Culture is the Secret to Real Restaurant Success

Hello. Good afternoon, Madrid. How's everybody? Good? Alive. Everyone awake from having a big lunch. So, you know, walking around the streets of Madrid, I'm kind of. I'm aware of some things. I'm aware of not our differences so much, but our similarities. How, you know, human beings, no matter where I am in the world, we all have the same things. We all want happiness. We all want family. We all want love. So who here in the room, just by a show of hands, who here today came to my seminar because they know deep down inside that their restaurant can be more, that they could be more? Raise your hand. All right. Awesome. So I have to give you a little fair warning. They say that the truth will set you free, but first it will piss you off. So I have three rules for today, or actually, four rules. I'm gonna throw a fourth one in there for you. Number one, I want you to have some fun. Number two, please listen. Number three, if you see me do this, it means hashtag, write this down. I'm gonna throw out a lot of little gold nuggets throughout the seminar today. And when I see me do this hashtag, write this down. And. And then number four, here's what I want you to do. I want you to take something you learned today, and I want you actually to take it back to your restaurant and your life and apply it. Can you do that? Yes. All right. Now, has anyone here ever been to Las Vegas, Nevada, in the United States, besides Kelly, who lives there? Yeah. So I was in Vegas a couple months ago, and I'm like everyone else. I like to learn. I was at a seminar. This guy was a great motivational speaker. He's talking about success. And I'm really into it. I'm, like, listening to every word he says. I'm like, oh, my God, this is great. And I'm writing notes frantically, and I'm sitting there, I'm just watching. And then he says three words. He says, knowledge is power. Actually, he did it more like Moses dropping the Ten Commandments. Down he goes, knowledge is power. And so it made me sit up for a second, and I sat there, and then I thought out loud. Actually, I said, you know, that's bullshit. Knowledge isn't power. It's potential. Applied knowledge is real power. You can have all the great stuff in the world, but if you don't apply it, it's kind of useless. How about this one? Have you ever heard people throw out this one to you? You know, you just need the right tools. If you have the right tools. And I Get this all the time. You know what you need? Here's what you need, man. You need a new checklist. If you have a new checklist, you're gonna. Everything will be fine. In your restaurant where people say, no, no, man, what you need is a new software system. You have a new software system. That's what you need. We sell a great software system. It'll fix all your problems in your restaurant. No, those things are half the battle. Tools are half the battle. Application is the other half. You have to apply it. I'll give you a great example of it. A hammer. A hammer on the table is just potential. It's not until you actually pick that hammer up and apply it. Now, I could pick a hammer up, and I could build a house, I could build a school. I could hang pictures on the wall of my loved ones to remind me of stuff. Or I could take that same hammer, hit someone in the head, and go to jail for a very long time, which you don't want to do. See, it's how you apply it. Tools are just potential. You have to pick them up, you have to apply them to have any validation and to do anything. So I call myself the restaurant coach, but what I really do is I really study restaurant success. Please allow me. I'm going to share with you a couple secrets I've learned over the last 40 years of working in this industry. Would you like to know a couple secrets about the restaurant success? If you would say yes. You guys don't really sound like a couple people in the front row when I have. If you want to hear us a secret, say yes. All right. Awesome. Secret number one, restaurant success is not rocket science. It's people science. The other one I've learned after 40 years is this. All business problems are really just people problems. Now, you need the right people to solve the people problems. And so. And here's another thing I noticed. It doesn't matter where I speak in the world. South America, United States, Australia, it does not matter. There's basically, there's five levels that restaurants all have in common. Five stages of growth, I call it now, each restaurant. And it doesn't matter where you are in the world, your restaurant actually will fall in one of these five different levels or stages of growth. And I want you to think of it kind of like a pyramid. Well, not those kind of pyramids. Those are different pyramids. I want you to think of like this one. This real sexy pyramid I have now. At the bottom of the pyramid is what I call the bad restaurants. The Bad restaurants are what I call struggling. And they make up about, you know, it's like 20% of the market. In any kind of demographic, any kind of economy I'm in, 20% of the restaurants are bad. Now, when