arizona, New Orleans. I trained international teams that were coming over. So I trained the team from the Philippines that was learning, all this from Brazil. So I was training, I was a training coordinator manager. And then finally, when I was 25 years old, now at this point, I’m still only 25, I finally became what was called a managing partner organization. So you sign a five-year contract, you write a big check, you own part of the cash flow of the business. And at that point, you’re kind of locked into one location, supposedly. You’re locked in to one location and you stick it out. But that, I was only in my first location for three years until I got tapped to do something else. So I stayed as a managing partner for almost 10 years, but it was in three different locations in the United States.

Ashish Tulsian:

So when you say managing partner, you mean like you have the profit sharing in a certain location.

John Haggai:

Exactly. And you contribute to that. Yep, you contribute to it. You sign up, you write a check, you invest, and you own part of that business. 

Ashish Tulsian:

How’s it different from a franchisee? 

John Haggai:

You’re still a corporate restaurant, so you’re participating in the cash flow with your investment.

Ashish Tulsian:

It’s an equity, okay, it’s an equity restaurant. 

John Haggai:

And then you sign a five-year contract and then there’s a deferred buyout after that.

Ashish Tulsian:

But do you still have duties towards the corporate and the brand, or do you stick to that one restaurant?

John Haggai:

You stick to that one restaurant. That’s your restaurant, you’re a general manager, you’re locked in, and that really helps with retention too, and helps with making stability with the restaurant. You know,.. Even today, my restaurant’s now, it’s always challenging when you look at compensation and competition and acquiring talent. So that was Outback’s method of locking in and acquiring talent, it really worked, because you get a little buyout at the end of your five years, you’re not gonna leave before then. But that was in West Virginia, so I went to West Virginia from Virginia Beach to Roanoke, so it was all through the Virginia market, and then moved to West Virginia to have my own restaurant. Once again, 25 years old, opening my own restaurant from scratch, didn’t know anybody, had to set up my own vendors, had to set up all the systems, so it was more of a trial by fire kind a thing. So I learned how to get things done pretty quickly, and that was a lot of fun.

Ashish Tulsian:

It’s amazing. One thing that I feel is that starting early in life, in business and job and your work, in whatever domain or skill set that you wanna hone, starting early in life is very, very underrated. Like, you know…  I mean, I started when I was 19, so I started my first tech company when I was 19, and I can definitely tell you that by 27, or 26, actually, so I sold that company by 26 and I was starting another one, and I almost felt, and I didn’t say that out loud, because I don’t know how will it come out, but I actually felt that I have lived a lifetime, and it was kind of a reset, like I know so much and I feel so much, and so many emotions have just leveled that people around me who are much older in age, like they don’t even stand.

John Haggai:

Yeah, that’s really similar to my journey, too, and so as a young manager and as a young leader, most of the people that I managed and led were older than me, sometimes five, 10 years older than me. Now, what I did miss out, I missed out on a lot of the stuff that my peers were doing. I missed out on some of the college experience. I missed out on the fun. I missed out on doing all that stuff. I said, you know what? Those days will always be ahead of me, hopefully, you know… and I think that what I’m giving up now, the reward will be much greater later. 

Ashish Tulsian:

But that’s okay. I mean.. You know… i was. I was doing my computer science engineering, and when I started my company on the side as well, and there was a time when my friends questioned that, and they said, hey, you’re wasting your college years, and honestly, I mean, in those days, I don’t know where that wisdom was coming from, or was it just I was too euphoric for the business. I basically told them that, hey, you know what? Looks like that you’re telling me that I’m only going to enjoy three years or four years of college, but in case I do I succeed in what I’m doing, I’m going to enjoy the next 40.

John Haggai:

Yeah

Ashish Tulsian:

So, and that turned out that way, I mean. 

John Haggai:

Good decision.

Ashish Tulsian: 

Yeah, not bad at all. I look back, and I feel happy about it.

John Haggai:

Yeah, yeah. I also feel you can control your own destiny and faith. If you, I never had any doubts on whether or not I would be successful. I’ve always felt like if the ball was in my hands, and I had the right opportunity, then I could be successful. So that was, you have to have some confidence. You know,  Doesn’t mean you still have a little bit of doubt or uncertainty, but you have to have a little confidence in your abilities and yourself. While everyone else is doing all those things, you kind of keep your head down. Now, it was a long journey. I kept my head down for a long time. It was 20 years, so this was not like I come in and do five years, and all of a sudden, I’m running the company. That was not the case, so I did it. But I also think that that gave me a lot of credibility, and it gave me the experience. It gave me the relationships that I’ve still used today. So.

Ashish Tulsian:

Two things I’m hearing. One is what you said, confidence, I would say. You’re talking about ownership. And hospitality is, the craziness in hospitality is really about that there are so many moving parts, and you have guests from outside, and you have to repeat the experience each time. And because of so many moving parts, so many things can go wrong, and they do go wrong at so many levels. Ownership is not even optional. How do you look at what you said as confidence, or whenever a ball was in your court, you knew that you’ll take care. How do you look at ownership as a virtue, and how do you see it in the people today, when you manage, like how do you instill that?

John Haggai:

You’re right about the moving parts, though. The business itself is very dynamic. And First of all, I think everyone should have to work in the service business at some point in their life, because it teaches you, you just mentioned a couple things, it teaches you, being in this industry, it teaches you problem solving, it teaches you communication, it teaches you self-confidence, it teaches you, you know… how to be organized. So a lot of people that do go off to college, and then acquire the skills from a knowledge standpoint, and then try to apply them in the real world, don’t garner and gain some of that real world experience.

Ashish Tulsian:

Yeah, it remains too academic. 

