Learning From Example

Now being a post extern student at the CIA brings about a lot of new things in my life. One, being the realization of how important a good leader is, what they should be like, and why I need to groom myself to become more of a leader. While on extern at Abigail Kirsch Catering, I saw examples of very good leaders, some being supervisors in the kitchen, and some being actual managers. Also, I unfortunately was subjected to an example of a bad leader; or an executive chef who did not know how to relate to his employees as people. Seeing this on extern really made me think a lot, especially on those long production days. I was able to observe Chef’s interactions with the other employees while I tried to identify why chef had such a problem with his employees.

The problem was not so much as confrontation, as much as it was just a lack of respect for the employees, who then would not listen to what Chef had to say because he didn’t treat them with respect. Chef did not treat his employees like they had any experience at all, he would tell someone what to do without letting the employee have any say or opinion. It was his was or the highway! That really bothered me and showed me what not to do as a future manager. One other major issue was the fact that because he was so much higher up than the cooks in the kitchen, if someone was doing something wrong, he would not directly go to the cook; he would get a supervisor to correct the employee. That to me shows some disrespect to his staff and in turn is bad for the company.

Although I mention bad examples, Abigail Kirsch was full of great Chefs and supervisors who made my extern such a learning experience by showing me great examples of managers. See that opened my eyes to the right ways to communicate and manage employees so that you have respect and trust from your staff. Your employees are the most important part of the business and thus should be treated that way. For the time when I need to be a manager and a leader, I will already have knowledge to do my job correctly and efficiently.