I look at this pyramid, what I'm actually looking at, I'm looking at three things. I'm looking at profits. I'm looking at the number of hours the owner works. And the third thing I'm looking at is the culture, because we're really going to dig into culture a little bit more. So at that bad level, what they're doing, they're basically breaking even or losing money. Let's just have this out on the table right now. If your goal is to break even, you need a new goal. Okay? Hashtag, write this down. You can't do better if you don't know better. So the next level up is what I call the good category. And those restaurants are basically surviving, and they make up the bulk of the market. In any demographic, any country I'm in, the bulk of the restaurants are what I call good. That's 60%. Here, the owners work, you know, like, well, in the bad area, bad category, they work like 80 hours a week. And the good category, they work like, maybe 60 to 80 hours a week. And this stage right here, the good category is what I call quicksand. What do I mean by quicksand? I'll give you an example. You're working in your restaurant and you think everything is going fine, and then something bad happens, and then you. Something else happens, and then another thing happens, and then another. And the way you fight back is the only way, you know, you start throwing more hours into work. Right? But the problem is by trying to fight with the only tool you have, throwing more hours at it, you basically sink deeper and deeper until you can't breathe, you can't move, you can't think clearly because you're in over your head, just like quicksand. Now, the next level up is what I call the great restaurants. Great restaurants make up about 15% of the market, and they're what I call thriving. The owners there, they, you know, they make a pretty good profit here, usually 15% or higher. The owners usually work, I say, 40 to 60 hours, and I say it's because they think they have to. They don't have to. They still have, you know, they still have some control issues. So they can't let go of their restaurants yet. So they work a lot of hours. They don't have to, but they tend to be There. And then the next level up is what I call the outstanding restaurants. And that's a very small percent. Only 4.5% make up what I call outstanding. And those restaurants are actually driving the market. They make great profits. You know, 18% higher. The owners work 40 hours or less a week, and these restaurants really just set the tone. Now, if you notice, maybe you can barely see it, at the very, very top of the pyramid, there's a fifth level. That fifth level is reserved for that super, super small select restaurant group. It's 0.5% of any market. It's what I call legendary. Legendary restaurants, they don't have competition. They dominate. They're the brands that people copy. They're the brands that people want to partner with. And I'll give you some examples of some, because legendary restaurants are known throughout the world. Does everyone know most of these restaurants on this marquee? Yes, there's more. But these are what I call legendary restaurants. They don't just exist. They change industries, they set trends, People follow them. When you get to that point, you don't have to worry about competition because you're out in front. So remember I talked about the. The culture part. So if we're going to break down the culture part in the same pyramid, at the bottom, at restaurant level, here's what you have. And it kind of goes up and it up in toxic culture. Bad restaurants have toxic cultures. That next level up, the good restaurants, they have what I call a training culture. Training cultures. The next level up from that, what I call are the great restaurants. They have what we call a learning culture. And then from the next level up from there, we have a leadership culture. And at the very top, you know that legendary thing, we have what I call an admired culture. Now, how does that relate to you? And you can kind of examine where you're at right now. Bad level, the toxic culture. Your team runs you and. And your restaurant. They tell you what to do. They set the standards. You're afraid to fire people because you don't want it to lose anyone. So at this level, they run you the next level up, the training culture. Basically, you're starting to run your restaurant. You're starting to put some systems in place. You got some training programs in place. You're starting to get control of your restaurant again. You actually run your restaurant, which is awesome. You should run your restaurant. Okay. And then at the leadership level, you're basically now your team runs a restaurant, and you take yourself out of the equation. This is where you start getting your Life back. This is the level I want all my clients to be at. I want you to get to that level where you start having a life again, where you're not, you know, you're not basically sacrificing your life and your quality of your life to your restaurant. And then at the very top, of course, legendary restaurants, people really seek to work with you and your