John Haggai:

Exactly, and so you gotta have both. And for me, so having that confidence to say, and also you, but at the end of the day, what we do is, it’s not complicated, but it’s really hard, because like you said, you have to, it’s the monotony and the minutia of the everyday experience of taking care of the customer, the guest, inspiring your team, making sure your facilities are immaculate, all the things that they teach us to do, but it’s not complicated, but it’s really hard, because you have to do it every day. So for me, you kinda like, it’s not that you don’t look down the road, but you have to always kind of focus on the now, and I call it just prioritize and focus. You gotta work the plan, you gotta solve the problem, and you gotta move on to the next one. You know… And all too often, people look at big picture stuff so much, they don’t know how to handle what’s happening right in front of them. And it’s easy to do that, because in this world, in this business, you always want, I want the next thing, I wanna do this. So you gotta kinda stay grounded in it, and it takes discipline to do that.

Ashish Tulsian:

Yeah, I think consistency and discipline just makes everything hard. Most of the things, I don’t know what business is complicated, honestly. I mean, I’ve dived in a few on the way.

John Haggai: Yeah

Ashish Tulsian:

I think the hardest part about business, running, building, managing, whichever position you’re in, hardest part, I think, is consistency. If you, Things that you need to do with discipline and consistently, they just become super hard. It’s like doing those number of reps in the gym.

John Haggai:

If you do it right, the results will be there. There’s not a magic, well, now there’s magic drugs to fix a lot of things, but there’s not a magic formula to do it, and I would add one more to it. I would add communication, because you have to be able to articulate, not just the vision and the strategy, but it has to continue to get past leadership. That’s why I feel I have a little bit of an advantage, because I was that guy, and now I’m this guy. So for me to make that connection, you have to be able to articulate and communicate strategy, leadership, you know… the focus, because you can have a great strategy, and you can have a great business plan, but if it doesn’t filter past the executive team, then you gotta get the buy-in from the staff. So the consistency is really key, and then communicating that every day, every single day. In this business, you can go and build beautiful restaurants and raise a lot of money and do all these things, but at the end of the day, the business, and that’s my strategy this year, is it’s just to focus on the four walls and to execute a touchpoint. We’re not disruptors. We are just, we block until we tackle. We innovate around the edges, we have to, but we don’t disrupt. There’s plenty of market share to be gained and customers to be had, sticking to the tenets that make a very successful business.

Ashish Tulsian:

Yeah, it’s so amazing that the simple… simplicity of the wisdom is the most difficult to actually execute. Whenever I, I read that a lot in tech businesses, restaurant businesses still, not everybody out there is calling themselves disruptors or trying to innovate just for the sake of it. Tech is crazy, and I see these people talking about disruption all the time, and I think, I was reading.

John Haggai:

That’s why your eyes lit up when I said disruptor.

Ashish Tulsian:

Yeah, because I was reading this book by Morgan Hussle’s new book, The Guy Who Wrote Psychology of Money.

John Haggai:

Okay

Ashish Tulsian:

He wrote a book called Same as Ever, just recently out. So I was reading it on the plane here, and he quoted Jeff Bezos somewhere, beautiful stuff. He said that, Jeff Bezos once shared, he said, everywhere I go in the world, people keep asking me, what’s gonna change in the next 10 years, what’s gonna change in the next 20 years? And he said, you know what, I don’t know what’s gonna change in the next 10 years, and that’s actually not an important question. The most important question is, what is gonna remain same in the next 10 years? And anything that’s gonna remain same in the next 10 years, we need to double down and quadruple down on it today. And he said, for me, I don’t really see any way why Amazon customers in the next 10 years would not want to have the best price and the fastest delivery, and these are the two things that’s not gonna change for 10 years, guaranteed.

John Haggai:

Yeah

Ashish Tulsian:

So I’m gonna double down on that. And that was, for me, that was like, I actually just closed the book, I was lying back, I was thinking.

John Haggai:

This is the aha moment right there. But, and it’s Captain Obvious, it’s the obvious aha moment.

Ashish Tulsian:

But in the world of, you know, continuous talk on disruption and innovation, somebody talking about preserving something.

John Haggai:

I don’t even like to use the word, innovation comes up and it’s overused, and I try to, I like to say ingenuity more sometimes, because you can take what you’re doing and make it better, and not necessarily innovate, take your people and rely on great teams to help you do things better, and then you augment, you know, even with tech, you know, you augment with technology. But like you said, my business is full service, most of my businesses are full service restaurant business. So it is high touch, it is hospitality, it is smiles, it’s engagement, so you’ve gotta be very careful on the tools with tech and everything else. I believe, because you don’t want to, you know, dilute that customer experience.

Ashish Tulsian:

Absolutely, you don’t want to.

John Haggai:

Because like you said, at the end of the day, they still want a great meal, great hospitality. There’ll be people that argue with me on that. Some people just want to order on your phone and not even talk to a server. Maybe that’s the day one day, but I don’t know.We’re still gonna.

Ashish Tulsian:

No, I don’t think so. You know, I run a restaurant tech company, and I can tell you that my belief is, you know, especially full service restaurants, where part of the experience is conversation with the server, you know, there should not be initial menus. You know, and I say that even to my team, and they’re frowned upon it, and they’re like, dude, we’re supposed to send it. It’s like, no, not to the wrong people. You know, if you’re running a quick service restaurant, if speed is what your customer is expecting, you have a way to do that. If, you know, you can use technology to elevate customer experience, but what touch points does technology appear? Does it remain, you know, behind the scenes? Does it come at the forefront? It’s something that’s a part of the customer experience design, 

John Haggai:

Yeah

Ashish Tulsian:

and that, to me, is actually going to become more valuable, because in a world which is getting more efficient by the day, kitchens are getting a little more efficient, people are, you know, they restaurants and food industry, and we’ll touch upon that, you know, as they’re in a rush to make sure that it’s more industrial, with cloud kitchens and whatnot, I think restaurants with better human experience, with high touch, you know, human touch, they’re gonna elevate.

