The Real Test of Your Team's Integrity #Leadership #TeamIntegrity #RestaurantLeadership

20 Sept 2025 · 0 min

Watch on YouTube

0:10

This YouTube conversation (Donald Burns and another speaker) focuses on team integrity and leadership. Core claim: integrity is demonstrated by how a team performs when the leader is absent — teams should operate near 100% without the owner present. The speakers emphasize that culture and standards must be internalized ("culture flows down, it doesn't flow up") and that leaders should be able to step away while operations continue consistently.

Your team should operate at a near a hundred percent even if they know you're not coming.
Exactly.
Yeah.
I would say that's the definition of integrity. Integrity is how people act when you're not around, when owners are around. That's real integrity. And does your team have integrity is like in and you know, we talk about culture flows down, it doesn't flow up. And we preach culture a lot. We preach about standards a lot. We preach about core values. We preach about all this stuff all the time. But again, what happens when you're not there? That's the big test.
I mean, I think so. You know, and listen, there's days where, you know, I take a weekend off or I don't go anymore. I try Saturday and Sundays, like I check in, but I might not go because they have to be able to do it without me, right.