brand. Any of those restaurants you saw on that list of legendary things, trust me, they have no problems trying to find quality people. People look for them, People seek them out. People come to them asking if they can work there. Remember, tools, culture, it's all just potential until you pick it up and apply it. Same thing. Like, I have a couple books. My books are full of tools and tips. Tools and tips. How to get a better restaurant. If you read it, you have the knowledge. If you apply it now, you have the power. So why is culture so important? I tell people this because you did not start a restaurant to have it run your life. We started this thing as a restaurant. We thought it was going to give us some independence, and instead, again, like quicksand, it sucked us in and took control of us. How do you change that? We're going to talk about that. I look at building a brand or building a restaurant. Brand especially, I look at it like building a house. You have to have a foundation. You have to have a framework, and then you have to have a roof. Now, anytime I'm building a brand with someone, we always look at the three different things. And I basically, instead of calling a roof, I call it foundation, framework, and functionality. So we'll break each one down real quick. Foundation is culture, plain and simple. If you have a weak foundation, you cannot build a very high structure on top of a weak foundation. Correct. But restaurants do it all the time. They have this great idea, this great menu, and they build this huge thing, but they don't have a solid foundation. And then they wonder why they can't scale it, or it all comes crumbling down upon them because they do not have a solid foundation. If I had to break down foundation into three elements, it would look like this foundation is basically your strengths. And I use a lot of behavioral dynamic profiles, behavioral assessments. I look at core values. And also I look at your mission and your why you have to have these things. These are your foundational elements. Without them, you are basically, you know, you're basically lost everyone. So, culture, here's the big things. A lot of people ask me too. What's the difference between brand and culture? I'll give you the best definition I ever heard in my life. Brand is what your guests say about you. Culture is what your team says about you. The big difference is that brand is what your guests say about you. Culture is what your team or your staff says about you. That's why it's so important. The next part is the framework. Frame is very important, but I think a lot of times we put too much emphasis on frame. When I'm looking at the frame, I'm looking at three things. I'm looking at your standards, your systems. I'm also looking at your team dynamics, and then I'm also looking at your menu, and I'm maximizing your menu. A lot of times we throw stuff out on a menu, but are we really maximizing our profitability? We're just like, you know, I always say we're playing the ego card. We're putting stuff on the menu because we like it or we make it, you know, think it feels good. We had this discussion the other day about a place. I'm here with Team usa. We had this discussion about a chef wanted to take off. We looked at the menu, and he realized that he was selling a lot of hamburgers, and he wanted to take off hamburgers. Why? Because they're not buying my other items. That's the stupidest thing in the world. You don't take off what people are buying. You give them more of what they want, and then the next level up is what I call functionality. That's where the gears kind of come together. Functionality is really, I would say it's where the rubber meets the road. It's where you start making the money. And there's three things I look at here. I look at your marketing, effective marketing. And I say effective marketing because a lot of restaurants market, but not effectively. A lot of restaurants post on social media, but they don't market. There's a difference between posting and marketing. And you got to know the difference. The next thing is strategic planning. You got to have a plan. You got to know where I'm going to be. Where do I want to be in the next 30 days, 60 days, quarter year, five years, what's my plan? And then the last thing you want to maximize, what we call KPIs, key performance indicators. There's certain numbers I can look at, you know, you ever seen, like, Neo? Anybody seen the Matrix? Yes. Yeah. You know how Neo could read the Matrix? I have a handful of friends like me. We can look at your KPIs. And I can tell you right now, right away, what's up, what's down and how come you're, you know, how come your restaurant sucks up or down by KPIs. KPIs are huge. They are a leading indicator and most people don't analyze those things. Most restaurants, I say it's kind of like an old beat up house. Especially restaurants that's struggling at bad level and at surviving level, they focus a lot on the framework and more specifically, they focus on their menu because they think having a great menu is everything. It's not, it's a menu, it's part of the