John Haggai:

Yeah, you mentioned touch points a lot. I use that word all the time. We look at the touch points in our business that are most critical to our success, and you have to hone in on those, preserve them, and then, once again, we went through a massive technology, implementation last year, massive, everything, and we are still doing it right now. We are on the like, the five-yard line to rolling out this, and we’re a mid-sized company, but it was a pretty exhaustive IT kind of implementation with back-end and front-end and loyalty and gift cards, everything, and it’s just like, wow, and we had to always think about, how do we preserve the customer experience? What’s the most important thing? But you’re right, it’s gonna allow, speed of service, if I can use a handheld, I have to still maintain eye contact, I still have to know my menu, but I can get that drink to the bar a lot quicker than walking to a POS station, typing again, wait a second, the printer, I gotta fix the printer, I gotta do this, walk to the kitchen, so those types of things you can do, and the customers, and also, just with paying, check and pay and things like that, that’s the low-lying fruit. You do that stuff, but you don’t mess with, at least for me, not now, I’m not gonna have a, I can’t have a robot running around the beautiful dining room in charge of the amount of money that we charge, the customer’s gonna call me out on that, and they’re gonna say, no way, no thank you.

Ashish Tulsian:

I don’t think so, too, I agree. I think it’s also about, whether you’re running a friendly neighborhood restaurant, or rather, I would say, if your customer walking into the door is not coming there for experience, but coming just for the food, and they know exactly what they wanna order, and they wanna get that and probably have it as fast as possible, probably it’s a different design, and tech can do a lot for you. But

John Haggai:

But even in fast casual, I don’t know, even in fast casual, the customer still wants to, especially the neighborhood customer, they know who you are, they know your order, they say hi to you, they smile at your kid, they make you feel special, so if you can make that human connection, and then still have the technology to have that speed of service element, but you’re right, it’s becoming harder and harder, because everyone knows the challenges, there’s no denying the labor challenge, the cost of goods challenge, the challenge with the supply chain and building restaurants, and I’m an optimist, sometimes to a fault, so I always look in the good and what the future can, I always believe good will still prevail, and there always will be, like you said, a need for people to go out and have a full-service dining experience. It’s up to us, it’s up to the leaders, and it’s up to, not just the leaders at the top, but leaders all through the organization to contribute with ideas and processes to make it better, and you keep moving on.

Ashish Tulsian:

What do you think about the labor crisis that kind of continues in a way, and there is this, one can say it’s an overreaction, one can say it’s, of course, planning for the future, robots rising to be on the tables.

John Haggai:

You go to the tech conferences, you see them, like the restaurant you see, when I was in Chicago last year I saw robots everywhere, it’s gonna, that’s the next thing to happen in the back of the house, I think. How do you take technology to help you with consistency with your systems, with stuff that, but it’s, I see, it started in the pandemic, of course, well, it started before that, it was already becoming challenging.

Ashish Tulsian:

But what’s your view right now, what’s happening? Where is the labor market right now?

John Haggai:

Well, there is a great resignation in our industry, they all left, you know… and I think half of that became the great regret, because they still, people need a job, and a lot of them work for me, they can’t find jobs in the fields that they study in, or the academia. This is where I think we messed up as an industry in general, because our industry is phenomenal, you can make a lot of money in it, it’s inspiring, it’s rewarding, and a lot of people, like your first question of the day was, people don’t really choose to be restaurateurs, we need to fix that, 

Ashish Tulsian:

Yeah

John Haggai:

because it’s a phenomenal industry to be in and be part of, it really is. But to answer your question, I think that the labor piece is not going away, so we have to face it head on, you have to stick to what your core values are, and what your moral purpose is, and what your strategy is, and you have to deal with it, and the best way to deal with it, back to my business plan, is you put yourself in a position to be better than everybody else, and you execute, and you take care of your people that you do have, you have to take care of your people now, it’s a completely different way of leading and inspiring people. We have shifted from this command and control, and the boss, and to more of a participatory environment,

Ashish Tulsian: Have we?

John Haggai:

100%, it’s a way different. With the bosses I worked for, I was in the kitchens, and things would get thrown at me, and people would scream at me, and don’t do that anymore, it’s just not the same. You have to, it’s just a way different, you can even motivate people to some degree, but that has a, to me, that there’s always an end. You have to inspire them, my business. I have restaurants from all up and down the East Coast, you know, 25 restaurants. So, you know, yeah, when you’re in a restaurant visiting, things might be going really well, but when you’re not there, what is the, you know, what’s everyone’s passion? What’s everyone’s purpose? What do they stand for? Are they doing it because they’re scared to get fired, or are they doing it because they believe in what we’re doing and what we’re accomplishing? So if you can flip that and then find people that, find the right people, and that’s through emotional, with their emotional intelligence. Do they have humility? Do, are they curious? You know, so I don’t even look at resumes hardly anymore. You know, that stuff is, and who, it’s not that who cares, but like, I want to sit down and have a conversation with them.

Ashish Tulsian: Yeah

John Haggai:

I want to see what, what they’re passionate about, what inspires them, because you can teach the physical stuff. 

Ashish Tulsian: Yeah

John Haggai:

You can’t, you can’t teach friendly. You can’t teach someone to smile.

Ashish Tulsian:

But do you, but you know, given that you, you started at the bottom, right? And as a student, of course, your stakes were low, you were ready to do anything and everything. And the bosses that you had, or, or the, or the era you were in, you know, do you think that people today, when they fly in, you know, somewhere in the middle, become a restaurant manager because, you know, their academic qualifications allowed them to be, or maybe just starting, not really at the bottom, but starting somewhere in the, you know, lower mid, do you see that they, they lack some of the things that, you know, you look at them and you feel, damn, I wish you roughed it out. 

John Haggai:

Yeah.And you try to, you see that it’s tough because you see it. And it’s kind of like every generation says that about us too. Like even, you know, like it’s just the parents and the generation before that.

Ashish Tulsian:

Yeah, these guys have it easy.

