Managment as a First

During my externship in California at Bottega Restaurant, I came in contact with what I can say is my first major manager control. Before the Culinary Institute of America I worked at Oakley’s Bistro in Indiana during High school. I was pretty much working with the only other dishwasher there starting off in a three comp sink. I worked in that position for 6 months before moving to the automatic washer for another year. Proceeding that I was moved up to the back of the house for another year and a half and finally worked sauté for 6 months. And although my boss was a fellow culinary institute graduate, he applied the “magic apron” method to my training.
Upon departing from the Institute to head west for Bottega, my culinary experiences were about to broaden. Chef Michael Chiarello knew exactly how to train me without a doubt. From the moment I stepped in he introduced me to everyone and showed me inside and out through the kitchen. He put me up in the Garde Manger station and had Chef de Cuisine Nick Richie instruct me every step of the way through menu item process. He and Chiarello took me inside and out in the line of Bottega and managed me all the way up to the last station at grill. They guided me well, corrected me when I was wrong, treated me like an actual human and not just another producer of profit. They listened to my ideas and thoughts and were always gratuitous with me.
Though I had a slight grasp of the kitchen workplace and workforce before I came to the Institute, but I sense being here and extern my knowledge and experience I say has greatly changed. One problem with Oakley’s is that the magic apron method is crude and doesn’t allow for standards to be set or hard work to be accomplished. Everything I have learned up until now has been all interpreted and is expressed most in my work and has been extremely fun learning.