equation, but it's not the end all, be all of the equation. Then you have those restaurants at that great level now. They got their framework pretty dialed in. They also got their functionality pretty good. But they really need to work on their foundation, those core values and stuff like that if they really want to build their brand and scale it. And then those restaurants that are at that top level, they've actually just kind of, they looked at their whole brand and they just rebuilt it from the ground up. They reinforced their foundation, they kind of restructured their systems, their framework, and they re engineered their profitability, they re engineered their functionality. So if you want to be able to do that, remember, take a look at your restaurant now and break it apart into foundation, framework and functionality and figure out where's the weak link and where do you have to rebuild now if we're going to make a recipe for success? Here's what the recipe card for restaurant success would look like. If we were making culture, I would take this one. This is number one. Okay? Raise your standards. Nothing gets better. I'll tell you right now, this is honest, got truth. Nothing in your life gets better until you raise your standards. You have to raise your standards about what you accept. You have to raise your standards. And here's the number one thing that holds you back is you. You set these standards high, the team comes in, they don't like them. So you start lowering your standards, lowering the bar, lowering the bar, lowering the bar until you don't even know who you are anymore. Your standards have become diluted. Once your standards are diluted, your brand becomes diluted, your culture becomes diluted. Then it's just a matter of time. Raise your standards. Everything in your life gets better when you raise your standards. I'm telling you, the quality of your life, the quality of your money, your relationships, everything gets better when you raise your standards about what you're going to tolerate. Number two, talk daily about your core values and your mission. Your core values, I'm telling you right now, your core values are your compassion. Without a compass, you're just kind of like, walking around like, I don't know where I'm going. Remember, like Alice in Wonderland, she walks up to the Cheshire Cat and asks, which way? You know, which way should she go? And he asks, well, where do you want to. Which way do you want to go? She goes, I don't know. I don't care. He goes, well, any road will take you there. Same thing if you don't know your core values. You know, who wants to work with someone who doesn't know who they are, what they stand for? I don't. I like all my friends, I know all my friends, all the colleagues I have, they have strong core values. And I know what their compass is, what their ethical compass is. Core values are everything. In fact, I'm so kind of feverish on it. All my clients have a core values and mission card that I make for them, and I make them carry them around. They have to have them on them all the time. They have to have their core values and mission card with them all the time. And here's my. I always spot check their teams. I'll walk up at any time. Anyone on the team, I'll say, what's the core values? If they can't tell me, I go find the owner right away. What's your mission? And if you notice, too, you've seen those really fancy mission statements. I don't get fancy. I mean, this place up in South Dakota, known as Kitchen, their mission, outstanding people, exceptional product, impeccable service. That's pretty easy to remember, right? You want stuff that's easy for your team to remember. And don't get 20 core values because, number one, you have no chance of living up to them. Your core values have to be a reflection of you because you have to live them. Nothing worse in the world, especially as far as leadership, than a hypocrite. We love hypocrites. I mean, just take a look at politics. They say one thing, but they do something else. And what do we value politicians as usually? Not too very high, right? Core values are your compass. They are what you live by. You have to live your core values. They are everything. Change the words you use, the words you use on a habitual habit, actually become the foundation of your culture. I can sit and talk to a restaurant owner for 20, 30 minutes, and I can tell you right away, just from listening to the words they use on a specific basis, whether they have a great culture. Or, or a negative culture, a toxic culture, just by the words they use. A lot of it's pronouns, do they say they or do they say we? They talk about certain things that you can talk about. You can listen. If you listen to people and listen to the words they use, you can tell a lot about what they value. When you find out what they value, you can find out what's important to them. And then you can also find out where the weakness is in their culture. I'll give you some examples of some ones. Here's the great ones. Do people say no problem or my pleasure? I hate when people say no problem. In the United