John Haggai:

They have it easy. Even the remote work now, it’s like, we went from a farm to a factory, to an office, to a couch, you know? So like, you don’t even have to get out of bed and you can go to work. So you see that and you recognize that, and you almost have to tuck it away because it’s, you have to, it is what it is at this point. Now at the same time, it’s our job as leaders to, to teach those skills and those traits and then to really mentor and guide them, you know, to, to, to success. I really believe that, you know, you, you have to have the people that tug on the shirt a little bit, but also it’s our job and our duty to tap people on the back and say, hey, you know, come follow me. Let me show you something, you know, because I refuse to believe, to answer your question on the labor thing, I refuse to believe there aren’t people out there that want to grow and be part of a successful team, that want to be inspired, that want to do something that’s rewarding. They want to make a lot of money because I could talk to operators, I’m going to be here for all week and we’re going to sit down and we’re going to talk and we’re going to, we’re going to talk a lot of business, but everyone’s scared about this labor thing and, you know, not to be overly optimistic about it, but I, I’m not as worried as everyone else. If you stick to what you believe in and if you take care of your people and you pay them well and you provide them an environment to grow in a pipeline for success, I think you’re, you’re setting yourself up the best you can.

Ashish Tulsian:

John, this is refreshing. I’ll tell you why, because I actually believe that. I, I genuinely believe that because, you know, I don’t really see any logic why people would not want to have a career. There may be, there was a spike of a different kind mentally, you know, people looked at life a little differently during pandemic, but then, you know, I, and I, and I, again, I compare that to tech, I compare that to restaurants because, you know, from our vantage point, you know, I mean, I see restaurants in 52 countries. So, you know, I kind of, you know, I’m able to also see where the world is leveled, where the world is acting like very, very similarly. I see countries with labor surplus, you know, geographies. I see, of course, countries with labor deficit, and I saw world leveling, and then I saw it, you know, coming back and then settling back. So I saw correction, you know, on both sides. And all I could see was that, hey, you know, people came back, you know, there’s still a gap, but it’s not as bad.

John Haggai:

Also, It looks bad. It looks bad, but I think the expectations are very high for people entering the market. For me, and I’m not saying do it, take 20 years to reach your goals, but people, we’re in that society of instant gratification.

Ashish Tulsian:

Why not?

John Haggai:

I want to get promoted tomorrow. If I get bored, I’m out of here, you know, so we don’t, you know, the baby boomer generation was you stick to one career your entire, and you get a pension, and then the Generation X was slightly different than the Millennials, and now the Zs, so the Zs now, it’s completely different. You have to find out what motivates them, too. Everyone’s a little different, so.

Ashish Tulsian:

Have you figured the formula, how to help them understand that, you know, anything that takes a decade, takes a decade? 

John Haggai:

Yeah. 

Ashish Tulsian:

Like, have you figured the formula?

John Haggai:

I haven’t figured it out yet. There’s no formula for it. There’s no secret to it, but there’s plenty of evidence out there in success stories that, you know, if you do things right, and you work hard, and you take care of other people, you do things the right way, chances are you’re going to be successful, and more often than not, if it looks too easy, and it’s too fast, it’s probably not going to last. It just isn’t, you know. You might get lucky, you know, but the rest of our business is not, it’s not about that. There’s no quick fixes to that in our business. It is a grind it out, you know, work hard. The margins are so, so tight, you know, and it’s hard to make money in this business, and it’s hard to, so it’s all the little nuances and details make it extremely hard, so there’s not a quick fix to that, and you can’t price your way out of it. You can’t, you know, you have to just have the right value proposition in your market, and you have to grind it out, and you have to do your best.

Ashish Tulsian:

In a journey, what was the point where, that you jumped out of Outback and started your own?

John Haggai:

So, there was, first of all, I didn’t, well, 20 years is a long time, but I was still young. I was in my mid-30s, early 30s, and I didn’t want my whole career defined by one job. That was kind of, like, hang on a second here. You hear these success stories, and it’s great, but at the same time, it’s like, wow, you know, I’ve done this for 20 years. At one point, we were public, and then we went private, and then, so the dynamics of the life cycle of the brand at the time, for me, it was starting to become a little different. I wasn’t building as many restaurants. I was managing and supervising restaurants. I like to build things, so it kind of came, I had this aha moment in 2010 that I wanted to try something new, and I wanted to build something, and I wanted to become an entrepreneur. I kind of did it backwards. I was on the corporate side first, and then became an entrepreneur second, but it was, it just felt like the time was right, you know, and you never know. Even my last job recently, you’ll never really know. You just have to decide and do it.

Ashsih Tulsian:

So did you?

John Haggai:

It takes a little bit of faith. The risks will always be out there, and you can sit there and overanalyze everything, but it’s like, you know what? I want to try this. I have a couple good business partners. We have a good plan, and you know, it was a compelling model, and we did it. 

Ashish Tulsian:

What happened? What was the brand about, and how did it go? 

John Haggai:

It started as a kind of a coffee shop, quite honestly, called Cafe Couture, and evolved quickly into what was called now Taza Kitchen. So, It started with a business partner. His name is Jeff Cran. He’s still probably my best friend today. He was a very young entrepreneur, hungry, brand guy, vision guy, didn’t know anything about how to really execute and operate, so he needed an operator, and we hit it off right away, and we had an angel investor as well. His name was John Davenport, and we had this model that was working, but it wasn’t quite where we wanted it, so we took a break. It took a pause. We traveled, and we said, what is this brand? What is the essence of this brand? What do we want? What do we want the feel to be? and We went to Campania, Italy, the Maltese coast, spent a while there, went to several trips to the Baja region of California, Mexico, the Valley of Guadalupe, and Sonata. We ate our way through Mexico. We ate our way through Italy, and we started to just kind of think about a concept that kind of blended the best of Baja, California, and the best of Campania, Italy, and then we molded it into what is called today called Taza Kitchen, which is basically just means tacos and pizza, but wood-fired ovens, 

Ashsih Tulsian:

wow

John Haggai:

seasonal ingredients, beautiful space, small, vibrant, and just phenomenal, and we did that, and it was inspiring, but it was three of us that started the company, and it was very entrepreneurial. We were raising money, building the restaurants ourselves, pouring our own concrete. It was intense, and it was in Richmond, Virginia, and we opened in 2013, our first one. 

Ashsih Tulsian:

So from 2010 to 13, it took you three years to…

John Haggai:

It took us, well, we were doing another concept, well, 2012, we started the vision for Taza, so it took us about a year, so 2010 to 2012, we were operating a smaller business called Cafe Couture that kind of morphed into Taza Kitchen, 

Ashsih Tulsian:

Got it

John Haggai:

and so it took us a year and a half, two years to kind of hone in on the brand, and then we actually converted a restaurant that we owned into this Taza Kitchen, which was really small. It was 3,500 square feet, so it was tiny, but yeah, and it kind of took off. It was phenomenal. It was wood-fired cooking, seasonal ingredients. It was, you know, it was really fun, and smoked brisket. We great smoked meats, pizzas. We had a phenomenal partnership with a group out of Amalfi, out of Naples, that built ovens for us, Marforni, and we would cook pizzas on one side of the oven, we’d cook vegetables and brussels sprouts on the other side of the oven, so you’d walk in these restaurants and you’d see fire, you’d see smoke, and people cooking and making pizzas, and it was a lot of fun, so to me, you have to… I want the visual. You gotta see the energy, feel it, and every restaurant I built, even today, I force people through what I call the energy zone. You’ve got to walk through the bar and see it and smell it and hear it. Even if you don’t want to sit in there, I make you kind of walk through it, so you can get a taste of the concept and see what it’s about, so we call it the energy zone. You walk through the energy zone, and then you can kind of… And music is important, so all the elements of that. It was fun, and we did it for 10 years, and up until the pandemic, the company’s still around today, and I still own part of it, so it’s very successful. I’m one of the biggest customers. I still eat there all the time. 

Ashsih Tulsian:

Awesome

John Haggai:

Phenomenal brand. Tons of respect for the brand, so…

Ashish Tulsian:

I want to still hold you in 2010 to 12. After 20 years at Outback, being a managing partner for 10 years, how different was for you emotionally when you actually jumped to your own?

John Haggai:

It was terrible. It was terrible for a while, because you’re at that comfort level. I was an executive. I made a lot of money. I had a second home in Florida, all these things, and it was when you give up, you give up, and but for me, those things were just material things anyway. I could… They’re nice to have. But that’s today.

Ashish Tulsian:

But that’s today. But while it was happening, how much…

John Haggai:

It was scary. It was scary when it was happening, because you had to transform into the comfort of being in a role and a position with comfort and security into a scary, eat what you kill environment.

Ashish Tulsian:

You’re a nobody suddenly. 

John Haggai:

Yeah.

Ashsih Tulsian:

Yeah. Was that… How much did you underestimate, you know, from being the Outback Steakhouse guy and an OG there? And suddenly, somebody who’s trying to bootstrap a cafe or build a cafe, nobody knows.

John Haggai:

Yeah. Highly underestimate, because you highly underestimate, because at Outback, I could pick up the phone and I had contractors and real estate people, attorneys, you had everybody at your disposal. And here, if you make one mistake, it could be devastating. You know, So it was a big, big learning curve, but you have to do it. And once you learn that, and you… So then I apply… Today, I apply all the learnings. Now that I run a larger company today, I apply those same learnings and that same entrepreneurial kind of spirit in my business today that I had back then, because you got to cut your teeth and feel the pain a little bit.

Ashish Tulsian:

Yeah, it’s so underrated, you know, because so many people at corporate executives who are really running large businesses, managing large businesses, the piece that everybody underestimates is that when you’re on your own, you’re on your own. 

John Haggai:

You’re on your own. There’s nobody to call. There’s no golden parachute. There’s nothing. If you make a mistake, you could… Well, that’s the small business today. You make one or two… That’s the problem, too, is that you can… Sometimes it’s… Well, when you’re an entrepreneur, too, you’re at the behest of your investors.You know, You raise money and you raise capital, and so you have to have good relationships with your investors, and that’s why a lot of entrepreneurs end up owning very little of their company, because they underestimate what it really takes, so then it needs more capital, and you’re burning capital. You need more funding, and you have payroll. You have infrastructure, and then you start to make decisions based on how much money you have as opposed to what’s maybe even right for the business, because you have to. So that’s the scary part, but yeah, you underestimate it 100%. You’re looking back today. It’s like, I can’t even believe I did it. Now, I had three business partners, so I had three people. It wasn’t as lonely, as scary, but we all wore different hats and had very distinct roles within the company. Mine was construction and design and beverage, and my other partner was finance and accounting, and my other partner was food and branding, so we all kind of wore different hats, so it kind of stayed in our buckets, but you underestimate it. It was extremely terrifying to do it.

Ashish Tulsian:

I was listening to this, it’s kind of on an extreme end, but there’s this chip maker company called NVIDIA. NVIDIA is a graphics chip maker, like one of the best, the top in the world, and they’ve gone through their own curves. They never went down, but you know how hardware chips market are like. You’re at the top, and then suddenly you don’t innovate. Nothing new is coming, and then you’re like, okay, people are just forgetting about you. These guys recently cracked a big thing in AI. Chips are way more powerful than before. Company is going 400 billion and above. The founder, who still runs the show after 30 years, ahhh he was asked this question, that hey, so if you knew what you know today, 30 years back, how differently you think you will build NVIDIA? He said, who said I will do this? He said, if I knew what will it take, and what will I go through for the next 30 years, hell no, I’m not going to do this. An interview was taken aback, because they were expecting what’s in the future, and all of that, right? And this guy said, you know what, i went through, if I knew that what is it going to take from me emotionally, how much humiliation, terror, fear, of course euphoria, there are good days for sure, but then how much it is going to take if I knew, I will definitely not do this as a plan. And I was like, you know what, it sounds a little extreme, but I kind of agree. The entrepreneurial journey is, I think everybody underestimates it, that’s why it happens.

John Haggai:

Yeah. Well that’s why very few are successful at it too, it’s extremely scary, and it’s uncertain. But you have to have, if you believe in yourself, and you believe in what you’re doing, and if you do it for the right reasons, so if you’re really passionate, a lot of times do things because hey, I can make money in this market, I think I can go out there and…

Ashish Tulsian:

I can be my own boss, what do you think about being your own boss?