States. We get a lot. No problem, you know, no problem's a double negative. So no problem is a problem. And then do you call them a customer or you call them a guest? Different mindset. Are you a manager or are you a leader? Now I write for a living and I do a lot of consulting. I'll tell you right now, words to me are very powerful. Manager. Look at the first part of the word manager. Manage. Look at the first part of the word leader. Lead. So if I call someone a manager, basically they're managing the shift where I always say a leader leads the vision. Managers tend to be firefighters. If you have managers in your organization, you have a bunch of firefighters, they're going around putting out fires and they feel very valuable when they put out fires. Oh, boss, you wouldn't believe it, man. I took care of this, took care of this, took care of this, took care of this, took care of that. I took care of all the fires. Here's the downside with firefighters and you want to make hashtag, write this down. When firefighters don't have a fire to put out, they start fires, they become arsonists, and they start damaging your organization because they need something to fix. My father, if you don't know my backstory, my father was a chef. I trained with him. My father was a brilliant chef. He was also what they call a hatchet man. He, he was a corporate chef. He would go into organizations, hotels. He would go into their poor performing hotel restaurants. He would turn them around in like two, three months. He was brilliant at that. But the problem was if he stayed too long, he started damaging the organization because he needed something to fix. That was his thing. So if they didn't have another project for him to go on, I would see it. He'd start damaging the organization, start damaging his own. The one he just fixed, he'd start breaking it so he had something to fix. Is that how he found value? And the last one, staff or team? What do you refer to your people as? What do you call them? Do you call them the staff? Do you call them the team? Think about it. Here's the other thing I want you to do. And this is like, I call this your homework. Go back and listen to what your team says about the guests. They call them guests. They call them customers. They call each other the team. They call each other staff. They call each other front of the house, back of the house. In most restaurants, we have this kind of big divide. Front of the house, back of the house, day staff, night staff. Why? Why don't we just work together? One of the things I love is I love using the phrase one team, one fight. It's us against the other restaurants in our market trying to take our market share. It's not us against each other. It's not the day staff versus the night staff. It's not the front house versus the back house, servers versus the kitchen. No, it's us against every other restaurant down the street trying to take our market share. That's the fight. And you want to remember that. You want to unify and solidify and pull your team together by using the power of words. The next thing I would do is I would say establish clear expectations. You have to establish clear expectations. Remember, we talked about that all business problems are people problems. There's another side of that coin. I say all business problems are people problems, but all people problems are communication problems. And those communication problems are either three things. Either miscommunication, lack of communication, or lack of clarity on expectations. One of the three things. That's the only three things that ever mess up. So you have to establish clear expectations. The same thing anybody. Everyone knows what it means to sweep the floor, correct? You've probably had people sweep the floor. Now, you've probably had somebody raise your hand if you've ever had someone sweep the floor, but they didn't do a good job. Right? You know, I told them to sweep the floor, but they didn't do a good job. Why? Because I did not set the expectations. I did not tell them exactly how I wanted it done. I would say most guys, especially if they're new in the restaurant business, they do what I call the chalk outline. You know, they sweep right down the middle. Like the dead body around the dead body, you know? No. So always think of your expectations like this, like a coin. And on any coin in the world, there's always two sides of a coin, correct? Our coin we have from now on, on one side of your coin is don't know. Now, if they don't know, that's your fault. You did not set the expectations. You did not tell them exactly how you wanted it done, when you wanted it done, exactly every detail you wanted. You did not tell them the expectations. That's the first side of the coin. If I flip the coin over, the other side of the coin is don't care. Now, if they don't care, then that's not your problem. That's their problem. And what you need to do is replace them. So I always look at the coin, two sides. Now, if I have a miscommunication problem, the first part is always on my responsibility as the leader. I look and say, maybe they don't