John Haggai:

Ahh… It’s more to me, that’s great, but I think to me it’s like the decision lies within me, so it’s like the success depends on you, so that was what was hard with Taza, because we had three people, it was always ruled by committee, and now when you’re a CEO, the buck stops with you, so you’re the boss at the same time, now I know that okay, everything’s in my hands, the success is in my hands. Not that I’m doing all the work, but I have to have a great executive team, I have to inspire the team, I have to set the strategy, the vision, the purpose of the company, and we have to go execute it, and if we’re not successful, then it’s on me, and it should be that way, it should be that way. No one else to blame.

Ashish Tulsian:

10 years at Taza, you know, what was the journey like, how many restaurants did you open? and

John Haggai:

We opened eight, we closed one, we started a couple other businesses while we were at Taza, one called The Big Kitchen, which was a home meal replacement business and a commissary model to help us a little bit, it was before its time, I think it was tough, but it was really compelling, I thought, a compelling business. We opened in three states, we were in Richmond, Virginia, we were in D.C., North Carolina and South Carolina, so it was really in driving, we would bring bread, we would bring stuff in my pickup truck, we would bring brisket, I’m not kidding you, it was like driving down to I-95 once a week to visit these restaurants, so it was inspiring, it was crazy, it was rewarding.

Ashsih Tulsian:

How long back?

John Haggai:

How long?

Ashsih Tulsian:

I mean, what year was this?

John Haggai:

This was in 2010 to 2019, yeah, 2020, so up until the pandemic, up until the pandemic, and Taza was working on, we were all working on another concept, and they opened it after I left, but I was helping design it, it’s called Canejo now, they have two brands, so the pandemic was the catalyst then for me to make this next move.

Ashsih Tulsian:

What happened?

John Haggai:

Well, we don’t need to revisit the pandemic, we all know what happened then, so it was a scary time, you lay off a bunch of people, it was.. you don’t know if we’re going to make it.You know

Ashish Tulsian:

What happened with you, what happened

John Haggai: 

Personally?

Ashsih Tulsian:

Internally?

John Haggai:

It was, for me, I was at a crossroads because the business was successful, but it wasn’t growing at the rate that I wanted it to grow, the pandemic was a kick in the gut, and I have always had this inner desire, not so much from an ego standpoint, but to really be the visionary and the leader of the business, and it still wasn’t quite there because it was three of us, so I was at a big crossroads in 2020, and then the pandemic was the catalyst at that point to say, okay, well maybe, and it wasn’t, I got a phone call, it wasn’t that I was looking, I got a phone call from my very good friend back from Outback that was an owner in this company, a part owner in the company that it took over, so it was a pandemic decision, it was an opportunity to run and lead an organization as the CEO, as the potential CEO, I came on as COO while the CEO was going to retire and hand the reins over to me, so it was a risky move, but I believed in it, I had a lot of respect and admiration for this company that I run today, I’ve known it very well, restaurant world is small, you kind of know the people around you and respect, so phenomenal brand, phenomenal reputation, a lot of upside for growth, and they were looking for leadership and leadership change, and it all kind of felt right.

Ashish Tulsian:

It’s still interesting to me, right, because I’ve seen a lot of transitions, which is you being a corporate employee and then you jump and take the you know entrepreneurship route, but then being an entrepreneur, then you join.

John Haggai:

I never thought I’d go back, I never thought I’d go back, I never thought I’d go back to the corporate world again, I never thought I would do it.

Ashish Tulsian:

But then, yeah, what was that emotion, what was that aha moment or what was that emotion that just made you say, alright, I’m going to work for somebody else, and in somebody else’s brand, especially, right, because you’re not, you’re leading it.

John Haggai:

I didn’t build it, yeah, I didn’t build a brand, which was, it wasn’t my brand, it wasn’t my company.

Ashish Tulsian:

Yeah, you have to conceive somebody else’s vision now, right?

John Haggai:

Yeah, it was, but. 

Ashsih Tulsian:

What was that vision? What was that emotion?

John Haggai:

The emotion was that it was, for me, I wanted to lead, I wanted to lead and grow a company, and it wasn’t just like pick a brand, I had to be associated with something I was passionate about, but I felt this desire to lead and to grow and develop and help others, and take a brand and really grow it, really scale it. We wanted to do that with Taza, and we just never got there. So I’ve always had, it wasn’t like I had to check the box, but I wanted to grow and scale a compelling company, and this was an opportunity to do it, now, same risk apply, scary as heck, I have some security, I’m a co-founder, a co-owner of a business that I started, what’s that all about? How do you, How do you deal with that? And then to take the risk and start at that top, you got to really, you got to start over, you have to build relationships, and then I’m wearing a mask every day, for a year. And this is, we talked about this earlier, this is a business, it’s high touch, it’s smiles, it’s high fives, it’s let’s go take the hill, can’t do that during the pandemic. So then I had to even change my kind of mentality and mindset on how to lead these folks in the very beginning, because I couldn’t physically even see their face, it was terrible. And for a moment there, I thought I made the wrong decision, it was like the same thing, it was like, oh gosh, did I really mess up? Once again, you have to believe in yourself and trust that, and it’s not blind faith, it’s that you believe in yourself and trust the process, that you can be successful given the opportunity, and I felt that I could, you know.

Ashish Tulsian:

Was there some unlearning, you know, again? 

John Haggai:

Unlearning?

Yeah, there’s a lot of unlearning, you have to like, it’s a completely different focus and mindset of taking, I had a lot of, you know, I was very entrepreneurial, you can make decisions very quickly, you want to change the menu tomorrow, you change the menu, and you can’t do that in a, and I learned very quickly, even if you have a lot of ideas and you have this, you have this charisma, I want to go out there and do this, you know, there’s processes, there’s systems, and you don’t want to, you can’t disrupt what’s happening. And even though I was, I saw things I didn’t like, and I wanted to change, I had to really be careful. And you have to really play chess, and you have to think about it long term, and then you have to pick your battles, and you have to prioritize and focus, like I said before, and know that at the end you want to get there, but you can’t go out there and disrupt right away. And at first I was like, let’s go and do this, the cocktails need to be changed, and we need to do this, and it’s a, we’re a chain restaurant, I hate to use that word, but we are multiple states, and we’re, you know, a $150 million company, so it’s a little bit different.