know. Maybe I didn't set the expectations. Maybe I did not explain myself clearly. So I go over, did you understand what I mean? Did you understand exactly what I wanted done, how I wanted it done? Yes. They say, yes, we'll demonstrate it. Okay, that's exactly how I want it done. Now they know. Now, if they don't do it now, it's on the other side of the coin. They don't care to follow the directions. And then if my standards are high, what do I need to do? I have to relieve them. Okay, I have to relieve them. I always tell people, over my years, I've probably let go thousands of people. I never, ever fired anyone. They've always fired themselves. And I always call it kind of legal sabotage. Give them the opportunity to work for your competition. That's legal sabotage. If you got a poor performer, allow them to work for the competition. That's great. You know what? Burger King's hiring. You should go work for them. They're great. You would love it there. Number five, you want to lead with integrity. Integrity is everything. Sadly, I hate to say, especially in bad restaurants and just good restaurants, the struggling and the surviving restaurants, integrity is sadly missing. Integrity is doing the right thing no matter what in our business. We need to have, especially if we want to move our industry forward into the future, into 20, 30 and beyond, we need to step up as leaders. We need to step up and have integrity. That means doing what we say, when we're going to say we're going to do it, how we're going to do it. You have to have integrity. Integrity builds cultures. Because you know what that builds? Builds trust. If you don't have trust, you don't have a team. It destroys teams faster than anything. Lack of integrity, lack of trust. No one wants to work for a hypocrite. No one does. And integrity is huge, especially nowadays. We have a lot of, there's, you know, a lot of people coming forward about harassment and stuff in the workplace. You need to make sure that we have integrity in everything we do. You cannot allow people to move that bar and to lower your standards any longer. And number six, you want to create a learning culture. Remember we talked about on that pyramid of cultures, learning culture was at the top. You have to have a learning culture. A training culture and a learning culture are quite different. I'll tell you how they are. Most restaurants, 90% in the world, have a training culture. Training culture is when I train people, when they first get hired, I give them the standard three or four day training, then I turn them loose and say, go, go, go, have fun, be great. And then I never train them again. That's a training culture. That's totally wrong. A learning culture is where you're constantly, constantly learning, developing. And who does it start with as a leader? Starts with you. Write this down. Culture flows down, not up. Culture starts with you. You have to be committed to learning, to getting better. Reading books, listening to podcasts, watching videos. There's tons of stuff you can do. I mean, most of you are here at this seminar. That's the great example that you want to create a learning culture. Take this stuff back to your organization and here's another one I want you to do. And you definitely want to write this one down. Hashtag, write this down. Do not train your team until they get it right. Train them until they can't get it wrong. So many times when we train people, we train them one or two times. Oh, they got it. He's got it. He's got it. No, they don't got it. How many times you train somebody? A couple times. And then you left them alone, you come back and you're like, what are you doing? Oh, I'm just doing what you said. I didn't show you like that because you did the first part. You trained them till they got it right and then you thought you were off the hook. That's a training culture. Learning culture is. No, I'm going to train you over and over and over and over and over and over again. You might not know. There's a great story I have. I worked one time for Wolfgang Puck, a chef of the United States. We were doing a menu tasting for an art museum we were doing in Minnesota, and Lee Hefter, Wolfgang's right hand man, asked me to make mashed potatoes. Now, I've been a chef for quite a few years. I knew how to make mashed potatoes. I made mashed potatoes. Lee tastes them, and he goes, overcooked. Do them again. Yes, Chef. Do it. All right. Cook them again. Bring them. Here's mashed potatoes, chef. He tastes them. Undercooked. Do them again. All right. You know, so I go back. Make them again. Come back. Here you go, Chef. Overcooked. Do them again, mother. I'm like, ooh. All right. I make them again. Undercooked. Overcooked. Undercooked. It took me seven times to get it right. But you know what? I never messed up mashed potatoes again. Because I knew he trained me until I got it right, and I could not get it wrong. I learned sometimes you got to do it at your team. No, do it again, do it again. Do it again. Do it again. Train them until they can't get it wrong. Now, I have to say I'm with a heavy heart right now. I'm