Ashish Tulsian:

Why do you hate to say that? 

Hogn Haggai:

Well, I think you get, it gets a very bad rap, number one, I get this all the time. Richmond was a prime example, we opened Burtons Grill and Bar in Richmond last year in a relatively smaller market, and it’s a very food-centric town. They know me in town because I started Taza, so I had a little bit of a leg up, but you fight this chain, people don’t like chains. And it’s this weird thing in Richmond, and a lot of cities, oh, they’re a chain restaurant, so they must be marginalized, the food must be mediocre, and they don’t have any passion, so I hate that there’s a, but also they punish, I combat that question to why would you punish someone else’s success? Everything started with one, right? A lot of people started with one and scaled, and why are restaurants the one example that people don’t like when they get scaled? Very successful businesses out there, huge, multi-billion dollar chain restaurants that are highly successful. So the unlearning to me was how do I embrace that world again, take the knowledge I had from the entrepreneurial world, apply it in a corporate world, in a manner and a way that can be compelling, strategic, and competitive, because I felt like I had a little secret weapon the last 10 years doing that. Because I do believe, even though you can’t disrupt and make changes quickly, at the same time, if you think like an entrepreneur, you might not act always, but if you think like an entrepreneur, it can better prepare you and present yourself with better opportunities in a larger environment, I think.

Ashish Tulsian:

One part of unlearning, of course, is that you can’t just make decisions just in time and change things, right? But then, what’s the other side? Did you also, now that you’re in an outfit which is not technically, was not conceived by you, and somebody else has set up, did you also see your mistakes in Taza?

John Haggai:

Yeah, I saw your mistakes. 

Ashish Tulsian:

I think… I mean, I may not use the word mistakes per se, but last couple of years at Burtons, have you… Do you keep looking back and say, hey, you know what? If

John Haggai:

A hundred percent. That happens all the time. I go back and I say, gosh darn it, if we would have done this, or we could have thought about this differently, I still believe that Taza could have, and could still today, be phenomenal. You have, Very large company.

Ashish Tulsian:

What’s one non-linear insight you felt that, hey, if we had done this thing differently at Taza, it could have been like 250 stores.

John Haggai:

Yeah, I think you have to just, a lot of the processes, I think that you get too emotional about like, you know, you have to have your sacred cows and what you believe in, and I’m not saying you let go, but you have to think about how do you really scale this, and what can you give up, and what can you hold on to. I think we held on to too much because we just wanted perfection. Excellence is still my mantra, no doubt about it. But, to scale it properly, to develop properly, you have to think differently, you have to present the business a little differently, and I think that we just, we were too stubborn sometimes. Too stubborn to do it. And we stuck to things that, which I think are also very noble. Things that, even quality decisions, or how we build these restaurants, and we have to make it… we have to build our own furniture, and all this dumb stuff like this. Sometimes the customers don’t even see any of that stuff, and I’m over there obsessing over a light fixture, and how it’s designed, and how it sits on a wall, and it’s like, hang on a second here. No one even knows that that even exists, you know, but to me, that was some of the, it wasn’t really regret, but it was like, you know what, I think that we could have positioned the brand a little differently. I think if we would have leveraged our marketing strategy, I think our brand and market, we didn’t tell our story enough. I think we didn’t, I just, I didn’t think we, we didn’t augment technology to the degree, near enough in the beginning, near enough. We could have used technology way better to position ourselves. You have to fight it out when you’re a small company, it’s really hard, you know, so.

Ashish Tulsian:

I also think that, that, you know, I actually wonder at times, right, that, that a dispassion, a somebody who’s an outsider, when they look at your business, they look at it for what it is. While when you’re passionately involved, you’re the one who’s who’s a creator you are you’re consumed in so many things Which you know may or may not be You know the business for real 

John Haggai:

you’re right And that’s what helped me coming into burtons because I might not have started it But now the evolution of the brand in 2.0 is me It’s my story. It’s the things like you said I was an outsider that came in So I didn’t have confirmation bias of the brand Yeah, you know I was asking questions, you know, and we say this brand is beautiful It’s positioned great But in order to grow it and scale it we’re gonna have to evolve it and it’s not disrupting it It’s to evolve it, you know, you have to continue to maintain your core customers You have to acquire new customers without losing your existing ones You have to attract a slightly younger audience You have to do these things over time and all those from my experience at Taza from design and Space and music and feel and menu engineering I could apply those things to the business now to say hang on a second here we can apply these things and make small subtle little tweaks to Once again innovate around the edges and just enough to to compel the brand to evolve, you know So even though I didn’t start it, it’s it feels now Completely different brand with a ton of potential and excitement So but I was that outsider that came in just like you said I was that guy so I saw things very clearly But the hard thing about making decisions is you can’t go out there and make decisions right away You have to you have to build value you have to earn trust you have to earn credibility So I’m just anxious 

Ashish Tulsian:

amongst the ones who are the OG’s 

John Haggai:

a hundred percent OG’s original founders original people in there been there since the beginning So you have to develop really strong relationships and I learned also now as the chief executive You might make a lot of that you you might make your job is really to make decisions But your biggest job is to bring value to your executive team You got to bring value to your team and support your executive team and be there for them because you can’t do the work

Ashish Tulsian:

What do you mean by bring value to the executive team?

John Haggai:

How do I because it looks they all have jobs and functions and everyone has their in their silos of marketing and finance and culinary and My job is how can I bring them the most value? How can I provide them value? My biggest mantra is through feedback through continuous honest feedback up and down all around We have to have feedback where that’s one thing that’s changing this generation to from last is We were always scared to give feedback and to get feedback Now I have run a company now that you can call me on my phone right now And it could be a line cook or a manager. I don’t care. I’ll pick it up all they could text me I want feedback. I want real feedback. So giving them real feedback and guidance where before it was It was tough for them to really know where they stood So they need to know where they stand and then what tools and resources that I can provide for them to for success Because I can provide good tools and resources for them bring value that way So they could focus on their job and they can focus on executing, you know If that means something is like helping you write helping you write your strategic plan helping you with communication Helping you with feedback You know working side-by-side with you, you know balancing ideas off you but it’s a real partnership It doesn’t feel our executive team does not feel like a hierarchy. It is it is a partnershi[,

Ashish Tulsian:

Yeah, your decisions your decisions have to support their KPIs and carry 100% if they’re not serving their KPIs and carries It’s gonna be a drag. Yeah, and you may be called disruptor, but but but for bad. 

John Haggai:

Yeah 100% 

Ashish Tulsian:

John what’s what’s ahead? What’s keeping you excited? 

John Haggai:

Umm… You know 

Ashish Tulsian:

Like personally, like what are you looking forward to every day or maybe you know over next next month 

John Haggai:

Think you’re gonna be judged. We are always judged. I believe by the relationships, you know that you develop over the years You know, you can’t you know, I’m in The second phase of my career I’ve still feel I have a lot of energy. I’ve a lot of gumption I don’t want to go conquer the world, but I love I truly love leading and developing people and inspiring people I was that guy that that looked up to others and I want to be that guy now that can that can help others and I do believe that once again you have big plans but you focus every day on what you what you do and how you can be successful and You will achieve your goals you just will I believe that and And I like to have a lot of fun, you know, it’s fun to enter new markets. It’s fun to bring smiles to faces I love to work the restaurants. I still love to go on the floor and shake hands and Talk to customers and work the line and say hi to the team to me. To me, that is extremely inspiring. 

Ashish Tulsian:

Do you do that as a part of the like do you have a system? Do you have a process?

John Haggai:

Barely am I barely in my office, you know, I’m usually in the field all the time I’m in markets. I fly in and I’ll spend time with the team. I’ll let them know I’m coming It’s exciting to be there. It feels good. You learn everything by being in your businesses You don’t learn it from in the office You just don’t and too many times people will sit in office and think strategy and wonder what’s happening their business So look at all these KPIs and go on the customer reviews and look at the dashboards go in the restaurant You can see in two seconds. 

Ashish Tulsian:

Yeah

John Haggai:

 you can see it in your field You can do the same thing. You just go in there and you can see it with your own two eyes all the time all the time So that inspires me and it’s not we have another concept outside of the burtons family Called red heat American Tavern. I’m really excited about that. That’s got five units I’m the we really feel like it’s a compelling compelling model So that’s fun because it’s still in the stages of kind of figuring out the brand a little bit and what’s next for it What’s our vision? What’s our strategy? What’s our purpose? And then giving people opportunity. So that’s fun is like getting people opportunity to go out and be part of it for me. That’s awesome.

Ashish Tulsian:

What do you do for personal growth? 

John Haggai:

I read I listen to podcasts I Try to even mentoring others believe it or not is my personal growth to you Like if I can spend time with other folks and help them it helps me

Ashish Tulsian:

How? like

John Haggai:

it just, well nobody helps you stay grounded number one. You realize that you have a big impact on others through relationship building through, you know leadership and mentoring, you know to me it brings stability it brings kind of you know a Homeostasis to me and a mindset that helps me because in this business, it’s it’s you know, it’s you run and gun a lot So you got to stay healthy. I think Professionally and you know, you have to keep your mind, right? You have to I’d like to exercise all these things to like keep your mind like, you know And I don’t like to say creative but just to keep your mind right on the business, you know, so you have to You sometimes you have to disengage, you know to re-engage a little bit on the business. You have to like really Zone out a little bit, you know and stay grounded. So I love to work I love to read not just business books But I try to you know, I love sports. I there’s a lot of parallels in our industry with sports So I like to I like to watch I like to play sports. I play tennis Work out do yoga do all that stuff. But it’s a 

Ashish Tulsian:

Mentoring, you know, you said that mentoring others to you know, how does it how does that enrich you? 

John Haggai:

Umm…

Ashish Tulsian:

One is your gratification that okay you were helping others, 

John Haggai:

Yeah.

Ashsih Tulsian:

you see, but but what else

John Haggai:

The gratification is the big one but the same thing is like It teaches me to be disciplined too because you have to rethink once again the things that you’re teaching You get the gratification and then you get the reinforcement that that will work So sometimes you almost need a kick in the butt, you know to not not drink your kool-aid Not to think not to get you keep your ego and check a little bit So that’s what helps me is I don’t want to be the the egomaniac that runs the show it helps the gratification But it really helps you stay grounded and know that they rely on you. And they believe in you, you know, say they trust you

Ashish Tulsian:

your mentees can also become your mirror 

John Haggai:

a hundred percent, a hundred percent. 

Ashish Tulsian:

You see your own bullshit like that.

John Haggai:

You want people to call bullshit on you and you call bullshit on them It’s important to do that But yeah, they can they can help me stay grounded and then keep keep me from making mistakes at this point You know, it’s about not making mistakes and not getting too arrogant and to hey We can go do this and we can go build another restaurant a new market that we know nothing about and so that’s where I Don’t want to make any mistakes, but you have to also act You have to keep your in this business. You have to keep your foot on the gas You have to if you let up just a little bit your competition is right around the corner. You lose people It’s you have to keep your foot on the gas. It’s very very difficult So those folks will help me stay grounded as we do that 

Ashish Tulsian:

John this was an excellent conversation You know great career and I can see it’s going, you know full throttle right now I see You know, I See the entire Entire process. I see your self-awareness. I see that you work very very hard for that self-awareness I think your your point on you know mentoring for self-growth Hits absolutely home for me.

Thank you for 

John Haggai:

thank you. 

Ashish Tulsian:

Thank you for having this chat. 

John Haggai:

Appreciate it.

Yeah, great.