a little sad because I gave you recipe. The recipe to create an outstanding culture in your restaurant. But most of you are going to go back to your restaurants and not do anything with it. Makes me sad. And you know why? It's because you're stuck. Would you like to know why you're stuck? Huh? Would you like to know exactly the reason? There's actually there's two reasons why you're stuck. If you'd like to hear the reasons why you're stuck, say yes. Okay, three people want to know. If you want to know the reasons you're stuck, say yes. All right, I'll tell you. She was really loud, so she said, yeah, really loud. There's two reasons why you're stuck. The first one, and I want you to hold on, because this one's a tough one to handle. You're stuck because your biggest problem is this. You don't think you should have any problems. That's our biggest thing. We don't think we should have any problems. Problems. I'm telling you right now, it doesn't matter how successful your restaurant is, you're going to always have problems. You just want better problems. It's like, should I take the Porsche today or the Audi? Oh, you know, for holiday, Shall I stay in Belize or should I stay in Fiji? That's the kind of problems you want. Not, where am I going to find another dishwasher? That's the problems you don't want. You want better problems. That's your number one thing. You have to understand. This problems sculpt our soul. They are what makes us become more. If we can really realize, and this changed my life. If you can realize that life is always happening for you and not to you, that's it. All the pain and suffering end, game over. Your problems are your gift. You have to look at it like that. Your problems are your gift. And the second thing is this. You should all over yourself. What do I mean by that? We have all these things that we should do in our restaurant. I should cost out my menu. I should market more. I should fire that negative energy vampire just sucking the life out of me and my restaurant. But I don't. I should. And I should. And I should. And I should. And I should. And I should. Remember this. You don't get your shoulds, okay? You got to turn those shoulds into a must. We never get our shoulds. We get what we must have. You got to turn that should into a must. Only then we actually start taking action and actually make it work, make it happen. You have to turn that should into a must. Decide, commit, succeed. I always like the word decide when you make a decision. It's actually from the Latin word decir, which means to cut off, like incision. So when you make a true decision, you cut off all different possibility, no other possibility, no other outcome. And you have to have this mindset, what I like to call burn the boats mindset. And you know where burn the boats came from? Came from your country, actually. 1519, Hernan Cortez, Spanish explorer in Conquistador, decides that he wants to go to the Yucatan. He wants to go and conquer the Aztecs. He's gonna go down and kick some Aztec ass because they got 600 years of treasure he heard about and he wants it. So Cortes takes 11 ships, 500 soldiers, 100 sailors. They head off to the New World. Now, on the way, they hear stories that the Aztecs are pretty brutal people. They don't take prisoners. In fact, they actually cut the hearts out of their prisoners and sacrifice them to their gods. So some of the soldiers kind of got like, you know, I don't know if this is a good idea. So they get there and they're like, you know, maybe we should just take some of the boats and head back. We can go lay low in Cuba while Cortes tries to take over these Aztecs. So Cortes found a wind of this, and what did he do? He ordered them to sink the boats, burn the boats. He had the attitude of this, we either conquer as heroes or we die in the process. That's the attitude you have to be if you want to move your restaurant to that level. You have to have this attitude that you are basically, I'm not going to take it anymore. No excuses, no bullshit, no lying to yourself. You are basically going to go forward, take some of these things and move them forward to making sure you get the restaurant and the life you want and that your restaurant does not run you. And that starts with having an outstanding culture. Remember the recipe, use the recipe, follow the recipe. It will not let you down, I swear. And above all, you have to burn the bridge boats. I'm going to leave you with this. This is one of the things I believe as a coach, too. I believe in you, especially since you're here and you know, there's so many restaurants that are not here trying to learn and become better. I believe in you even when you don't believe in yourself. That's one thing a coach does. I believe in you 100%. I believe you have the tools, you have all the resources you need. You just need to stop, you know, doing the same things you've been doing, which is insanity, trying to get different results. You have to try some new things. If you try some new things, I swear you will have the restaurant and the life you want. And with that, I will say thank you.